Avenged SevenFold is headed to the top

from Blabbermouth.com

Nightmare”, the fifth album from Orange County, California’s AVENGED SEVENFOLD, is likely to sell between 160,000 and 175,000 copies in the United States in its first week of release to debut at the top of next week’s The Billboard 200 chart, according to industry web site Hits Daily Double. The estimate was based on one-day sales reports compiled after the record arrived in stores on Tuesday (July 27).

AVENGED SEVENFOLD‘s self-titled fourth album sold 94,000 copies in its first week of release back in November 2007, nearly three times what its 2005 effort, “City of Evil”, sold in its biggest week on the chart.

The official video for “Nightmare”, the album’s first single and title track, premiered on MTV2, MTV.com, and MTV2.com on July 17 and became the second most popular video on YouTube, racking up more than 1,280,865 views last week. The “lyric” video that premiered via YouTube has racked up three million views.

“Nightmare” has sold more than 145,000 digital singles and is currently at No. 3 on Mediabase‘s Active Rock radio chart.

“Nightmare” was completed after the death of drummer Jimmy “The Rev” Sullivan, who passed away last December following an overdose of prescription drugs and alcohol. Guitarist Zacky Vengeance told The Pulse of Radio how the band got through the making of the record after losing their friend. “You know, you carry on knowing that there’s something so much more important than yourself to deliver, to millions of fans across the world, to all your friends, and to yourself,” he said. “To put out this piece of music that he helped write with us is extremely, extremely difficult and I don’t wish it on anybody. But I think the end result is even that much more spectacular because it brought us all closer and we did, you know, him justice.”

The band recruited DREAM THEATER drummer Mike Portnoy to play on the new album and all the band’s 2010 tour dates.

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