S. Samuel
Rap duo Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Machine Gun Kelly's newest albums are both reportedly en route to opening weeks on the music sales chart.
Macklemore and Lewis’ The Heist could potentially push up to 80,000 copies.
The week’s top debut is indie sleeper Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, a hip-hop duo from Seattle who had the #1 album on iTunes earlier this week with The Heist, which could do anywhere from 70-80k, according to our crack(ed?) retail pundits based on one-day sales. Ben Haggerty, who goes by the nom de rap Macklemore, has been popular in his hometown Seattle for the better part of a decade, releasing a series of acclaimed mixtapes after working at a juvenile detention facility as part of a “Gateways” program centered around rap. He teamed up with DJ/producer Lewis a couple of years ago on an EP, which attracted attention for the song, “Otherside,” which described his addition to OxyContin and sampled from the Chili Peppers song of the same name.. (HITS Daily Double)
Bad Boy Records rapper Machine Gun Kelly’s Lace Up could sell over 50,000 records.
Bad Boy/Interscope Texas-born, Cleveland-based rapper Machine Gun Kelly’s major label debut, Lace Up, is on target for between 50-55k in first-week sales. Known as MGK and born Colson Baker, the rap prodigy gets his name from the rapid-fire delivery he developed as a teenager. He’s been signed to P. Diddy‘s label since 2011 and also has a marketing partnership for HTC’s Rezound Beats by Dre phone, with his “Invincible” track playing during the TV spot for the product. (HITS Daily Double)
Recently, MGK revealed Bad Boy boss Diddy’s initial reaction to the LP.
“Honestly, man, Puff had got back from Ibiza three days prior to hearing the album,” Kells said when he appeared on “RapFix Live” this past Wednesday. “People where I’m from don’t even know what an Ibiza is; they probably think it’s like a fur coat.” With Diddy coming from the Spanish party island, he was probably in a celebratory state of mind, Kells said, and Lace Up isn’t that cheery. “I think when he heard it, his initial reaction was like, ‘Damn, why are you so angry?’ ” Machine Gun Kelly speculated. It took Diddy some time, but after absorbing the LP, which hits stores Tuesday, he began to see where the angst-filled rapper was coming from. “I ended having dinner with him the other day, and he looked at me like, ‘Yo, man, I really love the album,’ ” Kells said. (MTV)
Both Kells and Macklemore landed on XXL Magazine’s “2012 Freshmen Class” list last winter.
It’s that time of year again — XXL has officially revealed its list of the top hip hop “freshmen” of 2012, honoring fresh new talent poised to make a mark on the industry. The list has grown in popularity and garnered heated anticipation each year since its introduction in 2007. This year #XXLFreshmen2012 shot to the top of Twitter’s worldwide trending topics within minutes of the announcement. The XXL Freshmen Class of 2012 is: Future, Kid Ink, Danny Brown, French Montana, Roscoe Dash, Macklemore, Don Trip, Machine Gun Kelly, Hopsin and Iggy Azalea. (BET)
