Radiohead's In Rainbows goes to number one in Britain and America

The CD of In Rainbows has been number one in Britain and in America in the fortnight since it came out, and in America it sold 122,000 copies in a week.

The CD and vinyl went on sale on 31 December through XL Recordings outside North America, and on 1 January in the US through the band's TBD imprint with ATO. The October download, which Radiohead sold from their site for whatever buyers chose to pay, even nothing, could not count towards the UK chart, and the band have not given anyone its figures. Thom Yorke told Radio 4's Today programme that they would be stark raving mad⁴ not to put it out on CD.

In Britain In Rainbows went straight in at number one on the first albums chart of the year, announced on Sunday 6 January, ahead of Take That's Beautiful World and Leona Lewis's Spirit. It sold 44,602 copies in what is normally one of the quietest weeks of the year for record sales.

In America the album had already turned up on the Billboard 200 at number 156, a week early, because some shops sold the CD before the release date. On the chart Billboard announced on 9 January it went from there to number one, with Alicia Keys's As I Am at two. The band's best first week is still Hail to the Thief, which opened at number three in 2003 on 300,000, though Billboard itself calls the comparison unfair after weeks of downloads whose figures were never released.

Britain kept it at the top for a week. On today's chart Amy Macdonald's This Is the Life has climbed from six to number one, and In Rainbows is at two.

The chart run