Taylor Swift's sophomore album Fearless debuts at No. 1 on the all-genre Billboard Top 200 chart, marking the biggest opening week for any female recording artist in America this year.
The album earned sales of 592,304 units, which is the best country album debut for 2008 and the fourth-largest opening U.S. sales week overall. She ranks behind only Lil Wayne, AC/DC and Coldplay in 2008 album debuts.
"I found out this morning when my mom came in and woke me up because she had Ryan Seacrest on the phone wanting to congratulate me on my number one album," said Taylor, 18. "I freaked out; I had just woken up. I got on the air and said I was excited about 400 times in a row.
"I just wanted to sell more records (in the first week) than we did the first time around, which was 39,000. I try to aim low and always be surprised. Honestly, I don't think we could have ever dreamed that we could have sold this many."
A few other stats include:
>> With 129,046 copies sold digitally, it is the biggest country digital album debut in the history of Nielsen's SoundScan and the fourth biggest digital album debut to date;
>> It's the fourth country album to debut atop the Billboard Top 200 chart this year and the highest album debut for a country female since 2002;
>> Her song "White Horse" gives Taylor her sixth top 20 debut on Billboard's all-genre Hot 100, breaking the all-time Billboard record for the number of top 20 debuts in a calendar year by an artist. "Love Story" is in its second week at No. 1 on the Billboard country charts.
>> Taylor's six debuts and seven total tracks on today's charts each tie her with Hannah Montana(Miley Cyrus).
>> Taylor has surpassed 120 million music streams on MySpace, including more than 20 million in the last
10 days.
"It is so mind-blowing, all of those things," said Taylor, who also appears on the cover of the December issue of Women's Health. "All the fans just went out and broke those records for me. I just wrote the songs and made the music, and it's up to the fans to either buy it or not buy it. The fact that they made it the best-selling country album of the year, I can't even process that.
"It's so wonderful to me, and I'm so grateful that I've been allowed to write my own songs and co-produce my own album. I've never been so proud of anything as I have of this album.
"They accepted me for who I am," she said. "All I have ever done is be myself."
'People' taps Shelton among sexiest
From staff writer Cindy Watts:
Blake Shelton has made People magazine's annual list the Sexiest Men Alive.
Hugh Jackman, who made an appearance at the CMA Awards last week, topped the list that includes Olympian Michael Phelps, High School Musical's Zac Efron and James Bond actor Daniel Craig.
Of the distinction, Shelton told the magazine: "The wussiest thing a guy can do is drive a clean truck. Dents, scratches and mud — that's manly."
Snider takes Ryman stage tonight
Todd Snider, the pride of East Nashville, will take the Ryman stage at 7:30 tonight as part of Robert Earl Keen's show.
Todd's album, Peace Queer, has earned rave reviews and spent the last month atop the Americana album chart, which "means I can probably buy drinks if it was just me and a couple of other guys and we only stayed out for a few hours."
He says Peace Queer was written by a flaming liberal who respects those with whom he disagrees.
"It's a protest record written by a guy who thinks protest records are bunk," he said, noting that the stories aren't about him, but just "normal old people."
"There are songs about kids who go to war and people who watch war from the side and also stuff like fights in high school," he said. "I was trying not just to talk about peace in faraway fields, but also in my yard and the 3 Crow (Bar). I hate it when fights break out there as much as I hate to see a fight break out on TV."
Todd recently completed Peace Queer: The Movie, which was shot while he was on the road. "I don't know if it will be on DVD or maybe you'll go online to see it," he said. "Maybe we'll have a premiere on our side of town."
Last week he finished recording his new album with producer Don Was in Los Angeles' A&M Studios.
