France Album Sales: U2

Rattle And Hum (1988) Era

The Joshua Tree was so big that one can only expect a huge return for U2 with their following album, October 1988 set Rattle And Hum. Surprisingly, the band continued their hit or miss trajectory by failing to meet expectations.

Indeed, led by disappointing #37 single Desire the album was only able to debut at #8. Obviously the weird format of the album which contained live performances, covers as well as new songs hasn’t help but as shown in other countries if the single had been more successful the album would have sell well nevertheless.

Staying six weeks Top 10 and four months Top 30, Rattle And Hum in spite of coming nowhere near its predecessor still sold a healthy 310,000 by the end of 1989. At that date, sales of U2 catalog was standing as detailed below.

1980 Boy – 120,000
1981 October – 110,000
1983 War – 420,000
1983 Under A Blood Red Sky – 230,000
1984 The Unforgettable Fire – 160,000
1987 The Joshua Tree – 740,000
1988 Rattle And Hum – 310,000

Top 3 Most Streamed Tracks on Spotify

1. Desire – 7,633,000
2. When Love Comes To Town – 5,064,000
3. Angel Of Harlem – 4,829,000