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Hi Thomas,
Yeah that downturn in sales/popularity post Back In Black is weird. I know FTATR went to #1 in the US and #3 in UK but it's not a very well loved or remembered album these days, with 9 of it's 10 tracks under 3.5m streams. Then it kind of goes into total free fall, with that run of three albums all performing terribly, especially FOTS managing just over 10m streams in total, before a big lift with Razors Edge and Thunderstruck in particular, in 1990.
True. And I know I'm biased, but I love those albums. Not just semi classic songs like Let's Get it Up, Guns For Hire, Sink the Pink and Heatseeker, but also deeper cuts like Breaking the Rules, This House is on Fire, Fly on the Wall, Send for the Man, Two's Up and many more. I fully rate these albums as high as the likes of Ballbreaker and Stiff Upper Lip.
And even the title track of FTATR seem underappreciated these days. 34M streams is healthy, but I mean this is a bonafide AC/DC classic, they've finished almost every show with this one ever since release. The Grand Finale! Canons and all! It really should be right up there, well maybe not with the top 3 giants, but say with T.N.T., Hells Bells, DDDDC and Shoot to Thrill.
I'm a far bigger fan of the Bon Scott era, Powerage being possibly my favourite, an album which I also think is under listened to. Cold Hearted Man, is easily one of my top 5 DC songs ever, why it was left off the original US release and still is, I'll never know.
I feel the same way about IALWTTT (IYWRR), as you do with FTATR, it should be higher than just over 61m. It's just pure AC/DC for me and the video, on that float, with the bagpipes, will always be my favourite video/footage of them.
I do like a lot of tracks from those albums between FTATR to RE but even though I own them, they really don't get listened to very often, probably over 25 years since I've fully listened to any of them. The albums after that, I just don't really do, heard them when they came out but apart from Black Ice I've never listened to them again.
I'll pick the Bon Scott era too, if I have to choose. Let There Be Rock is my fave album of all time. Amazing from start to finish.
But yeah, Powerage is very underrated, grew up with vinyl, and was also disppointed that CHM isn't on the CD (=US vinyl). Streaming wise it has benefitted from the inclusion on Iron Man 2. Once a rarity, but now in the top half of Powerage with over 2.5M.
Your IALWTTT and my FTATR could probably have benefitted too 🙂
I take it you mean Backtracks, not Iron Man 2. Yeah I wore out my old UK vinyl LP copy a long time ago.
No actually. I did mean that CHM streams are high compared to other rarities like Crabsody in Blue and Carry Me Home - because it is also included on IM2, the closest thing to a AC/DC best of (even without IALWTTT, DDDDC, HB, FTATR & YSMANL)
The song IS their best rarity as well, but I'm sure IM2 helped, I believe it helped other tracks too, like Evil Walks for example.
I completely missed it on Iron Man 2, as I always go to Backtracks, when I listen to it on Spotify.
Being British, I've never really thought of it as a rarity. Luckily for me it's always been Side 2 Track 4 on Powerage. It's such a good track for me, that I have never understood why, come the CD release and re-release that they always give us the 9 track, US version. It's not as if time or space is an issue.
Since you've compiled their Spotify streams, do you also want to do their Youtube streams and publish a Streaming Masters for them. I was going to do them next but seeing as you've already completed one half of the analysis?
Not sure I remember how to publish it, lol.
But I still got the old excel sheet, so I can update the streaming figures in there and mail you if you like.
Martin, I'll wait a couple of weeks and then update the excel sheet to coincide with the one year anniversary of the AC/DC CSPC. Where would you like me to send it?
Hi Thomas, no worries, that's great.
I've sent you an email etc explaining what to do with the data and where to send it, once it's completed.
Today Shoot To Thrill passed 100M plays on Spotify.
As this is the 4th song from Back in Black to do so, that album joins a very exclusive club of pre-2000 albums to achieve this. Previously only MJ's Thriller, Dr. Dre's 2001 and Pearl Jam's Ten have done so.
However, a couple of other albums are very close.
Here's the list of pre-2000 albums with the biggest 4th song on Spotify:
1 Michael Jackson Thriller (1982)
P.Y.T. - 142,358,000
2 Dr. Dre 2001 (1999)
What's the Difference - 127,427,000
3 Pearl Jam Ten (1991)
Jeremy - 113,218,000
4 AC/DC Back in Black (1980)
Shoot to Thrill - 100,039,000
5 Michael Jackson Bad (1987)
Bad - 99,192,000
6 Bob Marley Exodus (1977)
Waiting in Vain - 98,985,000
7 Nirvana Nevermind (1991)
In Bloom - 92,550,000
8 Metallica Metallica (1991)
Sad But True - 91,504,000
Who's next? Bad or Exodus?
Back in Black (1980) is the oldest album with four 100M+ songs - but obviously Exodus is gonna break that record soon 😉
Friday is my birthday 🙂 So what are my birthday wishes? Well, a new car would be nice... but I guess less will do. Like my favourite band getting their first 500M+ track on Spotify.
Lo and behold the top ten AC/DC tracks on Spotify:
1 BACK IN BLACK - 499,574,000
2 HIGHWAY TO HELL - 495,263,000
3 THUNDERSTRUCK - 471,457,000
4 YOU SHOOK ME ALL NIGHT LONG - 346,640,000
5 T.N.T. - 234,653,000
6 SHOOT TO THRILL - 132,645,000
7 HELLS BELLS - 130,395,000
8 DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP - 123,221,000
9 IT'S A LONG WAY TO THE TOP - 86,550,000
10 ROCK'N'ROLL TRAIN - 62,675,000
BIB gets close to 500K plays a day on Spotify, so tomorrow it is likely to pass the 500M mark just in time for my birthday party! (HTH will join it before Xmas - Thunder in early 2020)
I shall celebrate by spinning it one more time 🙂
Speaking of celebration, the BIB album is 40 years old in 2020! So I guess quite a few people will give it an extra spin next year, so maybe this time next year all it's tracks will have passed the 10M mark!
BIB tracks as of today:
BIB 499.6M
YSMANL 346.6M
STT 132.6M
HB 130.4M
HADOM 28.0M
RNRANP 26.8M
WDYDFMH 11.7M
LMPMLIY 10.1M
GTDAB 9.5M
SAL 7.7M
Cheers,
Thomas
Jep. Back in Black:
485,591,580 + 9,932,151 + 3,999,408 + 329,020 + 218,578 = 500,070,737 🙂
That seems to fit pretty well with the US sales estimate since the certification likely also include streams and downloads.
Don' t you think that since the death of Malcolm Young the sales of physical copies have increased to 25 million ?
And today Highway to Hell:
487,071,561 + 8,377,254 + 3,115,141 + 1,094,026 + 758,835 = 500,416,717 🙂
I have compiled Back in Black sales in the barcode era in Brazil, it's safe to say that it sold 200K in the last 15 years, I'd estimate sales to be around 350 K overall. AC/DC is extremely under certified in Brazil.
Thunderstruck becomes the 3rd. AC/DC track to pass the 500M mark:
482,255,015 + 12,089,864 + 6,197,401 = 500,542,280 🙂
The only other legacy artist with more than two songs above that threshold is Queen, with five!
Today You Shook Me All Night Long passed 400M plays on Spotify (400.2M).
2nd song from BIB, and 4th from AC/DC to pass that threshold. Only Queen have more pre-2000 songs with over 400M plays (7 songs, soon to be 8 as We are the Champions is at 398.8M).
But when they talk about Back in black as the second best-selling album ever with 52 million copies sold, did they also include the copies left in the warehouses and the download/streaming ?
Back in Black was promoted on social medias last month in celebration of it's 40th anniversary.
This has pushed "Shake a Leg" above 10M spins on Spotify. Here are the BIB tracks (with increases since primo dec 2019)
BIB 628.5M (128.9M)
YSMANL 441.6M (95.0M)
STT 168.7M (36.1M)
HB 163.6M (33.2M)
HADOM 35.4M (7.4M)
RNRANP 34.4M (7.6M)
WDYDFMH 15.2M (3.5M)
LMPMLIY 12.6M (2.5M)
GTDAB 12.5M (3.0M)
SAL 10.0M (2.3M)
New single "Shot in the Dark" out now, New album "Power Up" out Nov. 13th.
First day streaming on Spotify for "Shot in the Dark" was 688K plays. That day's biggest by AC/DC, topping their classics "Back in Black" (669K), "Highway to Hell" (573K) and "Thunderstruck" (546K).
