Years back this happened #1

Not Madonna, not Britney, Rahman's NO1
31 Jul 2002, 2225 hrs IST

Allah Rakha Rahman can take a bow. And, as incredulous as it may sound, Madonna and Britney Spears can bow out as the current top album-sellers.

It is now out that AR Rahman sells more albums than Madonna and Britney Spears put together. According to the UK paper The News Of The World, Rahman is said to have sold a mind-boggling 200 million albums worldwide. That's still 50 million more than Madonna (cited at 130 million) and Spears (20 million) collectively. It was Andrew Lloyd Webber who put it in words first: ''Rahman is probably the highest selling musician in the world at the moment, if you were to go by airplay and album sales alone.
But the fact remains that every album sold in the US or in the UK is officially registered as a sale and adds to the numbers which end up as the 'official' figures to chart the progress of an album or single. But although Indian albums notch up significant sales and are brought here by relatives and friends, there is no proper mechanism in place to log those sales.''

Despite such voluminous sales, why is Rahman not on, say, the Billboard list? Bias? ''Perhaps,'' hints Webber, ''there could be reservations among the managers of these lists about featuring someone unknown to the West.'' That, for AR Rahman, is a jarring note.

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News courtesy:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/17693146.cms
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