Adele 's phenomenal chart success has been great news not only for herself, her fans probably the commercial music industry as a whole, but it's also pleased a great deal of statistics nuts, the sort who enjoy quoting endless figures to each other in an attempt to achieve some sort of revered oracle status. Perhaps. The latest stat regarding the 23 year-old is that she just overtook Michael Jackson's seminal album 'Bad' in the all-time UK Album Chart list following another upsurge in sales of '21' after her Brits success and, no doubt more importantly, speech snub.
The Official Chart Company reports that Adele has now racked up sales of over 4 million copies for her second album '21' which sees her leapfrog 'Bad' into 8th position on the all-time list. 'Bad sits on a shade under 4 million; who sense a Facebook campaign? Anyone? Unsurprisingly in these illegal file sharing times, it also makes the album the biggest selling of the 21st century, and now just 1.8 million copies short of the UK's largest selling album of all time, Queen's 'Greatest Hits.' A fair distance away yet, some might say, but let's not forget Adele achieved those sales in the space of a year. Queen's 'Greatest Hits' came out in 1981.
A couple more statistics since we're here: Adele's '21' has spent 57 weeks in the UK Album Chart, never once leaving the Top 10. Worldwide meanwhile it has sold well over 18 million copies; with figures like that, you wonder whether the music industry might try and persuade the star to get cracking on with her third record right away. They sure need it.