Times have changed

When Kid Cudi released his debut album, Man On The Moon: The End Of The Day album in 2009, which debuted at #4 on the Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 104,000 copies, ScHoolboy Q had just released his last free mixtape, Gangsta & Soul. He hadn’t signed a record deal yet and he wasn’t selling out tours or NYC showcases. He was merely another west coast artist trying to break into the game.

This week, ScHoolboy & Kid Cudi are sharing release weeks, with Q’s long-awaited debut album Oxymoron finally hitting stores this past Tuesday, and Kid Cudi’s surprise midnight-on-Monday release of Satellite Flight currently being available on iTunes, and early sales projections show that Q will comfortably finish ahead of Cudi after the 7 day tallies are counted. Hits Daily Double, the long-standing reliable source of early first-week numbers and chart placements, reports that ScHoolboy Q will finish between 150,000 & 160,000 units sold while Kid Cudi’s Satellite Flight will probably land somewhere between 90,000 & 95,000.

If these numbers hold true, ScHoolboy Q will debut at #1 on the charts next week, while Kid Cudi will have to duke it out with Romeo Santos for the #2 spot. Santos’ latest album is set to sell roughly 94,000 copies in its first week on the shelves.