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HITS Daily Double
NIN has proved on past releases to be an unusually active first-day artist, meaning it could conceivably trend downward as the week progresses; on the other hand, there’s a lot of heat on this record.

ONE-DAY SALES:
TRENT NAILS ANOTHER HIT

NIN Headed for a Big Win on Next Week’s Chart, but Look Out for Darth Vader and Fall Out Boy
This week’s chart race was a squeaker; next week’s will be a runaway.

Blazing ahead of the park in preliminary retail reports is Nine Inch Nails, whose Nothing/Interscope album, With Teeth, is taking a man-sized bite out of the early action. At this point, Trent Reznor’s first album since 2000’s Things Falling Apart appears headed for a first-week finish between 260k-280k, bolstered by some high-visibility live dates, strong press and heavy spins on lead-off track “The Hand That Feeds.” NIN has proved on past releases to be an unusually active first-day artist, meaning it could conceivably trend downward as the week progresses; on the other hand, there’s a lot of heat on this record.

The week’s wild card is Columbia Masterworks’ soundtrack to the final Star Wars episode, released several weeks before the film opens and already generating plenty of interest. At this point it looks like the album’s trajectory will take it to just short of the 150k galaxy, but it could trend higher as more Star Wars buffs discover that it’s already in the stores.

Island/IDJ’s remarkable hot streak under the savvy leadership of L.A. Reid—seems like the label breaks a new act or orchestrates a comeback every week—continues with the release of the first full-length album by envelope-pushing emo band Fall Out Boy, which has a real shot at 75k.

Onetime rap/metal avatars Limp Bizkit are heading toward a disappointing first-week tally of just over 50k on their Flip/Geffen album, which retailers have pointed out contains just seven tracks and clocks in at 29:42.

Business was up 366k units, or 3.6%, over last week (which was up 4% from the previous week), and down just a skosh—.4%, or 43k—vs. the comparable week of ’04. Total sales for the week were 10.6 million. The year-to-date deficit lessens slightly to -9.4%, but that’s still 19.2 million units (or slightly less than two weeks worth of average sales) under last year. Currents are off 12.1%, or 15.6m units, however; by contrast, catalog sales are lagging by less then 5%. The four-month total is 185.5 million units.