{blackbabes} Everything added up for U2, Kanye, Rihanna and more

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USA TODAY measures the musical year in numbers. A look at seven in '11 who counted.

Adele

The young British singer's 21, released Feb. 22, is the year's top-selling album, with U.S. sales exceeding 5 million copies. Rollingin the Deep spent seven weeks atop Billboard's Hot 100 and has sold 5.7 million downloads, more than any song this year. And the spare Someone Like You is the first vocal/piano-only ballad to reach No. 1 in Billboard history. The album's 13 weeks at the chart summit is the longest No. 1 stretch since the Titanic soundtrack's 16-week ride in 1998. Up for six Grammys, Adele is favored to win the triple crown of best album, song and record.

The Irish quartet's ambitious 360 tour sold out 100 stadium shows, ending in July with a final gross of $736 million and total attendance of 7.3 million fans, breaking the previous world records held by the Rolling Stones. Before the year was out, the band delivered a lavish reissue of 1991's Achtung Baby, which coincided with Davis Guggenheim's highly praised From the Sky Down documentary on the making of the groundbreaking album.

Katy Perry

With The One That Got Away, her Teenage Dream becomes only the third album in history to pump out at least six top-5 hits, a peak reached by Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814 (1989) and George Michael's Faith (1987). If The One reaches No. 1, Dream will eclipse Michael Jackson's Bad to become the first album to generate six chart-toppers. Mediabase named Perry its artist of the year in top 40 and adult contemporary formats for massive airplay of such hits as Firework, E.T. and Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.).

Rihanna

The rise of new single We Found Love makes Rihanna the fastest solo artist to rack up 20 top-10 singles, breaking Madonna's record. The song, featuring Calvin Harris, perched at No. 1 for eight weeks, beat Adele's Rolling in the Deep by one week and her own seven-week runs with 2007's Umbrella and 2010's Love the Way You Lie.

Lady Gaga

Her Born This Way album had the biggest debut of the year, selling 1.1 million copies its first week. (Add an asterisk to that achievement: Amazon sold it for 99 cents.) Lil Wayne's Tha Carter IV holds second place with 964,000, and Drake's Take Care is third with 631,000. Gaga also has the monster of music Twitter accounts, with 16.6 million followers. And she's No. 1 on Forbes' 2011 list of top-earning women in music. This year's paycheck: $90 million.

Kanye West

The rapper leads the upcoming Grammy Awards pack with seven nominations for My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and his collaboration with Jay-Z, Watch the Throne.

Nicki Minaj

The hip-hop comet had eight top-40 hits this year, including her collaboration with Britney Spears on Till the World Ends. None registered with the same ka-boom, ka-ching as Super Bass, Billboard's highest-charting rap hit by a solo female since Missy Elliott's Work It in 2002. The seventh single from Pink Friday, her 2010 debut that surged to No. 1 in February, Super Bass is only the eighth rap tune by a solo female ever to crack the top 10.

Katy Perry

Rihanna

Lady Gaga

Her Born This Way album had the biggest debut of the year, selling 1.1 million copies its first week. (Add an asterisk to that achievement: Amazon sold it for 99 cents.) Lil Wayne's Tha Carter IV holds second place with 964,000, and Drake's Take Care is third with 631,000. Gaga also has the monster of music Twitter accounts, with 16.6 million followers. And she's No. 1 on Forbes' 2011 list of top-earning women in music. This year's paycheck: $90 million.

Kanye West

The rapper leads the upcoming Grammy Awards pack with seven nominations for My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and his collaboration with Jay-Z, Watch the Throne.

Nicki Minaj