+ Plus Bonus DVD Audio. More recent and better-documented data adds even more grist to the mill and demonstrates that the picture with Presley records was and is indeed very much in keeping with market trends. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience. " All Shook Up" 6. There are the original Collectors CDs with CDs ranging from soundboard-recorded concerts (recorded from the mixing desk in mono) to full RCA professionally recorded concerts in stereo and CDs consisting of unreleased material from recording sessions, such as The Jungle Room Sessions, Memphis Sessions, etc. . Harum Scarum (1965) The film was billed as 1001 Swingin Nights and the plot involves Elvis bringing an enchanting princess back to Vegas from the Middle East. It is clear that no worldwide Elvis release, whether a long playing album or single, has sold less than half a million, including the most forgettable single, which must surely be 1965's 'Do the Clam' (900,000). Elvis Presley was one of the most popular musicians of the 20th century. Even Presleys worst soundtrack filler may get you there. From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee, Elvis As Recorded at Madison Square Garden, Singer Presents Elvis Singing Flaming Star and Others, Elvis Sings The Wonderful World of Christmas, From Memphis to Vegas/From Vegas to Memphis, Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. Password must be at least 8 characters and contain: As part of your account, youll receive occasional updates and offers from New York, which you can opt out of anytime. [1] [2] Billboard ranks Presley as the 13th Greatest Artist of all Time. We no longer need to make a song and dance over so-called lost sales. 20. Half material from a few Vegas hotel dates and half studio record, Elviss first two-LP set shuffles us around the country to capture his first performances for a general audience, not designed for TV since 1961, and some of the soulful cuts left over from the great From Elvis in Memphis sessions. He sold over 600 million records in his lifetime, making him one of the best-selling artists of all time. 49. Singer Presents Elvis Singing Flaming Star and Others (1968) This budget-priced compilation mostly consists of unreleased soundtrack recordings from the 60s, aside from a version of Chuck Berrys Too Much Monkey Business that was recorded as a warm-up and the sloppily energized Tiger Man, which is the most exciting thing here: a sneak peek of the upcoming comeback special. In fact, less than a third of his official US releases achieved a Gold award or better. So Glad Youre Mine, a great mocking Arthur Crudup song left over from an earlier session kicks off the second side, and when Elviss mournful desire peeks out on Hows the World Treating You, as elsewhere, the effect is spellbinding. Moody Blue (1977) Unable to get a full studio set out of Elvis, RCA settled for this combination of tracks recorded at Graceland and live versions of never-released songs from his final concerts, including his legendarily decrepit but moving version of Unchained Melody (which youre better off watching on YouTube). 41. # In several key overseas markets some sales were documented and certified - even as far back as the 1950s. Elvis got to distance himself from the worn-out commercial decisions imposed by Colonel Parker and dig deep into meaningful material of his own choosing, capturing some of the earlier TV specials spontaneous sense of fun and inventiveness with spirited and unpredictable arrangements and performances, including a great rhythm section and backup singing that blows his mainstays, the often-stiff Jordanaires, out of the water. 24. When he croons, My eyes may grow dim, on I Believe in the Man in the Sky, youll believe him. Perhaps, not surprisingly, the last album released during his lifetime, 'Moody Blue', was by 1982 thought to be one of the King's top sellers - with global sales put at more than 14 million copies. Elvis fans still prefer to have something physical in their hands, rather than a download. 39. Harem Holiday speculates about Romeo (Elvis) abandoning his Juliet (whichever current flame) for some action, My Desert Serenade attempts to make a brand-new world appear with arabesque flute and oboe, and the rest is equally ridiculous. . 40. "Good Times" reached number 1 on the Cash Box Country Albums chart. Like that earlier collection, the tone is mostly light but in this case, often grating: Yoga Is As Yoga Does gets Elvis tied up in an embarrassing knot, and The Love Machine awkwardly feeds Elvis through a fortune-telling scenario. Im Comin Home attempts a rock-and-roll revival at the top of the B side and just about achieves it. There are countless albums which saw their tracklist extended after the initial release (basically every big album of the last 12 years to start with! All Rights Reserved. Somebody else in the old RCA backroom may have initially dreamt up the figures, but it was Don Wardell who publicised them and thus must bear the responsibility. 'A Little Less Conversation' (2002), 'Rubberneckin' (2003) etc. Just because it never happened doesnt mean they cant get back together. In a letter, Elvis referred to Roy Orbison as "the greatest singer in the world." Girls! Why was the 1982 claim ever made? It was pretty much the same with 'Don't Cry Daddy'. Davis' album, Elephant, is by far the best . Read More. He said his surgery was a success, but he needs time to heal before he can tour again. The contents, sadly, aren't nearly as soul . Answer (1 of 2): Seriously. In the last ten years the differential between Elvis' US and overseas sales has widened to the point whereby there really is no argument about it. The title song simulates heavenly thunder over tinkling piano, and the rest of the A side is sweetly sung and gently soothing. Elvis Country (Im 10,000 Years Old) (1971), 15. On Stage (1970) Elviss second live album is mostly compiled from a few Vegas dates, collecting versions of hit songs associated with other people, like Neil Diamonds Sweet Caroline and Creedence Clearwater Revivals Proud Mary, and its fine though why not listen to Neil Diamond or CCR or the Beatles or Del Shannon or the Everly Brothers if you want to hear these songs? This website uses cookies to improve your experience. From Elvis In Memphis (1969) Fresh off the success of his 68 comeback special, a reanimated Elvis recorded this album many fans favorite at a studio hed never before used, American Sound, getting its talented southern soul-style house band the Memphis Boys to back him rather than the usual gang. In fact whilst a fifties classic such as 'Hound Dog' may well have initially sold twice as many copies in the States, as it did elsewhere - which as only the Americans had developed a consumer based society by that stage, should hardly come as a surprise - it is plain from what we do know that subsequently anything up to 70% of the sales of later singles were sold overseas. After going through thousands of releases on Discogs, Biwa and Elvisoncd, I concluded on 341 non-promotional albums that have been sold at some point. So whether RCA simply looked at the total sales figures up to that point, current sales, or probably both, the conclusions reached may have been the same. And it was during his watch that the 'Washington Post' claim first began to appear on the back of Elvis albums and in press releases. Based on the figures in front of him Ernst Jorgensen was able, with the help of Sony, to determine what this meant in sales terms and few have disputed the rationale behind the maths. 56. 11. More than 500 million records were sold by the Beatles worldwide. In the tracking week ending Aug. 4, the Elvis soundtrack sold 8,000 copies (up 1,466%), with 7,500 of that sum on CD. It adds up to an enjoyable mix of traditional classics (O Come, All Ye Faithful helped by the addition of a heavy bass line and funky drums), good new Christmas songs (the soulful Ill Be Home on Christmas Day), and newer songs like the stripped-down, randy Merry Christmas Baby. The holiday spirit gave Elvis a rare and welcome unifying concept to work with even though this album was recorded in May. var gcse = document.createElement('script'); The standout ballad Tender Feeling wasnt in the film, but got tossed in here as a pot sweetener. 6 Blue Hawaii (1961) ~ 3 Million RCA During his lifetime, Presley starred in 31 movies and while every soundtrack issued from each film managed to sell a million copies, this one stood out the most. 42. Today (1975) Elvis leads off by spelling out T-R-O-U-B-L-E and rocking through an echo box like a crueler, sloppier protoGarth Brooks (Travis Tritt made a later hit of this song), but the rest consists of fine adult-contemporary music thats easy to hear if hard to love Perry Como here, Don McLean there, a nostalgic hit from Elvis-favorite Tom Jones the most affecting of the bunch though theres plenty of sassy heat on the Pointer Sisters breakup declaration Fairytale.. after 1974 a GOLD LP had to sell $1 million AND 500,000 copies. Youve got some Janning to do! Whats Next for Convicted Sex Criminals Harvey Weinstein and R. Kelly? Despite his undeniable talents, Elvis was a wildly uneven recording artist. How many songs did Elvis sing total? In this scattered context of cutting-room scraps, even the most ridiculous stuff like Shes a Machine and Do the Vega contributes to an entertainingly cubist rendering of the King. Much of this is owed to Wallen's fans streaming his Academy of Country Music Album of the Year award-winning "Dangerous: The Double Album" over 5 billion times since its 2021 release. A German-inspired release entitled 'Elvis Forever' and its successors swept Europe around 1975/6 and did exactly the same. C. C. Now that Meredith is gone, it is business as usual at Grey Sloan Memorial. The statistics show that in the UK market, for example, overall sales of records had climbed from 66 million units in 1959 to over 100 million by 1964. Aloha From Hawaii Via Satellite (1973) On the same day as Super Bowl VII, Elvis attempted to outdo that extravaganza with his own super magic for the tube, as he put it, donning an American Eagle jumpsuit to appear in the most expensive televised live special thus far, broadcast to over a billion people worldwide. It also includes an extended version of the new hit Suspicious Minds, demonstrating that Elvis and his band know how eternally great the song is. Something for Everybody (1961) Elviss third post-Army record (he served, mostly in Germany, from 1958 to 1960) opens with the moody and introspective Don Robertson crooner Theres Always Me, but ditches the midnight mood thereafter, instead continuing with well-sung country-pop. The Wagner opera returns to the Met for the first time in 17 years. gcse.type = 'text/javascript'; When sometime later, after BMG took over RCA, the new team tried and failed to elicit any kind of rational explanation from Don Wardell, it swiftly became apparent to them that he hadn't got one. All told, there is less than 20% of his albums for which we do own that key sales indicator, and for most of them the number is outdated. Elvis has sold more albums then any other singer or group in the history of music. Highly recommended. Sumners lower-than-the-lowest-piano-note bass vocal leading off Why Me Lord? followed by a sensational How Great Thou Art. The album starts off strong with a dynamic I Got a Woman and a belted-out reworking of the Sun-era sex quest Tryin to Get to You, then closes with another pair of galloping 50s classics and the familiar Blue Hawaii charmer Cant Help Falling in Love. Its no comeback special, but this is still some choice live Elvis. How Great Thou Art (1967) Elvis liked to sing gospel as a means of relaxation between other nagging showbiz responsibilities, and How Great Thou Art was his second album of songs dedicated to, as one track here puts it, Somebody Bigger Than You and I. Finally, the singer got to perform music he cared about after years of churning out prefab soundtracks, and the results are more diverse and satisfying than his first gospel record, His Hand in Mine. Elvis (1956) Elvis is great, if not as strong as Elvis Presley from half a year earlier. Elvis plays an Army man meeting his lookalike cousin and a couple of sexy relatives for the first time in rural Tennessee, set to discomfiting songs about polygamy (One Boy, Two Little Girls) and smooching technique. King Creole (1958) Elviss favorite movie role was as the new star of the King Creole nightclub, and the accompanying soundtrack album was also something strong. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google These are albums which were never sold on standard retailers but instead by mail order or at Christian book stores. That is a complicated question that changes as albums are released and chart. Its a rare Elvis album from the 60s that was recorded with the intention of forming a distinct record i.e., it wasnt yet another soundtrack. Its another group of castoffs from the studio, plus an endearingly schlocky one from a performance at the Las Vegas Hilton, rendered into another one of his vaguely conceptual wholes by the unwise crooners sense of desperation and self-contempt, at its most moving when Elvis is seated at the piano for a few songs, like on Ivory Joe Hunters gorgeously understated Its Still Here., 32. The sales below minimum certification levels are less easy for me to justify since I have not been fortunate to see the complete list - only such selected items as Ernst felt able to pass onto me. No less than a staggering 30 or so major independent labels operating in the mail order sphere, have been involved at one time or, not to mention untold numbers of smaller scale regional enterprises. Elvis recorded his second gospel album, also titled "How Great Thou Art," over four days in 1966. . He started to grow as a popular artist, and began to change both race relations and popular teen culture. My original investigations revealed that Elvis was by some distance the greatest record seller of all time and ten years on it is that much easier to make a case for the claim that he has sold over a billion copies of his records. Did Elvis record a gospel album? [5] According to the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), Presley has sold 146.5 million certified albums in the US, making him the third top-selling album artist in the country. Elvis Presley sold an estimated 1.6 billion albums in his lifetime. Panty raid rhymes with lemonade in Poison Ivy League, one of several unconvincing songs here, sung from the perspective of a striving underdog which Elvis had stopped being years prior. Elvis Presley 23 Studio albums, 8 Live albums, 13 Compilation albums, 29 EPs, 18 Soundtrack albums, 30 Box sets, 115 Posthumous compilations, and 11 Remix albums. (function() { how many albums did elvis sell. 52. The following updated version has been considerably shortened, where possible, in the interests of brevity. 1. Then we will get into every non-RCA releases Time-Life, Provident Music, Razor & Tie, etc to see which ones were tracked by Soundscan or left out. 30. The List of Toto Albums in Order of Release, The List of Foreigner Albums in Order of Release, The List of Steely Dan Albums in Order of Release, The List of Genesis Albums in Order of Release, The List of Ne-Yo Albums in Order of Release, The List of Morgan Wallen Albums in Order of Release. Kissin Cousins (1964) Elvis feudin, Elvis lovin, Elvis swingin as he joins his mountain kinfolk for a hey, hey, hayride to good ol mountain music reads the movie-poster copy. Elvis Is Back! 36. "It got to the point where I was driving in my car, and I thought: I just want to know if Stevie Nicks and Lindsey . Sales of such albums as 'ELV1S 30 #1 Hits' (2002), 'If I Can Dream' ( 2015 ), 'The Wonder of You' (2016), 'Christmas with the RPO' (2017) and just recently 'Where No One Stands Alone' (2018) all underline my point. Rider that became the Elvis Shows frequent intro music, after which Elvis gurgles water into his mic, admits to being lost onstage, and indulges his love of sob stories on Release Me and new hit The Wonder of You.. 1 albums ('56-'59). As well as, extended play 45rpm mini-albums and several 45rpm single reissues. Some idea of the scale involved actually emerged through the 1977/8 interim and the final audited record company reports. Well it seems that around five years after Elvis died, a former Radio Luxembourg DJ, by the name of Don Wardell, took over from Joan Deary as the product manager in charge of the Elvis catalogue at RCA. "" denotes items which were not released in that country or failed to chart. His 25 percent commission from Elvis's tours and record sales alone amasses to nearly $14 million dollars, plus another $2 million for his film commissions. [4] Elvis' Christmas Album remains the biggest selling holiday album of all time, selling over 20 million copies worldwide. In its favor: Return to Sender.. Theres also blues, gospel, and gypsy music at their cheesiest. Good Times (1974) Okay times. Paradise, Hawaiian Style (1966) Elvis plays a rugged chopper pilot in this, his third Hawaiian movie, and again he cranked out a soundtrack with his regular studio gang and stable of songwriters. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. Elvis Presley is second in the U.S., with 135 million sold. RCA permitted a large number of them through various licensing deals from the 70s to the 00s. "Wonderful World of Christmas" reached number 13 on the Billboard Country Albums chart in 1978. If you include the soundtrack albums, Elvis had about 45 studio albums. This is his big show, with the addition of a Honolulu orchestra, opening with the 2001: A Space Odyssey theme and an elaborate version of See See Rider, and continuing with a mix of early successes, new hits like Burning Love, concert staples (My Way and Im So Lonesome I Could Cry) that hadnt yet appeared on an Elvis record, and other popular covers. It would seem that the growth of sales in overseas markets - reflected in the success of such records as 'It's Now or Never' - generally began to take off around about the time Elvis was demobbed from the army in 1960. 8. ELVIS PRESLEY Vinyl LP LOT 50+ Album Collection Many Sealed VG~NM Condition. Until Now! Speedway (1968) During the Summer of Love, Elvis was recording these iffy songs for his third onscreen appearance as a race-car driver, and it became his lowest seller yet it was also the last time he would release a full soundtrack album. 47. TikToks Favorite Celebrity Couple Is Kim Kardashian and Michael Cera. Elvis is the leading sales artist for both Solo Artist or Group. Though this is Elviss last LP, released a month before his death, its not as depressing as the album that came before it, From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee, which was recorded entirely at Graceland in February 76. Blue Hawaii (1961) The second-most commercially successful LP of the 60s (behind only the soundtrack to West Side Story) is this iconic soundtrack, which comes as close to having a unifying concept as Elvis ever got, Christmas and Christ excepted. " Teddy Bear" 5. A dash of then-trendy bossa nova is sped up and rendered unintelligible for the lead single, and Elvis sings that (Theres) No Room to Rhumba in a Sports Car, which encapsulates the stilted rhythms here, incongruously imported from Brazil and Cuba, despite the fact that the film is set in Mexico. Elvis has sold over 2.5 Billion Records Worldwide.