UPDATE - 5/3@3:28PM: Here's a quick FYI. For anybody who hasn't gotten the album yet and wants to listen to it, just go to Rush.net. They are streaming the entire album. You can't skip tracks or anything - but they're playing the whole thing. Thanks to highfocus for the heads up.

Based on one-day sales reports, Snakes & Arrows is on track to debut at #3 on the charts in its first week of release according to HITS Daily Double (free registration required). Ne-yo's Because of You will likely take the #1 spot and Michael Buble's Call me Irresponsible the #2. From the site:

BECAUSE OF YOU, NE-YO'S ON TOP: Reprise's Michael Buble, Atlantic's Rush Both On Target to Go Over 100k

May 2, 2007

Def Jam Urban star Ne-Yo is on target to hit #1 on next week’s HITS Top 50 Album chart, displacing Arista’s Avril Lavigne after two weeks.

His new album, Because of You, could hit the 250k mark in first-week sales, according to one-day sales reports from our crack group of retailers around the country… at least those still sober enough to call in after four rousing days close-talking with our own Mark Pearson at NARM.

Reprise crooner Michael Buble’s Call Me Irresponsible is proving irresistible to record buyers to the tune of just this side of 200k, enough to make it #2 next week.

Anthem/Atlantic prog-rock progenitors Rush return with Snakes and Arrows, the latest album in the Canadian group’s long and impressive career, with an estimated one-week total of 110k. ...

Thanks to reader deke for the heads up. Snakes & Arrows is also still holding at #2 on Amazon and #5 on iTunes US.

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