Garth, Hanson, Garbage Top Charts

Frank may be gone, but he's certainly not forgotten.

As word of Frank Sinatra's May 14 death spread last weekend, fans flocked to record stores, snatching up their idol's various greatest hit collections at a dizzying pace. According to SoundScan, for the week ending May 17, five of the top twenty-five -- and eleven of the Top 200 -- catalog albums were Sinatra titles, with his Very Good Years leading the way. (Catalog titles are two years old or older, and do not qualify for the so-called "current" sales chart.)

Combined, those Sinatra titles sold 74,000 copies -- and that was just over a three day period. (By comparison, the country's No. 14 "current" album, by the Big Punisher, sold 76,000 copies for the entire week.) Expect strong Sinatra sales to continue through this week as well.

Over on the main sales chart, Garth Brooks remains No. 1, with his six-CD box set, Limited Series, selling 190,000 copies. The week's notable debuts belonged to Hanson, whose Three Car Garage: The Indie Recordings '95-'96 (a collection of their pre-major label songs), came in at No. 6, while Garbage's Version 2.0 bowed at No. 13. Down a bit further was Lenny Kravitz's 5, at No. 36. Down much further, Soul Asylum's Candy From a Stranger at No. 121. That weak showing is not good news for the once-multi-platinum selling rock act.

From the top it was Limited Series, followed by the City of Angels soundtrack (selling 168,000 copies); LeAnn Rimes' Sittin' On Top of the World (147,000); the Dave Matthews Bands' Before These Crowded Streets (135,000); the soundtrack to Titanic (129,000); Three Car Garage (116,000); the soundtrack to Ally McBeal (116,000); Backstreet Boys (103,000); George Strait's One Step at a Time (101,000); and Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love (98,000).

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Song Stories

“Time to Pretend”

MGMT | 2008

Listening to MGMT’s breakthrough song, one might interpret it as being about the excesses of rock stardom, but it’s actually about the duo’s pet praying mantis. Ben Goldwasser and Andrew VanWyngarden told Rolling Stone they got the idea from the insect's jerky movements. The mantis died, but the two bandmates kept the egg sack and allowed the hundreds of eggs to hatch. “We tried to name them all, but they died after a day,” said Goldwasser, with VanWyngarden chiming in, “But the praying mantis dance inspired us.”

More Song Stories entries »

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