Despite a 66% drop from first week sales of 721,000 copies, Coldplay's fourth album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends retains the top spot on the Billboard 200, selling 249,000 copies in the album's second week of release. Billboard reported the chart placement Wednesday and noted album sales are down 7.66% in the last week while dropping 13.2% behind the same week totals from one year ago.

The album was released in the United Kingdom three weeks ago tomorrow, while it has only been out in the United States for two weeks. It debuted big in the UK, selling 302,000 copies in the first three days it was out and selling 500,000 copies after ten days. Sales in the U.S. over seven days are obviously larger than the UK figures, pointing to rumored hopes from the band's music label EMI that the album would provide a significant boost for the company during the summer and possibly the year.

I've had the album since it was released, reporting that very day about the packaging of a vinyl and CD copy together that seemed to hint EMI was aware that consumers listen to music more frequently on MP3 players even if they prefer vinyl copies for nostalgia or the entire experience. Two weeks at number is impressive in today's market and even though sales dropped 66%, 249,000 copies is a nice figure for one week. If continued rumors are true that the band will release another album within a year and a half, the future of EMI may be more and more based on the success of one band.

In the last few weeks, I've become more and more critical about the British music company EMI Group, especially with the coming release of Coldplay's fourth album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends. Numerous reports and rumors are circulating that the company is betting all of its yearly profits on the album's success, and this only fuels my fears about the success that the album would enjoy. It was never in doubt that the album would be huge, but with the band hoping to shake the image of a band that earns more profits for label management, the rumors worked against that.

In any case, I finally bought the album this morning from Best Buy Co., Inc. (NYSE: BBY) and was slightly surprised to see that the retail chain was carrying a very limited number of vinyl copies. Naturally, and possibly without thinking of my Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) iPod, I splurged for this version of the album. Regardless, when I finally opened the shrinkwrap I found another surprise -- a CD copy packaged with the vinyl. Clearly, EMI and American branch Capitol Records are aware that a vinyl copy hardly transfers to an iPod easily.

The label may not like the fact that I will burn that CD copy to my iPod because of lingering fears that somehow that will result in illegal sharing, but it does say something possibly revealing about EMI. Since Guy Hands and private equity firm Terra Firma bought out the music company last September, the company has taken steps that some view as not music company practices, and lost many big artists in the mean time. But if a consumer can purchase one copy of an album from the music giant and receive two, then the company might not be in such trouble.

That is the very dynamic that the music industry needed to show: that it cared about the consumer. Digital growth in the past year has indicated that it did, and while a vinyl and CD copy might seem against that trend, it shows that the industry knows where consumers are listening to music the most: through portable devices.

British band Coldplay's fourth album Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends debuted with impressive sales over the weekend, taking the first place position in the UK sales chart based on 302,000 copies sold over only three days. Music newspaper NME also reported that the album's sales are more than the other top five albums combined in the UK. As previously reported though, that figure is still below the sales that its predecessor X&Y sold during its first week in 2005: over 464,000.

The album is released in the United States on Tuesday, and hopes are high that it can duplicate, if not, exceed those sales in the largest music market in the world. X&Y has sold over 3 million copies in the U.S. since it was released three years ago.

Numerous reports indicate that struggling music company EMI is hedging its entire summer and possibly the year on the release of Viva la Vida, even though the band seems to be downplaying the hopes that fuel industry executives: "This time, we were hungry to disassociate ourselves from anything other than improving someone's holiday or bath time." Coldplay's success in the last three days in the UK is no doubt highly prized by EMI and its current owners, private equity firm Terra Firma, after many high profile and selling artists have left the company in the last year.

Coldplay is by no means the only highly successful band under contract at EMI, but the pressure that seems placed on the band will no doubt have an effect on Viva la Vida's success and what happens in the U.S. charts this week.

It is still over a week and a half until Coldplay's fourth album, Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends, is scheduled for release, but the album leaked online through a torrent Wednesday. The band's first album in just over three years has already proved itself popular with a highly downloaded single and has become the highest pre-sale album ever in Apple Inc.'s (NASDAQ: AAPL) iTunes Store, according to NME.

Prefix magazine speculates that the album's leak has raised serious issues for the band's label, privately-held EMI. Prefix reports that the albums second single, title track "Viva la Vida" has seen 510,000 downloads already, not as impressive as the two million its predecessor "Violet Hill" moved. The magazine also speculates that the leak will make it "unlikely that the album will be the rousing success that EMI had hoped." This just seems to disregard the consumer base and the band's large fanbase.

Arguably, the 510,000 downloads of "Viva la Vida" should be interpreted as that many presale downloads for the album, since the single and album pre-order are bundled together in iTunes. If that is the case, first week sales will be an impressive, rousing success. Coldplay and EMI have taken the next logical, and predictable, step to combat the online leak. NME reports that starting tonight the album will be available for streaming from the band's MySpace page.