'Idol' BB 200: 'All I Ever Wanted' #1 (3/28/09)

Kelly Clarkson exploded onto the Billboard Top 200 chart for the chart week of March 28, as she led not just all Idol alums on the chart, but all other artists period.

Kelly's All I Ever Wanted opened with 254.7k (255.2k including street date violations), which was her third-lowest opening week to date, besting only Breakaway (250k). Despite the relatively slow sales in comparison to her past albums, the album opened at #1 and will most likely remain in the pole position on next week's chart.

The sales were a bit above what many projected based on first-week sales, but was off IDOL LIVE's optimistic predictions by 79k (I had it coming in at 334k).

Aside from Kelly, Carrie Underwood had the next best news on the chart, as her Carnival Ride rose 11 spots to #42 thanks to a 25% sales hike. The album sold 12.1k, putting its total at 2.684 million. Jennifer Hudson's self-titled debut, which was #42 last week, fell to #45 but remained steady with 10.9k for the week. It now totals 667.8k.

David Cook's self-titled album was next at #52 with 9.8k, down 9% and seven spots from the previous week. The platinum-selling disc has sold 1.027 million.

The other debut by an Idol winner for the week, Taylor Hicks, saw his latest album The Distance premiere 246k copies below the other winner's debut, pulling in 9k and landing at #58 on the chart. This figure is by far the lowest debut for an LP by an Idol champ.

David Foster's CD/DVD combo Hit Man moved another 6.1k, up 19% from the previous week, advancing #112-91 on the chart. It now totals 166.5k. David Archuleta, on the other hand, slipped 9% to 4.8k copies. It fell 15 spots to #121 and has sold 665k copies to date.

Up after Arch was Daughtry, whose album keeps chugging along. This week, it rose 3% to 4k but fell five spots to #138, making for a grand total of 4.401 million. And Melinda Doolittle's Coming Back to You rounded out the Idol-related entries, finishing with 2.8k, off 26%. It fell 50 chart positions to #186 and has now sold 35.6k.

Full sales figures and chart positions courtesy of tony on Pulse as follows:

001 --- Kelly Clarkson - All I Ever Wanted 254,671 999% 417 255,231
042 053 Carrie Underwood - Carnival Ride 12,051 25% 9,628 2,683,819
045 042 Jennifer Hudson - Jennifer Hudson 10,949 0% 10,998 667,830
052 045 David Cook - David Cook 9,839 -9% 10,811 1,027,051
058 --- Taylor Hicks - The Distance 8,990 999% 1 8,991
091 112 David Foster - Hit Man... 6,084 19% 5,118 166,482
121 106 David Archuleta - David Archuleta 4,796 -9% 5,258 664,590
138 133 Daughtry - Daughtry 4,049 3% 3,913 4,400,878
186 136 Melinda Doolittle - Coming Back to You 2,833 -26% 3,822 36,596

Total sales are in bold.