Country star Miranda Lambert finally earned her first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 album chart with Platinum, making her only the 11th female country star to do so. In cooler news, Led Zeppelin’s reissues of their first three albums all charted in the Top 10.
Platinum sold 180,000 copies during the past week, according to Nielsen SoundScan numbers provided to Billboard. That’s not only Lambert’s best sales week, but also the best sales week for any female country star since Taylor Swift’s Red sold 241,000 copies on the Dec. 30, 2012 chart.
Even more noteworthy is the fact that as Lambert’s career has continued, her fanbase has grown larger, made obvious by her sales. Every album has done better than the previous one, including Platinum. Her last release, Four The Record debuted with 133,000 in 2011.
Frozen took the No. 2 spot with 52,000 copies, while Brantley Gilbert’s Just As I Am added 48,000 copies. Animal Ambition by 50 Cent probably did well thanks to his horrible first pitch, selling 47,000 copies.
Ghost Stories by Coldplay, which was No. 1 last week, slid to No. 5 with 46,000 copies. Now 50 stayed at No. 6 with 41,000 copies.
Led Zeppelin’s first three albums were reissued this week and fans of the band turned out in droves to buy them up, even if they already owned them in other forms. They took the No. 7, 9 and 10 spots with 37,000, 34,000 and 32,000 copies sold respectively.
The No. 8 slot was held by The Fault in Our Stars soundtrack, which sold 36,000 copies.
Iggy Azalea’s “Fancy” took the top spot on the Digital Songs chart with 263,000 downloads. Ariana Grande’s “Problem,” which also happens to feature Azalea, took No. 2 with 215,000 downloads.
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