Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums is a music chart published weekly by Billboard magazine that ranks R&B and hip-hop albums based on sales in the United States and is compiled by Luminate. The chart debuted as Hot R&B LPs in the issue dated January 30, 1965, in an effort by the magazine to further expand into the field of rhythm and blues music. It then went through several name changes, being known as Soul LPs in the 1970s and Top Black Albums in the 1980s, before returning to the R&B identification in 1990 and affixing a hip hop designation in 1999 to reflect the latter's growing sales and relationship to R&B during the decade.
From 1965 through 2009, the chart was compiled based on reported sales at a core panel of stores with a "higher-than-average volume" of R&B and/or hip-hop album sales to monitor buying trends of the African-American community. This panel included more independent and smaller chain stores compared to the high percentage of mass merchants that account for overall album sales. The core panel of stores continued to be monitored with the advent of SoundScan technology in the early 1990s but was dissolved at the end of 2009 when the methodology of the chart changed to "recap overall album sales of current R&B/hip-hop titles."
Chart name history The chart debuted on January 30, 1965, as the Hot R&B LP's. On August 23, 1969, Billboard renamed both singles and albums contingents of the R&B charts as Soul charts; the albums chart was first called Best Selling Soul LP's and then from July 14, 1973, simply Soul LP's.
On June 26, 1982, the singles and album charts were renamed again as Black Singles and Black LPs respectively. The change followed internal debate within Billboard about how to better reflect the growing stylistic range of music made and consumed by Black audiences. Nelson George called the change "long overdue", noting that Black artists had been making pop music beyond soul since the early 1970s. It was also part of a longer evolution in Billboard’s terminology for Black music, which had previously included terms like "Race Records", which was first used in the 1920s by OKeh Records to market Mamie Smith's "Crazy Blues". With Billboard's overhaul of its charts on October 20, 1984, the chart became Top Black Albums.
On October 27, 1990, the charts returned to the R&B designation (Top R&B Albums, Hot R&B Singles). On December 11, 1999, Billboard renamed them again as Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks, in an effort to recognize the growing sales of hip hop music and the genre's influential relationship to contemporary R&B. The phrase "hip-hop" was chosen over "rap" because the former was considered more inclusive and better reflected the genre's broader cultural influence. Billboard highlighted Lauryn Hill as a defining example of this shift, stating that she was "as accomplished a singer as she is a rapper" and "a prime example of an act who would more appropriately be described as a hip-hop artist than a rapper". The change also acknowledged that many of the top-charting rap tracks at the time had origins in R&B traditions, further blurring the genre lines.
Achievements +Artists with the most number-one albums Artist of #1 albums Source The Temptations17 Drake Future 16 Jay-Z 14 Kanye West 13 R. Kelly 12 +Album with the most weeks in the top ten Weeks Album Artist100 My TurnLil Baby89 Hollywood's Bleeding Post Malone77 Stoney beerbongs & bentleys76 Thriller Michael Jackson70 Shoot for the Stars, Aim for the Moon Pop Smoke64 Whitney Houston Whitney Houston63 The E.N.D. Black Eyed Peas61 After Hours The Weeknd59 The Heist Macklemore & Ryan Lewis
+Albums with the most weeks on the chart Weeks Album Artist700 Good Kid, M.A.A.D City Kendrick Lamar362 Take Care Drake342 Curtain Call: The Hits Eminem327 Greatest Hits Tupac Shakur319 2014 Forest Hills Drive J. Cole266 Goodbye & Good Riddance Juice Wrld263 Damn Kendrick Lamar259 beerbongs & bentleys Post Malone
Top Rap Albums Billboard began the Top Rap Albums chart on the weekend of June 26, 2004, although its first publication on print commenced on the week of November 20, 2004. Pop Smoke's posthumous debut, Shoot for the Stars, Aim for the Moon holds the record of most weeks at number one on the chart with twenty non-consecutive weeks.
Albums with the most weeks at number one Weeks Album Artist Source 20 Shoot for the Stars, Aim for the Moon Pop Smoke 19 Recovery Eminem 18 Heroes & Villains Metro Boomin 16 Take Care Drake Pope, A. (2016). Musical artists capitalizing on hybrid identities: A case study of drake the "Authentic" "Black" "Canadian" "Rapper". Stream: Culture/Politics/Technology, 9(1), 3. 14 The Marshall Mathers LP 2 Eminem GNX Kendrick Lamar 13 Paper Trail T.I. The Heist Macklemore & Ryan Lewis Certified Lover Boy Drake 11 Damn Kendrick Lamar Bohnett, M. (2019). Centers and Peripheries in the Expression and Enactment of Religion, Sociopolitical Soundscapes, and the Reception of Kendrick Lamar's DAMN. For All the DogsDrake
Artists with the most number-one albums of albums Artist Source16 Future 15 Drake 11 Kanye West10 Lil Wayne8 Tupac 7 Eminem Jay-Z Metro Boomin 6 Kendrick Lamar Travis Scott
Notes
References
Works cited Whitburn, Joel (2000). Top R&B Albums: 1965–1998. Record Research.
External links Yearly Billboard Top 5 R&B Hip-Hop Albums 1966-2006