People Still Buy Music: Eminem's new record sold a ton of copies its first week out
Struggling young up-and-comer Eminem sold a ton of copies of his latest record, The Marshall Mathers LP2, last week. According to Billboard, the rapper sold about 792,000 copies between Nov. 5 and 10, making it this year’s second-biggest first-week seller, behind Justin Timberlake’s The 20/20 Experience. MMLP2 was expected to sell about 750,000 copies, but it blew those numbers away.
Those big numbers also set the record for sixth-biggest sales week in the past five years. The only albums that sold more in their first week were Taylor Swift’s Red (1.2 million, 2012), Lady Gaga’s Born This Way (1.1 million, 2011), Taylor Swift’s Speak Now (1 million, 2010), the aforementioned Timberlake, and Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter IV (964,000, 2011).
This is Eminem’s eighth album and seventh No. 1. Only his debut, 1999’s The Slim Shady LP, failed to top the charts.