MTV Awards Help Push Keys to No. 1

System of a Down, a Los Angeles hard-rock quartet whose music is built around a raging sound and socially conscious themes, is certainly up when it comes to sales.

The group’s “Toxicity” entered the national album chart at No. 2 Wednesday after selling 170,000 copies in its first week in the stores, according to SoundScan.

In reviewing “Toxicity” for The Times, Lina Lecaro praised the collection for its individuality in a crowded field of “sound-alike metal men whose ferocious (and familiar) formula offers little more than mindless aggression and homogenized angst.”

System might have made it all the way to No. 1 if it had performed on the MTV Video Music Awards last Thursday. Several of the acts that did perform on the show, including pop-soul singer Alicia Keys, experienced sales spurts.

Keys, whose performance was one of the telecast’s highlights, jumped three places to No. 1 on this week’s chart by selling another 192,000 copies of her debut album, “Songs in A Minor.” This brings the album’s total sales to 2.1 million.

Other acts in the Top 10 this week who were presumably helped by MTV appearances were Staind (whose album jumped from No. 13 to No. 6), Linkin Park (No. 11 to No. 7) and ‘N Sync (No. 12 to No. 9).

Aaliyah, the 22-year-old R&B; vocalist whose album soared to No. 1 last week in a wave of emotion following her death in an Aug. 25 plane crash, fell to third after selling 161,000 copies last week. Though the figure was down sharply from the 306,000 copies registered the previous week, it pushes the album’s total to just under 1 million copies.

The remaining places in the Top 10 were claimed by the seventh volume in the “Now That’s What I Call Music” hit compilation series (No. 4), Mary J. Blige (No. 5), Maxwell (No. 8) and Afroman (No. 10). The nation’s best-selling single is Jagged Edge’s “Where the Party At?”