Crystal Bowersox’s “Farmer’s Daughter” managed to ride the holiday sales wave and outpace early forecasts, scoring 58,000 sales in its debut week.
Though underwhelming compared to many past “American Idol” runner-ups, and only good enough for a debut at number 28 on the very competitive, holiday-influenced Billboard 200, the figure easily outpaced “Idol” winner Lee DeWyze’s 39,000 opener for his fall release “Live it Up.”
With holiday shoppers driving sales, the universally-appealing Taylor Swift returned to the top of the album sales chart. Her “Speak Now” added another 259,000 sales to its total, which now sits at a healthy 2.6 million. Despite releasing within the final quarter of 2010, “Speak Now” only trails Eminem’s “Recovery” (3.2 million) and Lady Antebellum’s “Need You Now” (3 million) on the year-to-date chart.
Susan Boyle’s holdover hit “The Gift” was close behind with 254,000 copies, outpacing new Michael Jackson release “Michael,” which opens to 228,000.
High-profile debuts included R. Kelly’s “Love Letter” (154,000, #6), Diddy Dirty Money’s “Last Train to Paris” (101,000, #7), Tank’s “Now or Never” (44,000, #35), Ciara’s “Basic Instinct” (37,000, #4) and Kandi’s “Kandi Koated” (18,000, #91).