Sara Bareilles' 'The Blessed Unrest' album debuts at No. 2

Sara Bareilles, shown during her 2010 Lilith Fair performance, has entered the Billboard 200 Albums chart at No. 2 with "The Blessed Unrest."

By Randy Lewis

July 25, 2013 11:46 AM PT

Sara Bareilles has jumped into the Billboard 200 Albums chart at No. 2 this week with her latest effort, “The Blessed Unrest,” which sold 68,000 copies in its first week of release.

That’s a bit down from the 90,000 copies out of the gate with her 2010 album, “Kaleidoscope Heart,” but enough to fend off all comers except for the reigning rapper Jay-Z, whose “Magna Carta Holy Grail” held onto the No. 1 spot for a second week with sales of 129,000, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

“Damn. The blessed unrest is #2 on Billboard top 200,” Bareilles tweeted shortly after the latest chart results were released. “I’m soooo grateful. Thank you to my incredible fans. Yowza.”

The 33-year-old Northern California native, who moved to Los Angeles and studied communications at UCLA while establishing her career as a singer and songwriter, recently relocated to New York and will be touring during the summer with OneRepublic. That tour reaches the Southland for stops Sept. 10 at the Santa Barbara Bowl and Sept. 11 at the Greek Theatre in L.A.

Here’s her chat with talk show host Craig Ferguson earlier this week on “The Late Late Show,” and her performance of “Brave,” a song she wrote with Jack Antonoff, from the new album: