The Weeknd's 'Starboy' zooms to top of Billboard album chart

LOS ANGELES: Canadian rapper The Weeknd grabbed the top spot on the Billboard 200 album chart on Monday, with his new release "Starboy" showing one of the best-selling debut weeks of 2016.

"Starboy," the third studio album from the singer-songwriter, sold 348,000 units in its first week, according to figures from Nielsen SoundScan. Billboard.com said "Starboy" was the third-largest debut of 2016, behind rapper Drake's "Views" and Beyonce's spring release "Lemonade."

The Billboard 200 album chart tallies units from album sales, song sales (10 songs equal one album) and streaming activity (1,500 streams equal one album).

A cappella group Pentatonix climbed back into the No. 2 position on the Billboard 200 with their holiday album "A Pentatonix Christmas" which sold 130,000 copies during the week, while rockers Metallica slipped from last week's top spot to No.3 with their latest release "Hardwired."

The star-studded soundtracks to animated movies "Moana" and "Trolls" took fifth and sixth spots respectively.

On the digital songs chart, which measures online song sales, the "Starboy" lead single took the No. 2 spot for The Weeknd, with 53,000 copies in the past week, behind hip-hop duo Rae Sremmurd which again ruled at No. 1 with "Black Beatles," selling 82,000 copies.