20 or 25 years?
2001:Top Selling Albums from 2001:
https://www.billboard.com/charts/year-end/2001/top-billboard-200-albums#1 Selling Albums from 2001:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_200_number-one_albums_of_20011 The Beatles
J. Lo Jennifer Lopez
Hot Shot Shaggy
Everyday Dave Matthews Band
Until the End of Time 2Pac Amaru
Now That's What I Call Music! 6 Various Artists
All for You Janet Jackson
Survivor Destiny's Child
Lateralus Tool
Break the Cycle Staind
Take Off Your Pants and Jacket Blink-182
Devil's Night D12
Songs in A Minor Alicia Keys J
Celebrity NSYNC
Now That's What I Call Music! 7 Various Artists
Now Maxwell
Aaliyah Aaliyah
Toxicity System of a Down
The Blueprint Jay-Z
Pain Is Love Ja Rule
God Bless America: For the Benefit of the Twin Towers Fund Various Artists
The Great Depression DMX
Invincible Michael Jackson
Britney Britney Spears
Scarecrow Garth Brooks
Weathered Creed
Top Selling Album (in the USA) from 2001
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_albums_by_year_in_the_United_StatesHybrid Theory Linkin Park
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1996:Top 200 Selling Albums of 1996
https://www.billboard.com/charts/year-end/1996/top-billboard-200-albumsNumber 1 Albums from 1996:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Billboard_200_number-one_albums_of_1996Daydream Mariah Carey
Waiting to Exhale Whitney Houston
Jagged Little Pill Alanis Morissette
All Eyez on Me 2Pac Death Row
Anthology 2 The Beatles
Evil Empire Rage Against the Machine
Fairweather Johnson Hootie & the Blowfish
The Score Fugees
Load Metallica
It Was Written Nas
Beats, Rhymes and Life A Tribe Called Quest
No Code Pearl Jam
Home Again New Edition
Falling into You Celine Dion
From the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah Nirvana
Falling into You Celine Dion
Recovering the Satellites Counting Crows
Best Of – Volume I Van Halen
Anthology 3 The Beatles
The Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory
Tha Doggfather Snoop Doggy Dogg
Razorblade Suitcase Bush
Tragic Kingdom No Doubt
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Just using those 2 years as a sample, at least in terms of Billboard CHARTS and SALES, I really don't think there's any new album (exluding Compilations and live albums) that remotely that would be considered a "great" album (or all-time classic) that has crossed demographics and frequently heard in pop-culture today. Maybe Jagged Little Pill in some ways, but that's debateable.
I think only time really tells, but if there is one reasonable observation I and many others have made, popular music has become much less accessible (which sounds like a contradiction in terms) every decade. Not only about the SONGS but the ALBUMS.
If you look at history, each decade since the 90's, music and albums included, have become more niche and had a more fragmented appeal. So much so, Popular music and Popular albums have become less and less recognizable.
Downloading, Streaming, YouTube and the way music is consumed has changed things so dramatically, that has had a lot to do with it. But I also think the BUSINESS of music has played a big part of that. Making music and releasing albums have become more about how to make as much money, or how to avoid losing money, unless you are in a small fraction of artists on a major label that pays for it.
If you think about it, more songs and albums reached more people (and probably just had more creativity) through MTV/Videos and listening to the Radio. Even magazines and going to the Record/Music stores. But now, music consumers and album buyers have their tastes catered to specific algorythms and whatever their friends have on their Spotify Playlists or Tik Tok videos. They don't get exposed to many songs and albums they may have a few decades ago.
In other words, a "great" album may be out there, with many great tunes, but it will never reach the % of people it would have a generation or 2 ago because of the way music is consumed now.
I also think part of it is creativity and how there just may not be enough left to do, given Rock and Pop music as an artform is not new anymore. I.e. most of what can be done, has been done. New music does come out that is well written and creative, but it's nearly impossible to not find it to sound like or be compared to something that came before it.
A good example of that is Billboard and stuff like the WatchMojo Decade Lists for NEW songs and NEW albums (excluding compilations, and live albums). Each Decade from the 90's on, the lists become less and less recognizable (if not just worse), and certainly less iconic at this point. I think that is a product on how the most popular and highest selling music since the 90's has reached less people (and in a lot of ways because it has become that much worse).