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They are Huge (and always were huge) but let's not forget that half of Queen sales were done after Freddy Mercury died, not before when the songs were originally released. Also this movie documentary that was a huge box office hit (almost 1 billion dollars) really helped Queen increase their EAS on these past 2 years exposing them to a new audience.
They only beat Madonna sales because Freddy Mercury died and they became a cult band (and most Madonna albums and single sales here are under-estimated as some of her albums aren't re-certified since the 80's or 90's in most world countries but are every day on iTunes charts of dozens countries for the past 17 years). In fact while he was still alive Madonna sales were higher than Queen, Most of their sales were after his death.
3 years ago Madonna was still ahead on EAS, they jumped over 20 millions after their hit movie documentary that exposed them to a new audience. Madonna will catch up with them one day soon for sure.
26 million has been added, they were still one of the most streamed acts from the 20th century. When Freddie Mercury died their physical album sales were around 90 million. If you look at many other artists from that era, around half of their album sales have happened since then as well. Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin especially.
Her music is becoming much less relevant. Michael Jackson will always be relevant. Your knowledge of Queen, with all due respect, is inaccurate. Their catalogue sales around the world were quietly pulling in massive amounts while Madonna had a very powerful marketing machine behind her, allowing for countless hits for various reasons. Streaming is a much clearer way of us seeing who REALLY is popular these days and there are many 20th century acts now streaming way WAY more than Madonna.
Nuno - you see just what you want to see. Your argument, that Freddie Mercury's death as a factor helped to sell Queen's music and that's why Queen overtook Madonna is incorrect. Of course, in some way it helped, but Queen with Freddie's death lost a lot more. First of all - to release new material, new albums, second of all - to do live tours, I mean with Freddie Mercury (touring with Rogers and Lambert doesn't count, you just can't these concerts compare with Freddie's), and when there are no new albums, new material, when the last concert with original line was in 1986, your singer is dead - the band gets less press attention, comparing if Mercury would be still alive and touring, and releasing new albums and etc. Madonna had this all the time - new albums, concerts, scandals, attention and etc.
But Queen's music and Freddie's voice is so unique, so diverse, so original, that their music is timeless and people even after almost 30 years after Mercury died are interested and values Queen music, and is gaining new fans.
And I believe, if there will be a movie about Madonna - it wouldn't be so successful as Queen movie was.
That is very interesting, and it shows the general decline of sales from the 70's onward.
Madonna had a cultural impact, especially in the US. But Queen is not without cultural impact, Queen have been associated with a lot of big global events. Live Aid was viewed by almost 2 billion people, the Freddie Mercury tribute concert was viewed by over billion people. Freddie Mercury's music was used for the Olympics. Queen were also involved with the London Olympics. There was the Wayne's World movie, and now recently the Bohemian Rhapsody movie. Queen have been involved with huge cultural events, through the years. Many other musicians and artist through the years have been influenced by Queen.
Actually sales only started to decline in the 2000s. The Beatles, Pink Floyd & co. sold most of their albums after the 1970s.
Queen smashes Madonna, better music, better musicians... Madonna was more a media celebrity than a musician...
RLAAMJR wrote "Madonna has more worldwide hit songs than Queen so most people know/recognize more Madonna songs than Queen’s."
And yet Queen's songs are fare more streamed / bought / well known (and were long before the movie in case you want to make that argument). So no, you're wrong again.
Madonna hasn't been relevant in a long time. Her sales (including physical sales) have been fairly dire for years. On Spotify, she has 12,321, 321 monthly listeners, and 3,748, 181 followers. Compare that to Queen, who have 32,589,782 monthly listeners and 23,382,494 followers. Spotify numbers that even The Beatles or Michael Jackson can't compare to.
In fact, this very website said back in 2017 (long before the movie) that Queen would overtake Madonna in overall sales even if she releases another album. And that's exactly what's happened.
And no, Madonna doesn't have the cultural impact that Queen has worldwide outside of America.
@Nuno. No, most of Queen's sales were not after Freddie Mercury's death. You're talking nonsense.
That's right Lawyeris.
I don't believe a movie about Madonna would have any more of an impact than the Elton John movie. It certainly wouldn't do anywhere near as well as the Queen movie did. What a people like Nuno don't get is, the reason that the movie was so successful, was because of the group the movie was about. People absolutely love Queen.
The U.S isn't the world, Jake. You need to realise just how big Queen are worldwide, that even with losing America in the 80s, they still managed to outsell all those other artists.
