THE STROKES RING IN
THE NEW YEAR

Thank God for RCA. If they hadn’t decided to release The Strokes’ third album, First Impressions of Earth on Jan. 3, we really wouldn’t have anything at all to write about in this space. A second bit of good luck this week is that RCA pretty much acted alone in releasing the Strokes’ third album on Jan. 3, so this piece will be kept mercifully short. We all have better things to do, don’t we?

Now that the lead has been sufficiently buried, let’s get to the point: According to early reports from national accounts, First Impressions is on track to come on this week’s album chart with a first-week sales total of around 100k.

That number, while about 26k shy of their last album’s debut in Oct. 2003, should be good enough to give The Strokes a place in this week’s Top 10—turf currently occupied (in descending order) Jamie Foxx, Mary J. Blige, Eminem, a posthumous duets album from Biggie Smalls, Carrie Underwood and biggest-album-of-2005-haver Mariah Carey.

Just where in the Top 10 The Strokes will place depends very much on how the above albums fared in the first week of the new year. That question is what lends such excitement to this week’s Building Album Chart, which you can watch come together from today until tomorrow afternoon by clicking the “Sales” tab above. Enjoy.