Fall Out Boy and a slew of other new albums broke the dam and brought forth a flood of debuts back onto the Billboard 200 after the holiday sales lull. That band's American Beauty/American Psycho premiered at no. 1 with 218,000 equivalent albums sold, and its 192,000 actual album sales teamed with Meghan Trainor's debut last week for the first pair of albums released during January to top 150,000 apiece since 2010. American Beauty marked a significant uptick in sales from the band's 2013 album Save Rock and Roll.
The rest of the new albums in the Top 10 will have to wait a minute however as several longstanding chart-toppers follow in Fall Out Boy's wake. Taylor Swift spent consecutive weeks at no. 2 with 1989 for the first time (she hasn't fallen past no. 2) as that album moved 119,000 equivalent albums. Trainor and Title, last week's no. 1, dropped to 86,000 in equivalent sales during its second week and took no. 3 accordingly. Ed Sheeran used singles downloads and streams to his advantage, remaining at no. 4 with x, which moved 76,000 equivalent albums (barely half actually album sales).
Joey Bada$$ got a majority of his 58,000 equivalent albums from actual albums however as B4.Da.$ took no. 5 and got the new albums rolling in the Top 10 again. Fellow emcee Nicki Minaj stayed at no. 6 during her sixth week on the charts with The Pinkprint with 54,000 equivalent sales.
Two new albums moved almost exactly the same amount of equivalent albums to their respective audiences while taking spots nos. 7 and 8, respectively. The Decemberists moved 51,000 copies of What A Terrible World, What A Beautiful World while Marilyn Manson did almost exactly the same with The Pale Emperor.
Back to standards at no. 9 where Sam Smith managed to hold on for another week with In The Lonely Hour, which moved around 50,000 equivalent albums. Mark Ronson and Uptown Special got at least one more week in the Top 10 as the album moved 49,000 equivalent albums, fueled by downloads and singles. Actual albums sales make up less than 20 percent of his totals.
