Soundscan Surprises, Week of 1/12

Back-catalog sales numbers of note from Nielsen SoundScan.

The definition of “back catalog” is: “at least 18 months old, have fallen below №100 on the Billboard 200 and do not have an active single on our radio.”

Jackie Evancho, whose name you only know because the only fact about her is that she’s performing at Trump’s Inauguration, has made it onto the Top 200 of the back catalog, selling exactly one thousand copies last week. Here are some more facts: one thousand is exactly half of the number of the year in which she was born, she is sixteen years old, and is from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Anyway, I hope she writes Donald Trump a nice thank you note for the record sales.

U2 is going on The Joshua Tree Tour 2017 this year to celebrate the fact that it’s been roughly two Jackie Evanchos since that album was released, which explains its presence in the number one slot with a measly four thousand and some copies. January is rough you guys! Somehow Pentatonix is still selling Christmas records, which makes me really think they might have made a deal with Russian hackers or something. George Michael is still dead, and Tupac got a boost of his Greatest Hits after the announcement of a release date for the biopic, All Eyez On Me. The movie will be in theaters on June 16, what would have been the late Shakur’s forty-sixth birthday. Finally, last week, Aaliyah’s Ultimate finally hit iTunes—the singer was twenty-two years old when she died in a plane crash one Jackie Evancho ago.

1. U2 JOSHUA TREE 4,196 copies

4. TUPAC GREATEST HITS 3,978 copies

21. WHAM! MAKE IT BIG 2,397 copies

59. PENTATONIX THAT’S CHRISTMAS TO ME 1,475 copies

75. DR. DRE CHRONIC 1,327 copies

127. MICHAEL*GEORGE OLDER 1,014 copies

132. EVANCHO*JACKIE AWAKENING 1,000 copies

139. AALIYAH ULTIMATE 978 copies

(Previously.)