CSPC: Bob Marley Popularity Analysis

Part 3 – Island Records Compilation albums

The track list of Legend is made up of barely 14 songs. Those songs are responsible for an unreal 1,8 million EAS. This represents an average of 193 million audio streams. Truly insane.

We better understand now the absolutely monstrous catalog sales of Legend. Easily the greatest selling catalog album since the early 90s ahead of Pink Floyd‘s Dark Side of the Moon, this LP went from peaking at #54 in the US to selling over 35 million units worldwide to date.

Getting a piece of such a blockbuster is tough. It’s so powerful that even a song like No Woman, No Cry can only claim 9% of its attractiveness. Exodus is the main driver of this juggernaut as it boasts 33% of its appeal, this represents a gigantic 11,7 million album sales.

Subsequent releases of career-spanning best of albums like One Love, Gold and Africa Unite never managed to dislodge Legend. They still sold a solid 5 million units combined with distribution patterns similar to the ones of Legend.