Tupac's "Game" in Play for Xmas
Tupac Shakur may have been murdered eight years ago, but each holiday season, the rapper seems to reappear like Santa Claus.
For eight of the last nine holiday seasons, the late rapper cracked the charts with a new album, and this year continues the streak. For the week ended Sunday, the prolific emcee scored his third posthumous number one as Loyal to the Game moved 330,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan numbers released Wednesday.
His previous holiday-timed releases included 1996's Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory, 1997's R U Still Down? (Remember Me), 1998's Greatest Hits, 1999's Still I Rise with the Outlawz, 2000's The Rose That Grew From Concrete, 2002's Better Dayz and 2003's Tupac: Resurrection. Though he didn't have a new album out for the 2001 holiday season, Until the End of Time came out in March of that year and topped the charts.
After Tupac was gunned down in Las Vegas in September 1996, his mother, Afeni Shakur, started Amaru Records to release his catalog of unreleased songs. For the new album, Afeni shares executive-producer credit with Eminem, who appears on the disc along with 50 Cent, Jadakiss, Ron Isley, among others.
Loyal to the Game marks Tupac's fifth number one album overall--Me Against the World and All Eyez on Me nabbed number ones before his murder. The former disc topped the charts while the rapper was serving a prison term, making Tupac the first artist to score a number one debut while in the slammer.
Now That's What I Call Music! 17 came in at number two with 323,000 copies, about 8,000 more than Eminem's Encore, which followed at three. Shania Twain's Greatest Hits and U2's How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb rounded out the Top 5.
Aside from Tupac's big bow, the only Top 10 newcomer was Ashanti, whose Concrete Rose sold 254,000 copies at number seven. The Long Island-born R&B babe made history in 2002 when her self-titled debut sold more than a half-million first-week copies, the biggest debut ever for a rookie female artist. Equally impressive, her first three singles all hit the Top 10, another rookie first, and she became the first female to simultaneously hold the top two spots on Billboard's Hot 100.
Known for her hit collaborations, Ashanti reteamed with longtime pal Ja Rule along with TI for her lead Concrete Rose single, "Only U."
The rest of the Top 10 were Destiny's Child's Destiny Fulfilled at six, Toby Keith's Greatest Hits 2 at eight, Usher's Confessions at nine and Jay-Z and Linkin Park's Collision Course at 10.
Last week's number one, Ludacris' Red Light District, fell 11 spots to number 12 in its second week on the sales chart.
Xzibit notched the week's only other notable debut. The rapper's Weapons of Mass Destruction, featuring the Timbaland-produced radio hit "Hey Now (Mean Muggin')," sold 81,000 discs to open at 43.
Finally, Yellowcard celebrated its one-year anniversary on the charts with Ocean Avenue. To mark its milestone, the punker's disc jumped seven spots to 74 and sold 45,000 copies on a 50 percent sales spike.
Here's a recap of the Top 10 albums for the week ended Sunday:
1. Loyal to the Game, 2Pac
2. Now That's What I Call Music! 17, various
3. Encore, Eminem
4. Greatest Hits, Shania Twain
5. How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, U2
6. Destiny Fulfilled, Destiny's Child
7. Concrete Rose, Ashanti
8. Greatest Hits 2, Toby Keith
9. Confessions, Usher
10. Collision Course, Jay-Z and Linkin Park
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