Rod Wave continues to make a splash.
On Sunday (April 12), the Florida rapper's new album Pray 4 Love debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 chart. He was able to move 72,000 equivalent album units. The total includes 2,000 traditional album sales. Wave's new project had a strong streaming week with numbers equating to 105.8 million on-demand streams.
The feat is even more impressive considering the 14-song album has no big-name features. Wave put out five singles in promotion of the project including the title track "Dark Clouds," "Thug Motivation," "Thief in the Night" and "The Greatest."
The only thing stopping Wave from reaching No. 1 this week was The Weeknd's After Hours album, which was able to keep its top spot after moving another 90,000 equivalent album units. This marks his third consecutive week at No. 1, making it the first album in 2020 to spend back to back to back weeks atop the chart. It's also the first album to do so since Post Malone's Hollywood's Bleeding in 2019.
Other hip-hop artists in the top 10 of this week's Billboard 200 chart include Lil Uzi Vert (Eternal Atake, No. 3), Lil Baby (My Turn, No. 4), Roddy Ricch (Please Excuse Me for Being Antisocial, No. 7) and Post Malone (Hollywood's Bleeding, No. 9).
This is Rod Wave's first top five Billboard 200 album. His 2019 release, Ghetto Gospel, peaked at the No. 10 spot.
Wave has been making noise for the last couple of years. He also put out the mixtape PTSD in 2019 and toured with Kevin Gates last fall.
"When I was on tour with [Gates], it was fun seeing the world, and I learned how big the world was," Rod told XXL a few months back. "Being stuck in a bubble and stuck in a market, you feel me, it kinda made me more humbler because it's like it's a whole ’nother side of the world that don't even know who you is."
Wave is supposed to be currently on his own headlining tour but had to postpone the trek due to the coronavirus.
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