Kanye West has overtaken Taylor Swift to become the top-selling American artist in Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) history, after a fresh wave of certifications in the United States pushed his career sales to 271 million units, the organisation announced on Friday 17 July.
The RIAA's latest batch of updates marks the first time an American artist has officially crossed 250 million certified units across albums and singles in the body's 72-year history of tracking sales and streaming equivalents. West and Swift, whose rivalry has shadowed pop culture since the 2009 MTV VMAs incident, now find their names locked together again, this time in the cold, unforgiving realm of numbers.
