Noah Kahan’s ‘The Great Divide’ Spends Second Week Atop Billboard 200

Noah Kahan’s The Great Divide spends a second week atop the Billboard 200 (dated May 16) following its debut a week ago. The set earned 163,000 equivalent album units in the United States in the week ending May 7 (down 58% compared to its opening of 389,000), according to Luminate.

The Great Divide is the first rock album to spend at least two weeks at No. 1 in nearly three years. Zach Bryan’s self-titled set was the last rock set with two weeks at No. 1, in September 2023. (Rock albums are defined as those that are eligible for, or have charted on, Billboard’s Top Rock Albums chart.)

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Also in the top 10 of the latest Billboard 200, Kacey Musgraves collects her sixth top 10 — all of which have debuted in the top five — as Middle of Nowhere starts at No. 3. Plus, the success of the Michael Jackson biopic Michael continues to shine on the chart, as Jackson has two albums in the top 10. His former No. 1 Thriller rises 7-5 and the hits collection Number Ones jumps 13-6.

The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units, compiled by Luminate. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 2,500 ad-supported or 1,000 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. The new May 16, 2026-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on May 12. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X and Instagram.

Of The Great Divide’s 163,000 equivalent album units earned in the latest tracking week, SEA units comprise 137,000 (down 35%, equaling 139.5 million on-demand official streams of the set’s tracks; it spends a second week at No. 1 on Top Streaming Albums), album sales comprise 26,000 (down 85%; it falls 1-2 on Top Album Sales) and TEA units comprise the remainder (down 66%).

Ella Langley’s former leader Dandelion holds at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 with 103,000 equivalent album units earned (down 8%).

Kacey Musgraves’ Middle of Nowhere debuts at No. 3 with 100,000 equivalent album units earned, her best week ever by units. It’s the singer-songwriter’s sixth top 10, all of which have debuted in the top five. Of the album’s starting figure, album sales comprise 64,500 (it debuts at No. 1 on Top Album Sales), SEA units comprise 35,000 (equaling 35.54 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs, it debuts at No. 10 on Top Streaming Albums) and TEA units comprise 500.

Middle of Nowhere is Musgrave’s sixth studio album and was announced in early March. The project — which features collaborations with Gregory Alan Isakov, Miranda Lambert, Willie Nelson and Billy Strings — was led by the single “Dry Spell” (peaking at No. 15 on Hot Country Songs in March) and released on May 1. Musgraves’ Middle of Nowhere arena tour launches on Aug. 21 in Chicago and continues through the end of October.

The new album’s first-week sales were aided by its availability across 16 physical variants (including signed editions) and a deluxe download edition with two bonus tracks.

Chart-watchers take note: This is the second top 10-charted album with the exact title Middle of Nowhere. Brother trio Hanson reached No. 2 with their album of their same name in 1997.

Morgan Wallen’s former No. 1 I’m the Problem falls 3-4 on the latest Billboard 200 with 83,000 equivalent album units earned (up 3%).

Michael Jackson has a pair of albums in the top 10 as the buzz generated from the Michael biopic continues to resonate on the chart. His chart-topping Thriller climbs 7-5 (62,000 equivalent album units, up 36%) and best-of set Number Ones, released in 2003, reaches the top 10 for the first time, rising 13-6 (62,000 units, up 65%), becoming his 11th top 10.

With Number Ones’ ascent, Jackson, who died in 2009, has now claimed at least one new top 10 album in every decade from the 1970s onwards as a soloist. And, he’s only the fifth act overall to do so, joining Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and James Taylor.

Jackson found two new top 10s in the 1970s (first with Ben peaking at No. 5 in 1972 and then with Off the Wall, which reached the top 10 in September 1979 and peaked at No. 3 in February 1980); two in the ’80s (Thriller, No. 1 for 37 weeks in 1983-84; Bad, No. 1 for six weeks in 1987); two in the ’90s (Dangerous, No. 1 for four weeks in 1991-92, and HIStory: Past, Present and Future Book 1, No. 1 for two weeks in 1995); two in the 2000s (Invincible, No. 1 for one week in 2001, and his first posthumous top 10, the soundtrack to Michael Jackson’s This Is It, No. 1 for one week in 2009); two in the ’10s (Michael, No. 3 in 2011 and Xscape, No. 2 in 2014); and now one in the ’20s with Number Ones.

BTS’ chart-topping ARIRANG falls 5-7 on the latest Billboard 200 (49,000 equivalent album units earned, down 13%), Olivia Dean’s The Art of Loving is steady at No. 8 (42,000, down 3%), Wallen’s former leader One Thing at a Time is a non-mover at No. 9 (40,000, up 3%), and Bad Bunny’s former No. 1 DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS climbs 12-10 (37,000, down 3%).

Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.

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