phanan said:
Oasis wasn't the biggest recording artist in the world in 95/96. Biggest rock band, yes, but not overall.
Morning Glory has worldwide sales of 18 million, which is incredible, but there were other artists whose records sold more during this same period.
Alanis Morrisette's Jagged Little Pill came out the same year, and it has worldwide sales of 29 million, far outpacing Oasis.
And as much as I hate her, Celine Dion had not one, but TWO albums during 95/96:
Fallen Into You - 29 million
Let's Talk About Love - 30 million
Yes, sick, isn't it? Why bother? But that's beside the point.
Shania Twain and The Fugees also had the same worldwide album sales as Oasis around this time too.
Even Hootie & The Blowfish's debut from 1995 comes in at 17 million.
So Oasis was the biggest rock band for those two years, but not the biggest overall artist, or even the biggest rock act. Alanis beats them there.
Just getting the specifics out of the way for argument's sake.
Lets not forget though that album sales are only half of the equation for determining the biggest artist out there. The other half is concert drawing power. That area drags a lot of the artist above down as their concert drawing power is very weak compared to their album sales.
"Morning Glory" sold almost 16 million copies in its first two years of release, but the bands concert drawing power was comparitively very weak. The band played primarily single concert dates in most cities and only in Arena's. There were few if any multiple arena dates in the same city and almost no stadium shows outside of the United Kingdom.