A dogged DMX just misses out

THIS may be “The Year of the Dog ... Again,” as rapper DMX puts it in the title of his album, but it fell just short of being the Yonkers, N.Y.-bred rhymer’s week. His album entered the national sales chart at No. 2 on Wednesday, shy of grabbing No. 1 away from the 22nd volume of the “Now That’s What I Call Music!” hits series.

“Now 22” sold 127,156 copies during its fourth week in stores, claiming the top spot for the third time since it was released. “Year of the Dog” sold 125,739, breaking DMX’s streak of No. 1 debuts for his previous five albums, according to Billboard.

Arriving at No. 3 is another compilation album, “Kidz Bop 10,” the youth-oriented series featuring children singing off-key renditions of pop hits, this batch posting first week sales of 117,000 copies with versions of Daniel Powter’s “Bad Day” and Madonna’s “Hung Up.”

Hard-rock band Stone Sour lands at No. 4 after selling 81,000 copies of its latest, “Come What(ever) May.” Five For Fighting scored the highest debut of its career with the group’s fourth album, “Two Lights,” which enters the chart at No. 8 on sales of 52,000 copies, according to the Nielsen/SoundScan sales monitoring service.