Late Brooklyn drill rapper Pop Smoke has made history on the Billboard Top Rap Albums chart with his posthumous album, Shoot for the Stars Aim for the Moon. This week marks the project’s 20th week at No. 1, surpassing Eminem’s previous record of 19 weeks with Recovery.
The Top Rap Albums chart first launched in 2004. Drake’s Take Care (16 weeks), Eminem’s The Marshall Mathers LP 2 (14 weeks), and Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’ The Heist (13 weeks) sit behind Shoot for the Stars Aim for the Moon and Recovery in the history books.
Shoot for the Stars is the second-longest-running No. 1 album on the separate Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart at 19 weeks, solely trailing MC Hammer’s 29-week reign with Please Hammer Don’t Hurt Em in 1990.
Pop Smoke was killed at age 20 during a home invasion in Los Angeles in February 2020. Shoot for the Stars was released last July, debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 251,000 album-equivalent units sold.
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The album has spawned a series of Billboard Hot 100 hits, including “The Woo”, “Mood Swings”, and “For the Night”. Another posthumous single, “AP”, was released off Eddie Huang’s Boogie soundtrack in late February.
