Chart News: Week Of 1/26/2013 (UPDATED)

OK, some unexpected news this morning. Apparently, Billboard has now expanded the number of positions on the Dance/Electronic Albums chart (and their other genre-based album charts). As a result, MDNA shows up as a re-entry at #55 this week.

In other news, Billboard has launched a new chart called Dance / Electronic Songs. According to Billboard.com:

"Billboard expands its coverage of the burgeoning dance scene by launching Dance/Electronic Songs, the first-ever ranking of the nation's top dance songs combining digital download sales (tracked by Nielsen SoundScan), radio airplay (monitored by Nielsen BDS) and streaming data (tracked by BDS from such services as Spotify, Muve, Slacker, Rhapsody, Rdio, MySpace, Xbox Music and Guvera) and reported club play from a select national panel of 140 club DJs.

Outside of club play data, Dance/Electronic Songs will match the methodology applied to Billboard's signature all-genre songs ranking, the Billboard Hot 100. Titles eligible for the chart will be determined based on a song's core sound and tempo, as they have been for our sales-based Dance/Electronic Digital Songs chart, which launched in 2010. Dance remixes of titles categorized as pop, rock, R&B, rap or another genre would not make a song eligible for Dance/Electronic Songs, even if the title appears on the Dance Club Songs or Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart."

I think it's interesting that they are including club play data into this new chart. Could the old Club Play chart soon be on its way out? That chart has received some criticism in recent years for being old-fashioned and an inaccurate representation of current dance music, mostly because it is the last chart to be compiled in the outdated way of collecting playlists directly from DJ's, instead of using electronic Nielsen data. I guess we'll have to wait and see, but I do hope they keep it since Madonna dominates the Club Play chart so consistently. In the meantime, this new Dance / Electronic Songs chart is exciting because it is one that Madonna could appear on in the future :)

MDNA

DANCE / ELECTRONIC ALBUMS: #55 (Re-Entry)