Linggom Roy M. Napitupulu

Adele and Jones both appeal to an "upper-demo", adult contemporary audience, though Adele has also broken through to a young, singles-buying demographic with three #1 hits on the Hot 100. (By contrast, Jones' highest-charting single to date, "Don't Know Why," peaked at #30.)

A total of 25 albums have sold 5 million or more copies in the last 10 years. Four artists have reached that plateau with two albums in this period: Eminem, 50 Cent, Taylor Swift and Josh Groban. (Groban, somewhat surprisingly, is the only artist with two albums among the 20 best-sellers of the last 10 years. His 2003 studio album Closer is the 16th best-selling album of the last 10 years. His 2007 holiday album Noel is the 19th best-seller for this period.)

Nielsen SoundScan has tracked sales for Billboard since 1991. It maintains a running list of the 200 best-selling albums in its history, but that list is dominated by albums from the 1990s and early 2000s, when overall sales were much more robust than they are today. Phenomenal hits like 21 were much more common back then. It's almost unfair to compare albums from that era to albums from the last decade. So I extracted this list, of the best-selling albums of the last 10 years, from Nielsen SoundScan's larger list. Now we're comparing apples to apples.

Here are all albums that have sold 5 million or more copies in the last 10 years. The sales tally is the number of albums the album has sold from the week ending March 10, 2002 to the week ending March 11, 2012. I cap each entry by showing the month of the album's release and the album's current rank on Nielsen SoundScan's running list of the top 200 best-selling albums since 1991.

1. Norah Jones, Come Away With Me, 10,797,000. Top 200 rank: #11.
2. Eminem, The Eminem Show, 10,049,000. Top 200 rank: #18.
3. Usher, Confessions, 9,968,000. Top 200 rank: #19.
4. Adele, 21, 8,090,000. Top 200 rank: #39.
5. 50 Cent, Get Rich Or Die Tryin', 8,086,000. Top 200 rank: #41.
6. Evanescence, Fallen, 7,619,000. Top 200 rank: #51.
7. Nickelback, All The Right Reasons, 7,582,000. Top 200 rank: #53.
8. Carrie Underwood, Some Hearts, 7,177,000. Top 200 rank: #62.
9. Avril Lavigne, Let Go, 6,782,000. Top 200 rank: #71.
10. Taylor Swift, Fearless, 6,514,000. Top 200 rank: #76.
11. Nelly, Nellyville, 6,488,000. Top 200 rank: #78.
12. Kelly Clarkson, Breakaway, 6,219,000. Top 200 rank: #85.
13. Green Day, American Idiot, 6,056,000. Top 200 rank: #93.
14. Dixie Chicks, Home, 6,041,000. Top 200 rank: #94.
15. Mariah Carey, The Emancipation Of Mimi, 5,964,000. Top 200 rank: #101.
16. Josh Groban, Closer, 5,960,000. Top 200 rank: #102.
17. Linkin Park, Meteora, 5,913,000. Top 200 rank: #103.
18. OutKast, Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, 5,702,000. Top 200 rank: #110.
19. Josh Groban, Noel, 5,446,000. Top 200 rank: #127.
20. Shania Twain, Up!, 5,409,000. Top 200 rank: #129.
21. 50 Cent, The Massacre, 5,286,000. Top 200 rank: #136.
22. Eminem, Encore, 5,282,000. Top 200 rank: #137.
23. Rascal Flatts, Feels Like Today, 5,230,000. Top 200 rank: #140.
24. Taylor Swift, Taylor Swift, 5,175,000. Top 200 rank: #143.
25. Guns N' Roses, Greatest Hits, 5,161,000. Top 200 rank: #144.

Want me to keep going? These albums didn't quite sell 5 million copies in the past 10 years, but they came close: Rascal Flatt's Me And My Gang (4,918,000); Daughtry's Daughtry (4,873,000); High School Musical (4,867,000, the best-selling soundtrack of the last 10 years); 8 Mile (4,854,000, the best-selling movie soundtrack of the last 10 years); Beyonce's Dangerously In Love (4,825,000); Coldplay's A Rush Of Blood To The Head (4,822,000); Maroon 5's Songs About Jane (4,808,000); Elvis Presley's Elv1s: 30 #1 Hits (4,805,000); Michael Jackson's Number Ones (4,753,000); Alicia Keys' Diary Of Alicia Keys (4,650,000); Norah Jones' Feels Like Home (4,629,000) and Gretchen Wilson's Here For The Party (4,594,000).

If you're curious to know how many copies key "catalog" albums have sold in the last 10 years, here you go: Michael Jackson's Thriller (4,546,000), Bob Marley & the Wailers' Legend (4,194,000); the Beatles' 1 (3,924,000); Pink Floyd's The Dark Side Of The Moon (3,743,000); Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band's Greatest Hits (3,623,000); Journey's Greatest Hits (3,309,000); Creedence Clearwater Revival's Chronicle (The 20 Greatest Hits) (2,868,000); Queen's Greatest Hits (2,624,000); Abba's Gold - Greatest Hits (2,497,000) and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' Greatest Hits (2,455,000).