27
Jul
LOOKING to beat the heat? Visit a record store — the aisles are apparently both chilly and empty these days, at least if you use the Nielsen SoundScan album sales chart as a thermometer.
Only one CD sold more than 100,000 copies in the U.S. last week — “Now That’s What I Call Music!, Vol. 22,” which sold 207,000 copies. Even that had a tinge of disappointment to it; it marked a 48% tumble from the previous week, when “Now” debuted at No. 1 on the chart. Billboard.com reported Wednesday that the malaise was one for the record books. The site said that overall music sales last week hit the lowest total since 1994, and that last low-point came in January of that year, a month when retail is expected to bottom-out after the holiday splurges.
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