Adele’s ’21’ Proves To Be A Powerhouse, Debuts At #1

Adele’s steady stateside promotion for her sophomore album 21 has more than paid off, as the album has crashed into the #1 position on Billboard‘s Top 200 chart with first-week sales of 352,000 copies. Over in the UK, the 22-year-old London singer is at the top of both the album and single charts. Now she’s proving to be as much of a sales draw on this side of the pond. Billboard notes that 21‘s initial outing marks the best one-week sales for an LP since Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and Nicki Minaj’s Pink Friday debuted at #1 and #2, respectively, with 496,000 and 375,000 late year.

21 knocks Justin Bieber’s Never Say Never — The Remixes down to #2 after a one-week run at the top. Biebs sold another 102,000 copies of his movie tie-in LP last week, bringing its two-week total to 263,000.

The rest of the Top 10 mostly contains various other albums still benefiting from a post-Grammys boost. Might we expect Adele’s album to be still hovering around during awards season next year?

The Top 10 of Billboard’s Top 200 chart:

1. Adele, 21 *new* *1 week* 2. Justin Bieber, Never Say Never — The Remixes 3. Mumford & Sons, Sigh No More 4. Various, NOW 37 5. Justin Bieber, My World 2.0 6. Bruno Mars, Doo-Wops & Hooligans 7. Eminem, Recovery 8. Rihanna, Loud 9. Nicki Minaj, Pink Friday 10. Lady Antebellum, Need You Now