Just as Adele won a whole mess of Grammys, flipped the bird at the BRIT Awards and generally makes her triumphant return, she has her best sales week ever (730,000 copies). “21” is No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart for a 21st nonconsecutive week, breaking the record for the longest-running No. 1 album (since Billboard began tracking using SoundScan in 1991).

Let’s put it this way: 2.34% of the U.S. population now owns “21.”

And a happy 1st birthday to you, “21.”

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This week’s very special issue: Billboard’s Power 100 List

You may not know Irving Azoff by face, or even by name, but rest assured that the chairman of Live Nation ­- the world’s largest promoter, ticketing company and artist management group - is the most powerful person in the music industry. Azoff topped the first-ever Billboard Power 100 list, a ranking of where power and influence resides in the music business and the industries that intersect with it.Find out who else made the list.

While most of the executives on the list are behind-the-scenes power players, there are 11 names that even casual music fans will instantly recognize. Jay, Bey, U2, Gaga… they’re right up there, too. 

This week’s cover, featuring Kobalt founder/CEO Willard Ahdritz, who just may be changing the music biz…

Ever heard of Kobalt Music Group?

If you haven’t, just ask Pearl Jam, Tiësto, Kid Cudi, LMFAO, DJ Shadow, Neil Finn and Joss Stone.

They’re among the artist/songwriters who have signed administration deals with the music publishing company during the past two years. They join a growing list of other Kobalt clients that includes Lukasz “Dr. Luke” Gottwald, Max Martin, Kelly Clarkson, Skrillex, Bon Iver, Trent Reznor, Toby Keith, Vince Gill, Herbie Hancock, Rufus Wainwright and OneRepublic’s Ryan Tedder.

How has Kobalt managed to build up such a high-powered roster? By providing what it says is a new approach to music publishing: delivering royalty payments with greater transparency and accountability.

Sneak peek: Love her or hate her (and trust us, it’s usually a polarizing reaction), Lana Del Rey covers our Best Bets 2012 issue. Full cover story hits Billboard.com tomorrow.

Vintage Billboard: 1968 ad for The Beatles’ “White Album,” in which Apple’s main goal was to highlight the album’s offered formats. Oh technology, oh 8-tracks.

Simply put, Adele owned 2011. The kicky, 23-year-old British singer released her second album, the break-up requiem “21,” in February, and in barely 11 months, she has already sold more than any artist in the world, currently inching towards 13 million globally. But it wasn’t just heartbreak that made her popular. In contemporary music, Adele is one of a kind, a woman who thrives off no bells and whistles, just pure personality and talent (and the ability to make the toughest curmudgeon cry). And that’s why she’s Billboard’s Artist of the Year, both on the charts and well, in our hearts.

Despite it all, Adele has been living in exile, of sorts. After having surgery to remove a benign polyp from her throat, she was not allowed so speak for weeks, never mind sing. We emailed her a few days before she was nominated for six Grammys (by which she expects to be vocally recovered) to discuss her astronomical success and, naturally, true love. An excerpt…

Billboard: It’s been a long year. Have you found love again?

Adele: It’s been the most erratic year. It’s been fucking brilliant and exciting and emotional. Professionally, it’s been a year that will define my life forever. But because of the success, obviously things have been unearthed and people have crawled out of the woodwork publicly and privately. But that’s to be expected. And those things personally have forced me to address things I wouldn’t have. I probably wouldn’t have until my thirties.

Not having someone to share all this with made me miserable at times, to be honest. I wanted nothing more than to be in love and be loved back. That was until I remembered I was sharing it with millions and millions and millions of people!! I haven’t been ready to be in love again since summer 2009… until now. And I hadn’t met anyone along the way who has changed that.

I love that Robyn lyric from “Call Your Girlfriend”: “The only way her heart will mend is when she learns to love again.” I was bitter as fuck and so sad about my relationship that “21” is about. Obviously it was intensified because the record exploded, and it was a constant reminder of him that I couldn’t avoid. But I hadn’t met anyone else. I missed him because I didn’t like feeling lonely and so I just kept going over and over the fuck-ups and resenting him and regretting our time together. But really recently, I realized that that had to happen for me to know what I want and need from myself. And of course in someone else.

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Vintage Billboard: 1956 ad from Atlantic Records, the leading R&B label at the time.

buzzfeed:

Our friends at EW.com saw this yesterday and thought that we were being “rabble-rousers” for posting it. Only took 11+ months to be called “rabble-rousers” in 2011!

[12 Extremely Disappointing Facts About Popular Music]

Because this doesn’t oversimplify the music industry one bit, and has nothing to do with “TiK ToK” being sold on iTunes for less than a dollar.

Different record industry back then, different distribution models now.

Today’s big (albeit expected) Spotify announcement? A new (sort of public) API platform. What does that mean for all you music fans? Well, do you like any of the above brands (hint hint: Billboard)? They’ll soon have their own Spotify apps, where they’ll curate streaming playlists and the like.

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