pink floyd "dark side of the moon" – A look at the numbers

As a long-haired young man growing up in the suburbs of a northeastern city in the 1970s, there were 4 albums he could remember that everyone he knew, in and out of school, owned; Led Zeppelin IV, The Eagles Greatest Hits, Frampton Comes Alive and, of course, the granddaddy of progressive head music, Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon.”

Today, in 2010, I still have two vinyl albums in different condition, a cassette and a CD. The artwork was fantastic, the accompanying poster that came with the album was plastered everywhere, and the music and memories that come with that album are priceless.

There’s another thing that’s very impressive about this record, and that’s the numbers. We’ll see:

1. Record sales: According to an article on guardian.co.uk, the album is estimated to have sold 45 million copies. This is under Michael Jackson’s Thriller and right under AC/DC’s Back in Black.

2. Weeks in the Billboard Top 200: Has been in the Billboard Top 200 for 763 weeks (over 14.6 years). That includes 741 weeks for the original release (1973-1988) plus re-releases. Additionally, it has been on Billboard’s Top Pop Catalog Albums chart for 960 weeks. That’s over 30 years on Billboard with no signs of slowing down!

3.According to the British recording industry, Dark Side… was the sixth best-selling album in the British Isles.

4. According to Glenn Povey, author of the book Echoes, an estimated one in fourteen people under the age of 50 in the US owns or has owned a copy.

5. Rolling Stone magazine ranked Dark Side of the Moon #35 on their 1987 “100 Greatest Albums of the Last 20 Years.” Then again in 2003, it was ranked #43 on their “500 Greatest Albums of All Time”. the times”.

6.And it’s not just the music that has received so much praise. The cover, the classic prism, was voted VH1’s fourth greatest album cover of all time.

And this list doesn’t even include iTunes numbers, singles and other interesting statistics.

“Dark Side of the Moon” was released on March 10, 1973, and has been a driving force in rock music ever since.

Albums come and go… oh, except “Dark Side of the Moon.”