Debuting at #1 ... great. Remaining at #1 over both a Rod Stewart and an Eagles debut ... even better.
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Since the Rod Stewart CD features a much-hyped duet with Cher and is a sequel to his platinum album from last year, and since the Eagles' previous greatest-hits album is one of the all-time best sellers, with total unit sales on LP (!), 8-track (!!), cassette and CD of 28 million units, Clay's continued reign at #1 comes as somewhat of a surprise. Two-week sales of Clay's album now stand at 838,000 units, making its platinum certification (for sales of 1,000,000 units) in November a certainty.
However, it looks like Measure of a Man will fail to gain the top spot on the Nielsen SoundScan Canadian Album Sales chart, according to Jam! Showbiz. Celine Dion's French-language CD 1 filles & 4 types held onto first place for the second straight week with sales of 19,300 units; Rod Stewart debuted with sales of 18,200; and Clay fell to sales of 14,600 -- which was a smaller percentage decline than in the U.S., but large enough to make Clay's chances of reaching #1 north of the 49th parallel very doubtful.
Next week's big new releases are another greatest hits package, REM's In Time: The Best Of R.E.M. 1988-2003, and the Strokes' Room on Fire. Whether Clay can turn in a third week at #1 is questionable, considering the competition. Then again, two weeks at #1 in the U.S. during the holiday release season was unexpected by anyone except for Clay himself and the "Clay-mates." It looks like Clay may have been correct when he described his support as "a revolution."
