At one point in his career, the 25-year-old Atlanta rapper Lil Baby earned cachet as a reluctant hip-hop star — he avoided the limelight even while churning out mountains of content, and was known to swing by the local Chick-fil-A unaccompanied.
But since the release of his latest album, “My Turn,” in March, Lil Baby has been unavoidable, holding strong streaming numbers week after week and releasing a candid protest anthem, “The Bigger Picture,” this month.
“My Turn,” which opened at No. 1, returned to the top spot last week, helped in part by a lack of competition from new releases as the music industry went on a self-imposed pause to focus on racism in the wake of George Floyd’s death. This week, “My Turn” has held No. 1 again, notching its third week at the top — only the third title to reach that milestone this year.
“My Turn” had the equivalent of 72,000 sales in the United States last week, according to Nielsen Music, with 110 million streams, many of them coming through Apple Music. “The Bigger Picture” — which has aching lines like “It’s too many mothers who’s grieving, they killing us for no reason, it been going on for too long to get even” — was not included on “My Turn,” but as Billboard noted, it surely drew attention to the album.
Also this week, Lady Gaga’s “Chromatica” holds at No. 2, DaBaby’s “Blame It on Baby” is No. 3, and Post Malone’s “Hollywood’s Bleeding” — a monster hit last year — is No. 4, after gradually moving up the charts over the last several weeks (a period in which he also launched his own rosé brand, Maison No. 9). Drake’s “Dark Lane Demo Tapes” holds at No. 5.
Source: Music - nytimes.com
