Usher Charts Three Hits in Top 10 This Week - 'Burn' at #1, 'Yeah!' at #4, 'Confessions II' at #8 - First Solo-Artist Since The Beatles in 1964 and the Bee Gees in 1978!

Confessions Album Hits 4-Times Platinum in 9th Week at #1

Usher earns four BET Awards nominations, to perform on June 29th show

Usher Tallies 9 Teen Choice Award Nominations, Show will air August 11th on Fox

PRNewswire
NEW YORK
06/07/2004

It only took 40 years -- and the phenom of LaFace recording artist Usher's 4-times platinum #1 CONFESSIONS album -- for three singles by the same artist to appear inside the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 this week.

With "Burn" in its 2nd week at #1 on the Hot 100, "Yeah!" featuring Lil' Jon and Ludacris at #4 (it previously spent 12 weeks at #1), and the album's newest single "Confessions II" at #8, Usher has carved another record for himself in pop music history. This put Usher in "extremely rare territory," wrote Fred Bronson in Billboard, only the third lead artist in pop music history -- but the first solo artist -- to land three hits inside the top 10 in the same week, matching The Beatles in 1964 and The Bee Gees in 1978.

This success follows the March 23rd in-store week of CONFESSIONS, when it debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 and Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums charts, and set an astonishing seven Soundscan sales records. On Billboard's Hot R&B/ Hip-Hop Singles chart this week, "Burn" bullets to the #1 spot, "Confessions II" moves up the list to #4, and "Yeah!" -- which spent 12 weeks at #1 -- hangs in at #11 after an incredible 23 weeks, almost 6 months!

Earlier this week in Los Angeles, at the announcement of the 3rd annual BET Awards, Usher earned four nominations: Best Male R&B Artist, and Video Of The Year, Best Collaboration, and Viewers' Choice, all for "Yeah!" featuring Lil' Jon and Ludacris. The 2004 BET Awards spectacular, which will feature a live performance of "Yeah!" is set for June 29th from the Kodak Theatre in Los Angeles.

Fresh from recent announcement of his nine nominations for this year's Teen Choice Awards, the most for any artist nominated this year. The Teen Choice Awards tapes August 8th in Los Angeles and will air on Fox on August 11th. Usher is off to Los Angeles this week for the "Confessions II" video shoot with director Chris Robinson (credits Alicia Key's "A Women's Worth; Jay- Z's "Anything"; Monica's "So Gone" and may more) MTV's "Making The Video" series will cover the shoot for an installment to air on June 29th.

   Contact:
   Chris Chambers, 212.930.1603
   Email: chris.chambers@bmg.com

SOURCE: BMG

CONTACT: Chris Chambers of BMG, +1-212-930-1603, or
chris.chambers@bmg.com