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HITS Daily Double
Disney's Lyric Street has a new breaking act to go alongside Rascal Flatts, with Bucky Covington, yet another American Idol alum, who appears headed for first-week sales of around 60k, which would put him solidly in the Top 10 and maybe even in the Top 5 next Tuesday.

AVRIL SHOWERS, RETAIL FLOWERS

Lavigne’s The Best Damn Thing Will Bow at #1, Nine Inch Nails Trails
It’s The Best Damn Thing to happen for the music biz in awhile.

Avril Lavigne’s Arista album of the same name appears to be the easy winner of next week’s chart race, on target to rack up some 250k in sales for her third album. Those are based on one-day sales figures from our shell-shocked, if indefatigable, network of record retailers around the country.

That’s quite a bit less than her last album, Under My Skin, which sold some 380k three years ago on the way to almost 3 million in U.S. sales, but the times they have a-changed, my friends.

Lavigne had a spate of TV appearances over the last week, including stints on Saturday Night Live last weekend (where she appeared in one of the skits as Elle Fanning), Letterman last night and Regis and Kelly this morning. Yesterday, a planned performance on Good Morning America was canceled due to coverage of the Virginia Tech tragedy.

Interscope’s Nine Inch Nails return with Year Zero and, thanks to a cyber scavenger hunt that defines the new online marketing paradigm masterminded by Trent Reznor, looks on track to top 200k in first-week sales.

Finally, Disney's Lyric Street has a new breaking act to go alongside Rascal Flatts, with Bucky Covington, yet another American Idol alum, who appears headed for first-week sales of around 60k, which would put him solidly in the Top 10 and maybe even in the Top 5 next Tuesday.

The market was off almost 24% vs. the comparatively robust Easter weekend, down almost 32% vs. same week last year and now down nearly 17% in what has been a sobering year-to-date for the beleaguered biz.