Plies Climbs Back Into The Top 40 On the Billboard Charts

On this week’s Billboard Charts rundown Kanye West, T.I., Akon and Lil Wayne slide down the scale while Florida rapper Plies works his way back into the Top 40.

While coming off two big Grammy performances on Sunday night, Mr. West failed to hold onto his Top 5 spot this week. Slipping to the no. 9 position Ye managed to sell 33,408 copies of 808s and Heartbreak this sales cycle. After 11 weeks the rap superstar has sold 1,291,220 albums according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Ten spots down is Atlanta rap giant T.I. who moved 22,920 Paper Trail discs this week. The Grand Hustle leader - whose MTV reality Show, “Road To Redemption”premiered last night - scanned an overall 1,661,190 CDs after 19 weeks on the charts.

Directly below Tip at no. 20 is hip-hop hook man extraordinaire Akon, whose third solo LP Freedom pushed 22,790 CDs off the shelves this week. Kon is still on his way to gold status as his overall tally stands at 466,529. Landing at no. 22 is New Orleans rap heavyweight Lil Wayne. Weezy’s latest opus, Tha Carter III, added an additional 20,160 discs to his impressive sales tally, which now sits at 2,985,150.

Moving up eight spots this week to no. 34 is Southern rap star Plies. The “Bust It Baby” MC sold 13,860 more copies of his third solo set Da Realist. After 8 weeks Plies moved 255,300 CDs off the shelves.

Next week look for sales figures to experience a much needed bump due to the Grammys. – Elan Mancini