[BILLBOARD] Taeyang Scores 2nd Consecutive No. 1 on World Albums With ‘White Night’

Once again, Taeyang proves his power as a solo star with the release of his third solo album, White Night.

The BIGBANG singer’s latest debuts at No. 1 on Billboard‘s World Albums chartmarking his second consecutive release to do so. The new album sold 2,000 copies sold in the week ending Aug. 17, according to Nielsen Music. White Night marks the star’s second-best sales week in America, following 2014’s Rise, which also hit No. 1 on World Albums after moving 3,000 in its first week.

Among solo K-pop acts, Rise still holds the record for highest-charting album on the Billboard 200 when it hit No. 112 in June 2014, beating out entires from BoA(whose self-titled English album hit No. 127 in 2009) and G-Dragon (who has landed three titles on the Billboard 200, peaking so far with One of a Kind at No. 161 in 2013).

Taeyang is now only the second solo K-pop act to score multiple chart-toppers on World Albums. Remarkably, the only other artist to do so is his BIGBANG band mate G-Dragon, who has three No. 1s.

From his debut solo record Solar released in 2010, Taeyang has always been a R&B crooner, but has continuously grown more experimental and ambitious with genre and theme explorations.

The LP’s overarching electro-R&B theme is set by the introduction track “White Night” and sealed as it moves into the gorgeous “Wake Me Up” single with its waterfalls of moving synthesizers. The sensual standout “Naked” sees Tae passionately pleading a case for intimacy (“I want you naked/ Through the night,” he sings over punchy production) while the record’s sole collaboration on “Tonight” featuring Zico sees the guys detailing the intricate intimacies of transforming a hook up into true love among a slew of sexy lyrics (Good luck not getting chills when Taeyang closes the track belting “Let’s make love because it feels so right/ Tonight is the night/ We can’t stop, baby, won’t stop” in his best Michael Jackson impression). Yet among all the artistic boundaries Taeyang pushes here, the simple piano ballad single “Darling” mostly proves how the 29-year-old’s most precious instrument is his own voice.

Elsewhere on the Billboard charts, White Night starts at No. 5 on Heatseekers Albums (his second entry on the chart that sees few K-pop acts) and “Wake Me Up” debuts at No. 9 on the World Digital Song Sales as the fifth-best selling K-pop song in America this week. As the main artist, Taeyang peaked at No. 2 on World Digital Song Sales with 2013’s “Ringa Linga,” but also has a No. 1 with G-Dragon (credited to GD x Taeyang) with 2014’s “Good Boy.”

Taeyang also debuts on the Social 50 chart at No. 47, marking his first-ever appearance on the ranking. He’s the fourth most active K-pop act in the world this week after BTS, EXO and Seventeen. Stay tuned to Billboard.com for a deeper story into Taeyang’s social gains on Thursday.