Adele Catches Up To ‘The Bodyguard’, Whitney Houston’s Music Sales Explode

 Following her six wins at the Grammy Awards on Sunday, Adele has another feather to put in her cap: her sophomore LP 21, which sold another 237,000 last week, has tied the 20-week run at #1 by Whitney Houston’s The Bodyguard on Billboard’s Top 200 chart. The soundtrack to the 1992 film starring Houston and Kevin Costner had been the most recent LP with a stretch that long atop the chart. That said, the late Whitney’s sales also managed to surge in the short time after her tragic death on Saturday.

Adele and Whitney aren’t the only artists to spend 20 weeks at the top of the main album chart. Previously, Elvis Presley racked up the same amount of time at #1 between 1961 and 1962 with his 14th album Blue Hawaii. If 21 pulls off an appropriate 21st week at the peak of the chart — which seems a sure thing in the wake of the Grammys — Adele will be tied with MC Hammer’s stretch on top in 1990 with Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em.

After that, both Purple Rain by Prince (1984) and the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack (1978) spent 24 weeks at #1. But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves!

Back on this week’s Top 200, Van Halen’s first studio LP in 14 years, A Different Kind Of Truth, debuts at #2 (187,000). Meanwhile, Houston’s 2000 collection Whitney – The Greatest Hits re-enters at #6 on the strength of a whopping 64,000 sold by Sunday’s chart cut-off time. (Keep in mind that news of the singer’s death didn’t break until Saturday evening.) Other Whitney titles that received a posthumous bump over the weekend include Whitney Houston (in at #72 after roughly 8,000 copies were sold), The Bodyguard soundtrack (#80, 8,000), I Look To You (#118, 5,000), Whitney (#122, 5,000) and The Preacher’s Wife soundtrack (#183, 4,000).

As for Houston’s individual songs, 887,000 downloads were sold this past week. “I Will Always Love You” leads the pack with 195,000. (The 1992 chart-topper is currently #2 on iTunes, just behind Katy Perry’s new single “Part Of Me”.)

We’re in the middle of the first full chart week that will eventually reflect the full impact of Whitney’s posthumous sales, so expect many of her albums to rise up the Top 200 when Billboard’s chart data is released this time next Wednesday.
The Top 10 Of Billboard’s Top 200 Chart
1. Adele, 21 *20 weeks*
2. Van Halen, A Different Kind Of Truth *new*
3. Various, Now 41 *new*
4. The Fray, Scars & Stories *new*
5. Paul McCartney, Kisses On The Bottom *new*
6. Whitney Houston, Whitney – The Greatest Hits
7. Dierks Bentley, Home *new*
8. Various, 2012 Grammy Nominees
9. Adele, 19
10. Drake, Take Care