Kanye West's Bully denied chart-topping spot by BTS

BTS has outpaced Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, to land a second week atop the US Billboard 200.

The K-pop group's latest album, Arirang, has held steady at No. 1 on the albums chart with 187,000 equivalent album units, down 71% from its opening smash of a week with 641,000, Variety reports.

Last week, Arirang became BTS' seventh No. 1 album and scored the biggest sales week for an album by a group in over a decade.

Meanwhile, Ye's Bully has entered the chart at No. 2. Bully is the rapper's 14th album to hit the top 10. It debuted with 152,000 equivalent album units, with some pundits expressing surprise at its strong performance, considering West's well-documented hate speech over the past few years.

It does, however, end his long string of No. 1 solo albums.

Bully, which was released on 28 March after numerous delays, pre-empted a pair of sold-out concerts at Los Angeles' SoFi Stadium earlier this week, where the rapper performed a handful of songs from the album, as well as past hits.

Elsewhere on the US chart, Melanie Martinez came in at No. 3 with Hades; Morgan Wallen's I'm the Problem dipped from No. 3 to 4; and Yeat debuted at No. 5 with ADL. Harry Styles' Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally slid out to No. 10.