Prince's new album, "LotusFlow3r" (NPG), issued exclusively in the U.S. through Target stores on Sunday, March 29, leads Nielsen SoundScan's Building Chart, which was released today, April 1.

Yet, the album may not finish the week at No. 1.

Why? The Building Chart reflected unweighted sales through the close of business on Tuesday, March 31. Which means that new releases -- which almost always bow on Tuesday -- usually only have one day's worth of sales included on the Building Chart that is released on Wednesday of each week. However, Prince's album dropped on Sunday, so the Building Chart actually reflects the set's first three days worth of sales.

We'll have a better gauge on how next week's official Billboard 200 chart will shake out on Friday, April 3, when SoundScan releases its next Building Chart. As it stands now, Prince's album is ahead of the No. 2 set, Keith Urban's new "Defying Gravity" (Capitol Nashville), by a very wide margin.

Billboard estimates the seven merchants who report to Nielsen SoundScan's Building chart -- Trans World Entertainment, Best Buy, iTunes, Starbucks, Borders, Target and Anderson Merchandisers -- comprise about 60% of all U.S. album sales.

http://www.billboard.com/...8005.story

:fat albert and the cosby kids yelling and cheering in the junkyard emoticon:

PurpleLove7 said:

Already mentioned. http://prince.org/msg/7/303393

Smittyrock70 said:

Yeah, I saw that when reading thru another post, saw the link ... Oh well ...

So, how are sales outside the US doing?

Congratulations Prince and NPG Records...Good luck next week.