With 2015 fast approaching, the second-to-last weekly sales report of the year from Billboard includes a number of big Hip Hop sellers. Nicki Minaj’s third album debuted as the #2 album in the country behind only Taylor Swift’s still huge 1989. Lower down the list, J. Cole has fallen to #4 after putting up the best first-week sales numbers of any Hip Hop artist in 2014.
Finally, D’Angelo’s long awaited return to music earned him a spot at #5 following a surprise, midnight release last week. Lower down the list, Kevin Gates’ latest offering reached #38 while Eminem’s Shady XV continued to fall, bottoming out at #54 as of this past Sunday.
Nicki Minaj Debuts At #2
After weeks of speculation about the album’s commercial viability, Nicki Minaj’s Pinkprint sold a total of 198,142 in its first week on shelves and online. Minaj’s third studio album was helped to the runner-up position thanks to a huge week of streaming numbers, topping out at 16,847,401 plays across platforms.
Minaj’s latest record was given a four out of five in HipHopDX’s review with writer Marcus Dowling writing that “The Pinkprint runs a middle path between pop over exertion and real lyricism, creating an everything for someone aesthetic that Nicki doesn’t allow to shift into wastefulness. As such, it is an ambitious undertaking Nicki has wrangled in highly entertaining fashion.”
J. Cole Falls To #4
After 2014 Forest Hills Drive marked his second #1 debut last week, J. Cole’s latest album fell to #4 with 118,781 albums sold. The latest numbers represent a 64% drop in the album’s total activity after Cole debuted with 353,538 albums sold last week. Meanwhile, Cole’s streaming numbers actually increased by nearly fifty percent with a total of 15,642,589 plays around the world.
D’Angelo Returs At #5
Breaking nearly 15 years of musical silence, D’Angelo surprised fans everywhere with a surprise album release last Sunday (December 15). The album, which has been widely well received by critics, shot to #5 on Billboard’s Top 200 thanks to a total activity count of 117,106. Black Messiah sold a total of 111,040 albums as of this past Sunday (December 21) and was streamed more than five million times in a single week period.
D’Angelo’s Black Messiah received a 4.5/5 rating on HipHopDX with the writer describing the release as a welcome return. “After so many years, [an] unwillingness to settle into the same groove is part and parcel to the D’Angelo we’ve all been waiting for. There’s a comfort in not having to worry about more new music for now. There will be years spent with Black Messiah; it deserves the time to grow. And rise.”
Top 10 Billboard Top 200 Rap & R&B Albums For The Week Ending 12/21/2014
Note: The figures below represent this week’s “total activity,” an intersection of album sales, single sales, and streams. A pure album sales figure is available in parenthesis and information about each album’s streaming count is available in brackets.
#2. Nicki Minaj – Pinkprint – 244,477 (198,142) [16,847,401]
#4. J. Cole – 2014 Forest Hills Drive – 135,471 (118,781) [15,642,589]
#5. D’Angelo & The Vanguard – Black Messiah – 117,106 (111,040) [5,301,306]
#38. Kevin Gates – Luca Brasi 2: Gangsta Grillz – 26,224 (22,892) [1,267,583]
#46. Mary J. Blige – The London Sessions – 22,919 (22,000) [431,621]
#49. Beyonce – Beyonce – 22,353 (14,915) [4,452,754]
#54. Eminem – ShadyXV – 19,635 (17,134) [1,599,018]
#67. Pitbull – Globalization – 16,850 (10,915) [1,973,319]
#77. Chris Brown – X – 15,287 (8,746) [4,369,397]
#92. Iggy Azalea – Reclassified – 12,269 (5,727) [1,785,443]
this is fucking gay. why cant we see what j cole or or eminem sold total without streams factored in?
So, how many units Cole sold? He is gold now, right? Or he is really close.
371,228(last week) + 135,471(this week) = 506,699(total so far). Yeah, J.Cole is certified Gold.
It goes to show that Brooklyn doesn’t have any worthy young MC’s because Jay had to get a down south brother to get the Roc hot again. NYC rap takes another L lol..
Joey Badass is doing his thing, representing BK.
You know Nicki ain’t shit when she shows her ass and titties, fake breakups with her BF and still sells less than Taylor Swift’s 2 month old album.
Your an Idiot Obviously Taylor Swift is going to sell more you moron she has a wider audience and is White where mainly white ppl buy albums. To think Nicki had a chance to outsell Taylor is moronic which you clearly are.
Excuses excuses. Taylors album album been out for 2 fucking months, if Nicki can’t outsell a 2 month old album first week shes in trouble.
Well then Iggy really must not be ish cuz her last album didn’t even sell 15,000 copies in the first week. I think J Cole has gone gold and that is something Iggy couldnt do in 7 months.
i confused. billboard has her at 244k
HEY HIPHOP DX xan ypou guys still put up ther week to week total figures this stream stuff is BS. I don’t know why your going out of your way on this site making things shittier. Please fix this the new ay sucks and doesn’t make sense whe should have to add up weeks numbers to know J.cole has gone gold thats something “AS A HIPO HOP SITE” that you point out. Your site is starting to become a disappointment. I used to be the one to defend you guys in here when you fetched hate but now your making that hard to do. STEP UP MAN!!
no, a hiphop site doesn’t have to post weekly numbers and add up sales for your liking. All they have to do is play music and open up a true forum for discussion. If the fans weren’t more like you, we wouldn’t be looking at album streams in the 1st place. BLAME YOURSELF for the way things are.
Add up the album sales ourselves?
Ain’t nobody got time fo’ dat!
Yeah but that’s the reason people click on the post. They wanna know the “to date” numbers too. Hip Hop fans wanna what the biggest selling hip hop albums are.
Damn Rozay only last 3 weeks, LMFAO. SUBURBAN FLOPIONAIRE!
The way they do this now is retarded. Put the weekly sales for the album, the TOTAL OVERALL album sales, and then if you want to put the total activity/streams in brackets. Having both the “total activity” and “total streams” [or whatever the hell it is…even I’m confused lol] is unnecessary.
If the site is for the readers, please change this. I can guarantee you that NOONE reading this site likes it this way. I’ve already seen many comments regarding this. Thank you lol…
inflated numbers that no one is even really getting paid from they are mostly free streams then 10 single sales equates to one album sale & the numbers are still low attempting to make things look better than what they actually is not a reality
Sir (or madam), the basis of the industry is a company’s investment in an artists’ PUBLISHED music by distributing it to the masses and they split the income by a percentage agreement. While you novices are upset about weekly sales of a product you know you don’t go out to purchase, there are other ways to make music public. Like jukeboxes, events, internet, CABLE, placements on TV shows, commercials, than just a CD or vinyl format. Which most of you don’t even have. Even the micro SD format is too late to do. The only reason you guys are complaining is because the info isn’t laid out for you to gossip about, but the FACT is you are the very reason why it is this way!
WHATS UP WITH THE TOTAL ALBUM SALES!?
Congrats to Nicki & J Cole. Make em mad.
OH Yeah. I just noticed the total sales number column was gone too. They need to keep that up there. Did J COle go gold tho? I think so but I’m not sure.
If he went gold that is seriously amazing. No one is selling except Taylor S. records and he goes gold in 3 weeks? WOW.
2015 is gonna be a good year for rap.
The article says he sold about 472,000 in this first 2 weeks. So he’s definitely Gold at this point and will be “Gold” sales-wise next week.
Wow, so only one hip hop artist (J Cole) went Gold this year? Damn, I sure hope 2015 is much better.
correct yourself @jj, you don’t speak for all fans. plenty of other sites do NOT post weekly numbers. hhdx has rendered many of the Wednesday armchair record industry label executives useless & irrelevant with the ACTUAL industry numbers! the gossip cannot continue unless you conform and CONTRADICT yourself and speak on the numbers that do NOT reflect a TRUE FAN’S position of BUYING their music!
Nerds still trying to find a way to argue over sales like its 2001 again, LOL.
J Cole went gold ? I listened to the album it’s decent but nothing great , i’ll give him credit for making something decent it’s better than most of the garbage that’s been put out over the past few years by wack ass pop rappers like Nicki Minaj , lil wayne , wacka flocka , etc Almost 80 percent of the hip hop and rap albums being shoved down are throats and ears have been complete garbage over the past few years . And the ones that get rated and overhyped as great albums have been overrated as hell . GKMC and Macklemores albums were both overrated . MACKLEMORE won a damn grammy for that garbage ass wack ass album . SMH COME ON HIP HOP FANS AND LISTENERS OPEN UP YOUR EARS AND KNOW THE GOOD SHIT FROM THE BULLSHIT .
the only people who call GKMC overrated is people who haven’t heard it
if you did recite and wack lyric from it and ill give you the strongest one
Ricky was at 100K last week and sold bout 5K this week so Hood Billionaire total would be 105K while ShadyXV at 206K with lil if any promo just one single and a freestyle lol
Not to mention it was a compilation album aswell!They just keep losin!
whos they? Hood Billionaire is priced at $7.99 on iTunes while ShadyXV still sellin at $15.99 he def lost in a big way lol
YES!! YESSSSS!! YES YES YES!!! YESSS!! THIS BITCHES STREAK IS FUFCKING BROKEN!!! YESSSSSSS!!!!! IT’S OVER!!!! SHE USED HER LAST ASS CARD AND NOW THE PUBLIC IS SICK OF HER AND SHE HAS NO TALENT TO CONTINUE HER CAREER!!! THE GIMMICKS ARE OVER!! THIS BITCHES BAG OF TRICKS IS EMPTY!!! AHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA
WE LOVE YOU TAYLOR SWIFT!!! FOR KEEPING NICKI MINAJS TALENTLESS SINGLE OFF #1 AND FOR KEEPING HER ALBUM OFF #1 AGAIn! YOU ARE TRULY DOING GODS WORK!!! THANK YOU FOR PREVENTING HER TRICK OF USING HER BODY TO SELL SONGS FROM WORKING!!! SHE’LL NEVER HAVE THOSE #1S. THANK YOU!!!! THANK YOU TAYLOR!!!!! I AM FOREVER GRATEFUL!!! GOD IS GOOD!!!!!!!
i have never heard a single taylor swift song but im already her biggest fan. going to go listen to her album now. if nicki minaj is what yall are giving us then fuck rap.
j cole is corny too
^ Nicki stan feeling some type of way.
I found out that Nicki broke her own record. The only female rapper to have three albums debut with more than 200,000 copies sold in first week. I;m glad she is still the top selling female MC. Iggy could never…
Wrong.
missy shits on nickis career sales wise
HELL!EVEN I WILL CALL THAT A FLOP!THANK JESUS ITS NOT JUST ME!SALUTE!
What’s the total sales? The new way you’ll doing it sucks man