RUBEN STUDDARD - ANOTHER AMERICAN IDOL HITS THE TOP

Chubby soul star RUBEN STUDDARD has rounded off a very good year for TV talent show AMERICAN IDOL by racing to the top of the album charts with his debut SOULFUL.

Studdard, who was the second-season American Idol winner, joins runner-up CLAY AIKEN and first season winner KELLY CLARKSON as 2003's American Idol chart-toppers.

The larger-than-life singer's debut sold 416,500 copies in its first week, according to new estimates, to kick ALICIA KEYS' THE DIARY OF ALICIA KEYS off the top of the charts.

Elsewhere in the American album charts, ROD STEWART enjoyed a pre-Christmas burst on his album AS TIME GOES BY: THE GREAT AMERICAN SONG BOOK VOL 2. Sales of 204,000 copies took the album's total over the one million mark.

And BRITNEY SPEARS' IN THE ZONE also crept past the one million sales mark with a healthy 158,000 week of sales.