5 Tips For Wayne To Go Triple Platinum

Shit, I gotta say I'm surprised. Peeped SoundScan this morning to see what Curtis and company did for their first week numbers and find Mr. Carter resting comfortably back on top of the charts with another 156,370 units, bringing the kid born Dwayne to almost 1.7 million sold in four weeks. I gotta give credit when it's due. Congrats, Wayne, all your campaigning worked (Hopefully, the same can ring true for Barack, but I digress...)

Now, let's be real, I wasn't expecting G-Unit to top the charts this week (they came in at #4 with 101,802, respectable but a poor outing by 50’s standards) so that wasn't that much of a surprise to me. It's a solid album, yeah, but it's more of a credibility project than a commercially viable project packed with radio singles. Even still, 50 is probably blowing a gasket over the 101K and thinking of some way to spin that number into some sort of victory ("Even when I lose I win," according to his body spray commercial, right?).

The big shocker for me, though, was Wayne moving back into the #1 spot over Cold Play, who had knocked him off his perch the past two weeks. For Weezy to pass a commercial White rock band like Cold Play in his fourth week and their third is a bit of an accomplishment. This means that White kids are feeling Wayne more and more each day (even if it was just by a 7,000 margin). Although I'm NOT rushing to crown him Greatest Rapper Alive, he's definitely the most popular by far. Wayne just went into a whole other echelon of money making potential with White America now taking note of him. I see endorsement deals, movies, more products of his own like that silly Wayne Champagne that’s coming (I’ll pass) in his future. I just hope he doesn't fuck shit up with more arrests and that Styrofoam cup "problem."

At this rate, though, Wayne will be double platinum in 2 or 3 weeks tops—a much faster rate than Kanye who crawled to the double up mark after having a similarly huge first week number last year. So if Wayne plays his cards right, he could potentially reach triple plat (I'd bet 2.4 or 2.5 when it's all said and done, though). But I have a few suggestions for Mr. Carter to help keep his gravy train going.

1) Drop "Mrs. Officer" as a single. That shit is catchy as fuck, and you need to get some prime time Hollywood chick like Meagan Good or an R&B chick like Ciara to play the lead in the video. But don’t reveal her face until the end of the clip.

2) Drop "Comfortable" as a single. No way a rapper can sit on a record with Babyface and just keep it as an album cut. That record will get you on even more pop and contemporary radio stations and get people my mom's age to take note of you and buy your shit.

3) Tour non-stop. Artists have to get back to working their projects, so hit the road hard and hit every city you can with a solid supporting cast of opening acts and then take the show international. More moola, baby.

4) Fuck a chop & screwed version of your album, drop the first AutoTuned version of your album in time for Christmas (Just to be even more different, do "Lollipop" with your regular voice). Be a leader not a follower; you gotta set the trends.

5) Continue the campaign for Tha Carter IV now. Your best marketing tool is your own fuckin mouth (pause!). You talk about shit enough people start believing it and anticipating it. Tha Carter III is a case in point. --ArmyAns (The Other Music Guy)

PS

If Wayne does any of the above, remember you heard (well, read) it here first.