The Moody Blue LP

[jurasic]

From wikipedia: An "Elvis Moody Blue plaque" most commonly refers to the plaque he received from RCA on June 26, 1977, for the two billionth record pressed at the Indianapolis plant, which was his final album, Moody Blue. Elvis also received an RIAA Gold Record Award for Moody Blue in September 1977, when he was dead, for over 500,000 in sales. My question is: Did this LP sold more than any other LP's after Aloha? I think so.

[MartyMcfly]

Even before his death Moody Blue was his highest charting album on the Billboard Top200 album chart, IIRC at number 24 for 2 weeks. It was his highest selling studio album before his demise, somewhere around 300k units in 2 months after its release. I would estimate 1974 Memphis album sold in similar numbers.
In Europe Arcade's 40 Greatest Hits and Elvis Forever each sold many more units and the 1973 US Elvis compilation as well. Around 2,5 -3 million units each before August 16 1977.

[jurasic]

Thanks. Impressive figures. So I think that Elvis sold a billion records until today.

[colonel snow]

Thanks. Impressive figures. So I think that Elvis sold a billion records until today.

May be half of this number of records. Selling vinyl goes downhill since the 70's. It's still an impressive number of sales.


colonel snow

[MartyMcfly]

Thanks. Impressive figures. So I think that Elvis sold a billion records until today.

No way in real records, only if you convert album sales to singles. Depending on the number of songs on an album, one 10 song album equals 5 singles, a 12 song album 6 singles etc.
I think a reasonable total worldwide figure is 500 million all combined (singles, EPs, albums).
Elvis sold huge numbers in his heyday, but compared to CD sales in the 90s and 00s, they were quite low. The market simply was much smaller until the 80s.

[jurasic]

Agree, but Elvis continued to sell millions of records in the 21'st century.

[Alan]

Since 1973 and as of September 77, Moody Blue was not his biggest selling LP. That honour would have gone to 40 Greatest, released under licence to Arcade label and then released by RCA itself.

[jurasic]

More than 2 million copies.

[jurasic]

Moody Blue was a more successful LP, compared to From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee, which was released one year before, in 1976.

[Walter Hale 5]

in hindsight, RCA should have not included Let Me Be There recorded in 1974, on this record. This album had too many live songs featured.

To me it made sense to make Moody Blue a 9 track album only but with longer fade-outs - 1 minute each - for Moody Blue, Pledging my Love, and She Thinks I Still Care tracks.

[jurasic]

Yes, this could be an alternative solution.

[jurasic]

In 1977, RCA released also the Welcome to My World compilation LP with half of it with previous live recorded tracks.