'N Sync Top Seller of 2000
January 3 -- The album's called No Strings Attached, but judging from how it flew out of stores in 2000, there were plenty of consumers who had no intention of severing ties with 'N Sync. The pop quintet's second album sold 9,936,104 copies in 2000 since its March release, according to sales tracker SoundScan, making it the year's best-selling record by a margin of 2 million copies. That enormous figure was also enough to make it the ninth-best-selling album since 1991, when SoundScan adopted its current method of tabulating sales.
The boy band wasn't the only act to avoid the sophomore slump in grand style: Controversial rapper Eminem and Britney Spears earned the second and third spots on the best seller list — both with their second album.
Eminem sold 7,921,107 copies of The Marshall Mathers LP, which was released May 23, while Spears' Oops! … I Did It Again, released a week earlier, sold 7,893,544 units.
Not all of the year's top sellers were released in 2000, however. Creed's Human Clay, which sold 6,587,834 copies to earn the fourth spot on the list, came out in September 1999 — it hovered near the top 10 throughout 2000 and will even come in at No. 6 on the next Billboard Top 200 albums chart.
Santana's Supernatural, similarly, was first released in June 1999, but continued radio play and the album's success at last year's Grammys helped sell another 5,857,824 copies of it, making it the fifth-best in 2000.
Dr. Dre's 2001, released in November 1999, also saw strong sales throughout the past year, moving 3,992,311 copies for the ninth position on the list, while Destiny's Child sold 3,802,165 copies of Writing's on the Wall this year, though the album hit stores in July 1999.
Two albums became top sellers with a remarkably short amount of time on the shelves: 1, the greatest-hits collection from The Beatles, was released Nov. 14 but sold an incredible 5,068,300 units in the final month and a half of 2000. The Backstreet Boys' Black & Blue, released a week later, grabbed the No. 8 slot with sales of 4,289,865 copies.
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