Album of the Week: 25, by Adele

The minute I heard Adele had a new album coming out, I was searching for a way to pre-order it. My wife and I were disheartened to find out the vinyl we ordered would not make it to our house the day it was released. Some media reports had suggested she would not tour her latest album as she does not like leaving her three-year-old son Angelo.

In just four days, her “21” follow-up album has already broken the record that NSYNC holds – 2.4 million sales in seven days – as her album sales already went up to 2.43 million units.

Fans have been eagerly awaiting the news, as this will be the singer’s first tour in four years.

Adele’s 25 has now officially sold just over 3 million copies in the USA, according to Nielsen Music.

The 27 year old, who was educated at the Brit School in south London, the same stage school as Amy Winehouse and Leona Lewis, sold more than 30m copies of her last album, “21” which won multiple Grammys including Album of the Year.

The story begins and ends in 1983 – Motown’s 25th anniversary – and travels back in time to show how Gordy helped start the careers of Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye and many more.

Adele’s third studio album is already the biggest selling album of 2015. Not only does she belt out songs that become instant hits and can reduce you to tears in a grocery store, she keeps it real, gives swear-packed interviews, and shows great deftness with liquid eyeliner.

The boy band’s No Strings Attached sold 2.416 million albums in its first week.

Following her words, the album was made available at Pandora along with their radio outlet. Yeah, we’re still doing the record-record-record thing, what of it? Or are you stoked because, like, Adele is just that awesome? “I’ve always done this, and Hello was on there (streaming sites) because it’s on radio, so it’s out there…” The presence of no less than 11 different producers – matching the number of songs on the record – means that Adele’s personality and her spectacular voice are the unifying factors here more than any kind of signature sound.

The lyrics are also much more poetic than what we might expect from Adele’s usual, candid style.