As expected, considering the 460k units sold at 99 cents on Amazon MP3, Lady Gaga’s Born This Way experienced a massive drop-off in week two. Indeed, the 84% decline, from 1.108m to 174k, was the steepest of the SoundScan era—worse than 50 Cent’s Curtis in 2007 (-79%), Jay-Z’s Kingdom Come in 2006 (-79%) or Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy last year (-78%). Can the Gaga album—which is trending toward 65-70k on next week’s chart—settle into a pattern of 40k a week, as Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream managed to do after a slow start (it’s now north of 1.5m)?
If not, Gaga may be called upon to get her third album project underway sooner than expected. But Interscope and manager Troy Carter have to be encouraged that third single “The Edge of Glory” has sold nearly 700k tracks
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