With a Bullet: Today's Charts

Velvet Revolver's reinvention has paid off! This hard-rock band teeming with former Guns N' Roses members sent the music world reeling when, instead of releasing a second album full of '90s-era rock 'n raunch clichés about life on the road, partying hard with chemical assistance and their courtships with underage girls, instead issued a shocking change of direction, the Spanish-titled 'Libertad.'

This gentle and faithful collection of environmentally conscious Chilean folk ballads clearly didn't alienate VR fans, who supported the band's new direction by purchasing enough copies of the album (94,000 to be almost precise) to give it a No. 5 debut. (And who knew Duff was such a virtuoso on the palo de lluvia -- must have been those cultural anthropology classes he took when he went back to college a few years ago.) It's been reported that the first single off 'Libertad' will be 'El Lamento del Bosque' -- which features Weiland singing a duet with an actual Andean tree frog.

Weekly Winehouse Watch haiku:

Amy's 'Back to Black'
On its way to platinum
Liquor store man smiles

The top five albums for the week ending July 8:

1. 'T.I. vs. T.I.P.,' T.I. (469,000 in 1st week)
2. 'Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus,' soundtrack (188,000 in 2nd week; 514,000 total)
3. 'My December,' Kelly Clarkson (113,000 in 2nd week; 405,000 total)
4. 'Lost Highway,' Bon Jovi (94,000 in 3rd week; 510,000 total)
5. 'Libertad,' Velvet Revolver (94,000 in 1st week)