Streisand Just Misses Top Spot With New Album

It looks like Barbra Streisand will miss topping the charts with her new album, Love is the Answer, by a slim amount. Paramour's Brand New Eyes appears to be the winner of the race with Streisand and Mariah Carey for sales in the just completed week, selling somewhere in the area of 185,000 copies to Streisand's 177,000 and Carey's 173,000. Final numbers will be announced Wednesday and the charts released Thursday.

Madonna's new hits set, Celebration, sold less than half of the three leaders sales, coming in at about 70,000 for seventh. This is a much different result than in the U.K. and Australia where the album has been at or near the top of the charts.

Other approximate totals for new albums by veteran artists, based on a sampling of major retailers, puts Lynyrd Skynyrd's Gods & Guns at 35,000 copies and Foreigner's Can't Slow Down at 17,500.

In the case of older albums, Whitney Houston's I Look to You is tracking at 53,000 (down 16%), Harry Connick, Jr.'s Your Songs at 43,000 (up 19%), Michael Jackson's Number Ones at 32,000 (down 18%) and the Beatles' Abbey Road at 25,000 (down 18%).

Source: Hits Daily Double