Cyrus Langhorne
The highly-anticipated "Empire" soundtrack left its competition in the dust this week after debuting atop the sales chart with over 100,000 albums sold.
After a strong seven days of availability, the project earned the number one spot.
Leading into the two-hour Season Finale of FOX’s #1 hit show EMPIRE, airing tomorrow, Wednesday, March 18 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT), the Original Soundtrack from Season 1 of Empire enters the Billboard 200 chart at #1, moving a total of 130,000 equivalent album units. This feat makes it the first television soundtrack to debut on top of the chart in five years; the last to do so was in 2010, when three different Glee albums debuted at #1. EMPIRE also reached a milestone with over 1 million digital single sales to date. (Press Release)
Listen to the new soundtrack on the next page…
Initial reports suggested the “Empire” album could turn into a chart-topper despite competition from music icon Madonna‘s new Rebel Heart release.
Empire (Turn First/Columbia) 115-125k (90-100k sales)
Madonna (Live Nation/Interscope) 115-125k (100-110k sales)
Luke Bryan (Capitol Nashville) 95-105k (85-95k sales) (HITS Daily Double)
Recently, actress Mo’Nique revealed “Empire” producer Lee Daniels envisioned her playing fellow actress Taraji P. Henson‘s “Cookie” character.
“When he called me up, he offered me the role in Empire as Cookie,” she said. Mo’Nique said Daniels even sent her a script. Mo’Nique explained, “Maybe four days had gone by, and I hadn’t heard anything. So I’m trying to reach out to him to say, what time do I need to be in? Where do I need to be? When he finally returned the call, he says listen, the executives at Fox said that you’re difficult.” (Inside Edition)
