Rihanna scores first No. 1 album with 'Unapologetic'

Rihanna scores first No. 1 album with ‘Unapologetic’

Rihanna, during her concert stop in New York on Nov. 20, has landed her first No. 1 album with "Unapologetic."

By Randy Lewis

Nov. 28, 2012 12 AM PT

While Adele is busy celebrating her cavalcade of 21s (her album “21” just became the 21st album to sell 10 million copies since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking retail sales 21 years ago), R&B-pop; star Rihanna is rolling in lucky 7s.

Her seventh album, “Unapologetic” has given the Barbados-born singer her first No. 1 collection on the Billboard 200 album chart—seven years after the release of her debut set, “Music of the Sun.” She’s also on the road with what she has dubbed her “777 Tour.”

“Unapologetic” sold 238,000 copies last week, which also represents the biggest sales week to this point for Rihanna, who until this week held the record for the musician with the most No. 1 singles on the Billboard Hot 100 without a No. 1 album, as noted by Billboard’s Keith Caulfield.

“Unapologetic” bumps last week’s top-selling album, One Direction’s “Take Me Home,” to the No. 3 slot, as the British boy group’s sophomore outing sold another 176,000 copies, behind Taylor Swift’s “Red,” holding on at No. 2 with 185,000 copies, up 28% from the previous week.

The other new entries in this week’s Top 10 are “American Idol” grad Phillip Phillips’ debut, “The World From the Side of the Moon,” which sold 169,000 copies to enter at No. 4, which came in ahead of Kid Rock’s “Rebel Soul,” starting out at No. 5 on sales of 146,000 copies.

The Led Zeppelin live album “Celebration Day,” recorded during the band’s 2007 reunion shows in London, enters at No. 9 with sales of 101,000 copies, followed by Keyshia Cole’s “Woman to Woman,” selling 96,000 copies and debuting at No. 10.

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Follow Randy Lewis on Twitter: @RandyLewis2