CAN TAYLOR RETAIN THE CROWN?

Taylor Swift has now scored 11 weeks at #1 with THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT (Republic). Last year, her labelmate Morgan Wallen's One Thing at a Time (Big Loud/Mercury/Republic) spent 12 straight weeks in the top spot—on its way to 19 (nonconsecutive) weeks at #1. Will Taylor face a challenge as she attempts to tie Wallen's streak? The signs are murky.

Warner's Zach Bryan scored a Top 15 bow with 35k after just one day with The Great American Bar Scene, thanks to nearly 40m streams and 5k in digital downloads. In its first full week, now underway, it's projected to generate an additional 110-120k in activity. Could this be enough to unseat Taylor? Zach will have his work cut out for him given that Tay made seven previously released CD versions available on 7/6 for less than eight hours; three iterations are sold out as of this writing.

Will Taylor retain the crown and match Morgan's record when this week's HITS Top 50 is finalized, or will Zach's Bar Scene end up toasting a #1? Stay tuned.

Meanwhile, this week will also see the release of Eminem's hotly anticipated The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce), which is projected to bow on the subsequent week's chart at 300k-350k. Is there anything Tay can do to hold off the rap god's new Shady/Aftermath/Interscope set? We don't know, but we look forward to finding out.