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Adele Tops Nielsen SoundScan Charts

English singer Adele topped Nielsen SoundScan’s mid-year sales charts, being the only artist to sell more than one million units this year.

According to Billboard, the Grammy-winning artist’s album 21 has sold 3.69 million units, and Gotye’s “Somebody That I Used to Know” (featuring Kimbra) took the top spot on the charts for digital song with 5.5 million sold.

This is the first time in the history of the tracking system’s 21 years that only one artist sold more than one million units before the mid-year sales charts.

Lionel Ritchie’s Tuskagee ranked second on the charts with 912,000 and British boy band One Direction landed the third spot with Up All Night.

Photo Courtesy of One Direction
Main Photo Courtesy Adele

In 2011, 21 and Lady Gaga’s Born This Way were the only two albums to surpass the one million mark for the mid-year charts, with 16 albums passing half a million. This year 11 albums have sold 500,000 units so far.

Adele's album is one of the nine albums on the list that were released last year. Another nine were released this year and two, Whitney Houston’s Whitney: The Greatest Hits and Adele’s 19, were from 2000 and 2008 respectively.

Adele also led the charts in the 2011 mid-year sales charts and 2011 year-end charts. If the Londoner’s sales continue to hold off the rest of the music industry and she ranks first at the year-end sales, Adele will be the first artist to top the Nielsen SoundScan’s charts for two consecutive years.

Although album sales are down 3% from this time last year, singles are doing well. Gotye and fun. are the only two artists to pass 5 million. “Somebody That I Used to Know” is still selling well and ranking high on the charts, which could cause the single to be the first track to reach 6 million units in a year.

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