Which band was the most successful?

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 dougmcauliffe wrote:

 AFlowerKingCrimson wrote:

 dougmcauliffe wrote:

People often forget how successful Kansas were, their first 3 went gold but leftoverture and POKR both went somewhere from 4-6x platinum in the states and monolith went platinum.

Nope. As someone who studies album sales of certain bands intently I have to say I disagree with some of this.

First of all it's true that the first three albums went gold but in the case of the second and third only a few years later and not when they were first released. The first album didn't go gold until the 90's. Also, POKR and Leftoverture went four times platinum not more than that. If they sold more it hasn't been documented by the riaa(maybe someday but not as of yet). Finally, Monolith did not go platinum. It "only" went gold. If it has gone platinum then it hasn't been documented. It is certainly possible albums have sold more than what the riaa reports(they can only certify something if it's requested and since it costs money to make that request not all record companies do that until they are sure it's worth it if they do it at all)but we can only know what is official. 

Oops, my bad on that one. Knew I shouldn't have trusted my memory. Still though, pretty good numbers for a band out of bumblef**k nowhere!

Well, like I said it's quite likely they have sold more then what is listed anyway. That holds true with other bands. For example, Dark side of the moon is listed as 15 million but that is from 1998. I'm pretty sure it has sold at least 22 million by now. Close to the Edge is certified as platinum(also 1998) but has probably sold at least 1.5 by now and maybe even 2 million. Who knows. There's probably other examples too. 

Monolith was listed on wikipedia at one point as selling one million but that hasn't been verified on the riaa website so it can't be considered official. I'm an editor on wikipedia so I had to change that so it only showed gold status. Trust, me that was hard to do. ;) I dont mind someone changing it back as long as it reflects the truth but so far no evidence to suggest it has gone platinum yet(only gold).

Edited by AFlowerKingCrimson - August 05 2020 at 23:24

Poll Question: Which band was the most successful?
Poll Choice	Votes	Poll Statistics
Pink Floyd	30	[44.12%]
Genesis	6	[8.82%]
Yes	10	[14.71%]
King Crimson	13	[19.12%]
Rush	5	[7.35%]
ELP	4	[5.88%]
You can not vote in this poll