People sure do like Adele. It’s really something. The British singer can disappear for years at a time and then return with another album that sounds like virtually nothing else that’s happening in pop music. And then right away, she eclipses everyone else. In an era when streaming has come to define the music business, people actually buy Adele’s albums. This past Friday, Adele released her long-awaited new LP 30. Within three days, 30 had already become America’s biggest-selling album of 2021.

Admittedly, when you’re talking about actual sales figures, you don’t have to do Thriller numbers to get the crown these days. Up until the past few days, the highest-selling album of 2021 was Taylor Swift’s evermore, which came out at the end of 2020 and sold 462,000 copies during this calendar year. Swift also had the biggest pre-Adele first-week sales of the year; her Red (Taylor’s Version) moved 369,000 units the week before Adele released 30. In three days, Adele beat both of those totals.

Billboard reports that Adele shifted more than 500,000 copies of 30 in the first three days of release. That would make the album a hit in any era. The 500,000 number doesn’t involve streaming, and 30 is doing big numbers there, as well. Still, some significant number of people who rarely buy or stream albums are still picking up the Adele record as soon as they can. Meanwhile, Taylor Swift, who no longer reigns over all those charts, can still brag that she’s got the longest #1 hit in history.