EST Gee scores his first No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Rap Albums chart as I Never Felt Nun debuts in the top slot of the list dated Oct. 1. The set arrives with 30,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Sept. 22, according to Luminate.
Streaming powers almost all the album’s debut, with 29,000 of Nun’s 30,000-unit start deriving from the consumption method. 29,000 streaming-equivalent album units equals 41.1 million official on-demand streams of Nun’s songs in the tracking week. The remaining 1,000 units split between traditional album sales and track-equivalent album units. (One unit equals the following levels of consumption: one album sale, 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams for a song on the album.)
Rising rapper EST Gee, born George Stone III, captures his first champ on Top Rap Albums with his third charting release. His first foray onto the list, last year’s Bigger Than Life of Death, debuted and peaked No. 4 in August 2021, while Bigger Than Life or Death, Part 2 reached a No. 18 best last December.
Elsewhere, I Never Felt Nun opens at No. 3 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and at No. 8 on the all-genre Billboard 200.
The album’s large streaming activity sparks two tracks’ debuts on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. “Backstage Passes,” featuring Jack Harlow, begins at No. 28 and is the album’s most-streamed song of the week, with 5.5 million clicks in its first seven days. “Shoot It Myself,” featuring Future, meanwhile, starts at No. 40, driven by 4.7 million clicks. The former track links two of the most successful rappers from Louisville in recent years, while the latter track reunites EST Gee with Future, who he describes as “like our JAY-Z” in his Billboard profile this month.
