Veteran country star Kenny Chesney beat Drake on the latest Rolling Stone Top 200 Albums chart. Chesney’s Here and Now was boosted by an impressive sales total, more than 218,000 copies, most of which came through ticket-album bundles.
But the album didn’t fare nearly as well on streaming: The 12 tracks on Here and Now picked up just 9.9 million streams. In contrast, the 14 tracks on Drake’s Dark Lane Demo Tapes, some of which were previously available on SoundCloud or as leaks, amassed more than 220 million streams. Drake, who did not bundle his album with tickets or merch, also sold more than 20,000 copies of Dark Lane Demo Tapes.
Lil Baby also surged on the chart this week — jumping from 49,000 album equivalent units to 98,400, good for Number Three — thanks to the release of a deluxe edition of My Turn that included six new tracks. Streaming services are primarily focused around delivering new music, so deluxe editions have become increasingly popular as a way of boosting an album’s numbers several weeks after release. Like Lil Baby, the Weeknd recently put out a deluxe version of After Hours featuring three extra songs. Lil Uzi Vert gave Eternal Atake a more lavish deluxe treatment: another whole album’s worth of songs.
While My Turn benefitted from a handful of new tracks, some albums only need one new track to see chart gains. This week, Megan Thee Stallion’s Suga and Doja Cat’s Hot Pink both climbed in the Top Ten due to star-studded remixes — Beyoncé on Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage” and Nicki Minaj on Doja Cat’s “Say So.”
The Rolling Stone 200 Albums chart tracks the most popular releases of the week in the United States. Entries are ranked by album units, a number that combines digital and physical album sales, digital song sales, and audio streams using a custom weighting system. The chart does not include passive listening such as terrestrial radio or digital radio. The Rolling Stone 200 Albums chart is updated daily, and each week Rolling Stone finalizes and publishes an official version of the chart, covering the seven-day period ending with the previous Thursday.
Two other new albums debuted in the Top 40: Beyond Bulletproof, the latest set from the rapper Mozzy (Number 36) and Slime & B, a collaborative project from Young Thug and Chris Brown (Number 39). Good to Know, the latest album from the R&B singer Jojo, arrived at Number 41.
Next week, Nav and Kehlani are expected to debut high on the chart with new albums.