Chart Watch

  • Doris Day, 1989 [Photo: Barry King/WireImage]Doris Day turns 90 today. The iconic star, who rose to the top in recordings, movies and television, is one of a dwindling number of pop music hit-makers from the 1940s and early 1950s who are still living. The major stars of that era who are still with us are now in their 80s and 90s. A few, notably the eternally cool Tony Bennett, 85, are still going strong. But most have been in retirement for years.

    Some have lived to see their work influence current artists. Pete Seeger, 92, was saluted on Bruce Springsteen's 2006 album We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions. Patty Andrews, 94, watched Bette Midler score a top 10 hit in 1973 with the Andrews Sisters' "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy." She also saw Christina Aguilera echo the sound and spirit of that 1941 classic on her 2007 hit "Candyman."

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  • Doris Day [Photo: Martin Mills/Getty Images]Nowadays, we take for granted that top female singers will have opportunities in film and television, but this wasn't always the case. Such "triple-threat" performers as Beyonce, J.Lo and Jennifer Hudson owe a debt to such pioneers as Doris Day and Barbra Streisand. Both of these legendary stars are having milestone birthdays this month. Day turns 90 on April 3. Streisand turns 70 on April 24.

    Day and Streisand have a fair amount in common. Both started out in supporting roles, but were too talented to stay in supporting roles for long. Day was the "girl singer" with Les Brown and his Orchestra in the mid-1940s before going out on her own in 1948. Streisand had a featured role in the 1962 Broadway hit I Can Get It For You Wholesale, before releasing her first solo album in 1963 and returning to Broadway in a star-making lead role in 1964.

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  • "We Are Young" by fun. featuring Janelle Monae this week surpasses Kelly Clarkson's "Stronger (What Doesn't Kill You)" as the best-selling song so far in 2012. "We Are Young" has sold 2,389,000 copies so far this year, compared to 2,246,000 for "Stronger." "We Are Young" also surpasses "Stronger" as the year's longest-running #1 hit on the Hot 100. This is the fourth week on top for "We Are Young," compared to three weeks for "Stronger."

    This is also the fourth week in a row that "We Are Young" has sold 300K or more digital copies. Only four other songs in digital history have topped 300K in weekly sales four or more times. "Love The Way You Lie" by Eminem featuring Rihanna leads the pack, having topped 300K five times. Flo Rida's "Right Round," "California Gurls" by Katy Perry featuring Snoop Dogg and "E.T." by Katy Perry featuring Kanye West each topped that lofty plateau four times.

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  • The Hunger Games soundtrack enters The Billboard 200 at #1. It's the first multi-artist soundtrack to top the chart since October 2009, when The Twilight Saga: New Moon achieved the feat. The Hunger Games has a lot in common with the Twilight franchise. Both are based on a series of popular young adult novels which were written by talented (and now very wealthy) women. Stephenie Meyer created the Twilight novels. Suzanne Collins wrote The Hunger Games novels. (This is the first in a planned four-film series based on those novels.)

    The soundtracks from the first two Twilight movies both debuted at #1. The soundtracks from the next two installments both opened in the top five. Twilight is one of only two movie franchises in movie history to spawn four or more top 10 soundtracks. The other is Star Wars, which leads with five. It will be interesting to see if The Hunger Games franchise one day joins this little club.

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  • Survivor's 1982 smash "Eye Of The Tiger" tops the 3 million mark in digital sales this week. Of the thousands of songs that were released in the 1980s, only one has sold more digital copies: Journey's 1981 hit "Don't Stop Believin,'" which has sold 5,068,000 copies. Michael Jackson's 1984 hit "Thriller" is in third place. It has sold 2,997,000 copies.

    All three of these songs were top 10 hits back in the '80s, but only "Eye Of The Tiger" reached #1. The propulsive pop/rock smash topped the Hot 100 for six weeks in the summer of 1982. In August of that year, it was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Assn. of America, signifying sales of 2 million vinyl copies. Thus, the song has been a multi-million seller in both physical and digital configurations.

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  • With its album Up All Night, One Direction this week becomes the first British teen group to hit #1 on The Billboard 200. Four of the five members of the boy band (which includes one Irishman) are still in their teens. Six previous groups which included at least one teen member have landed #1 albums: Kris Kross, New Kids On The Block, Backstreet Boys, *NSYNC, Destiny's Child and Jonas Brothers. All were American.

    One Direction has a great "back-story." The five members tried out individually for The X Factor in the U.K., but failed to qualify in the "boys" category. After a suggestion by guest judge Nicole Scherzinger, they formed a group, thus qualifying in the "group" category. The group made its first live appearance in the U.S. on March 12 on NBC's Today show.

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  • Adele's 21 tops the 8 million mark in U.S. sales this week. After just a little more than a year (55 weeks, to be precise), it's already the fourth best-selling album of the last 10 years, according to Nielsen SoundScan. Only Norah Jones' Come Away With Me, Eminem's The Eminem Show and Usher's Confessions have sold more copies in the last 10 years.

    Adele and Jones both appeal to an "upper-demo," adult contemporary audience, though Adele has also broken through to a young, singles-buying demographic with three #1 hits on the Hot 100. (By contrast, Jones' highest-charting single to date, "Don't Know Why," peaked at #30).

    A total of 25 albums have sold 5 million or more copies in the last 10 years. Four artists have reached that plateau with two albums in this period: Eminem, 50 Cent, Taylor Swift and Josh Groban. (Groban, somewhat surprisingly, is the only artist with two albums among the 20 best-sellers of the last 10 years. His 2003 studio album Closer is the 16th best-selling album of the last 10 years. His 2007 holiday album Noel is the 19th best-seller for this period.)

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  • Billboard revamped its formula for the Hot 100 this week, but the same song is #1 this week as last week: "We Are Young" by fun. featuring Janelle Monae. The fact that this smash came out on top using two different formulas is testament to how this is truly the song of the moment.

    On-demand streaming data is now factored into the Hot 100, joining sales information, as tracked by Nielsen SoundScan, and radio airplay and other streaming services, as tracked by Nielsen BDS. Billboard's Gary Trust notes that the new formula "slightly lessens the influence of sales," though that continues to be the most important component in the mix. Radio is the next most important component, followed by streaming.

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  • Bruce Springsteen lands his 10th #1 album with Wrecking Ball, which allows him to both tie and surpass Elvis Presley. These two legends now share the record for most #1 albums by a male rock solo artist. So, in what way does Springsteen surpass Presley? Springsteen has lived to see all 10 of his #1 albums. Only Presley's first nine #1 albums (from 1956's Elvis Presley through 1973's Aloha From Hawaii Via Satellite) occurred in his lifetime. The 10th, Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits, came 25 years after his death.

    Two artists have had even more #1 albums than The Boss and The King. The Beatles lead the pack with 19 #1 albums. Jay-Z is in second place with 12.

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  • Remember when Lady Gaga took some flak last May because digital copies of her then-new album, Born This Way, were sold for just 99 cents for two days at Amazon's MP3 store? The album sold more copies in one week than any album had in more than six years, but because some of them were sold for about the price of a candy bar or a newspaper, it diminished the achievement.

    That almost seems like a steep price in light of bargain-basement pricing of 25 cents offered in the past week by Google Play (and matched by AmazonMP3) on digital copies of such hit albums as Now 41, Lady Antebellum's Own The Night, Coldplay's Mylo Xyloto, Lil Wayne's Tha Carter IV and Drake's Take Care.

    You may remember that Billboard altered its chart policy last fall in the wake of the Gaga incident. So you may be thinking that these 25 cent sales won't count toward this week's Billboard 200 chart (which will be released on Wednesday). Actually, unless Billboard rewrites its policy again in midst of this tracking week (which it almost never does), these sales will count.

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