black album

Last night (June 9) Metallica headlined night two of the massive stage at the Download Festival at Castle Donington in Leicestershire, U.K. but according to Download Festival booker Andy Copping, the dream show almost never happened.

Billboard and Nielsen SoundScan have just released a list of the top-selling albums of the SoundScan era (1991-2011). Coming in at No. 1 with more than 15 million units sold to date is Metallica‘s self-titled 1991 disc, aka The Black Album.

At the close of 2010, Metallica’s Metallica (the “Black Album”) remains the biggest selling album of the SoundScan era. The Metallica disc has sold 15,620,000 units since SoundScan began tracking sales in 1991. The album boasted...