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Source Album Charts

The "Chart Entries" listing for each album documents which charts it appeared in. So for example an entry of "UK 1 - Jun 1967, US CashBox 5 of 1967, Global 19 - 24 M claimed, Internet 9 - 32 M claimed 1967, RIAA 51 - 11 M claimed, Rolling Stone 1" would indicate that the album:

Was number one in the UK album charts, entering the chart in Jun 1967
Was number 5 for the year 1967 in the Cashbox charts
Is number 19 on the "Global" album list which claims sales of 24 million
Is 9th on the internet album list
Is 51st on the RIAA list with claimed sales of 11 million
Was in the top slot of "Rolling Stone" magazine's 2004 list

The way that a total score for each album is derived from the chart entries is the same as that described for songs on the introduction page. This set of results was generated 10 May 2008 06:25 GMT and is version 1.3.0069. The 26 album source charts that contributed were:

Name	Period Covered	Max Pos	Num Entries	Region	Type	Description
UK	1957 - 2006	40	8687	UK	position each week	The UK album charts
Sweden	1975 - 2005	40	7018	Sweden	position each week	Top 40 charts from swedishcharts.com/archiv.asp
Austria	1973 - 2005	40	8229	Austria	position each month	Top 40 charts from austriancharts.at/archiv.asp
Norway	1967 - 2005	40	6024	Norway	position each week	Top 40 charts from norwegiancharts.com/archiv.asp
Switzerland	1983 - 2005	40	4364	Switzerland	position each week	Top 40 charts from swisscharts.com/archiv.asp
US	1956 - 2005	5	250	US	position in year	Top 5 of the Billboard year end album chart
US Cashbox	1957 - 1995	100	3145	US	position in year	Top 100 of each year in 'Cashbox Magazine' chart
Italy	1965 - 2006	100	3653	Italy	position in year	Top 100 of each year from www.hitparadeitalia.it/
Australia GoSet	1970 - 1974	20	444	Australia	position each week	From the Australian magazine GoSet (source www.poparchives.com.au/)
Melody Maker	1978 - 2000	50	710	US	position in year	Top annual album list published in 'Melody Maker'
France Best	1984 - 1990	19	115	France	position in year	Best magazine's picks as listed on disques.de.l.annee.free.fr/
Rolling Stone	up to 2004	500	500	US	critic's pick	Top 500 albums listed in 'Rolling Stone'
Grammy	1958 - 2007	-	49	US	voted for	Winner of the Grammy for best album
Guinness	up to 1994	100	100	UK	voted for	Top 100 from 'Guinness All Time Top 1000 Albums'
RYM	up to 2006	200	10991	internet	social network	Albums with the highest rating on rateyourmusic.com (Feb 2007)
Fox101	up to 2004	100	100	US	voted for	101 The Fox Classic Rock & Roll Radio
Radio2	up to 2006	100	100	UK	voted for	BBC Radio 2 Music Club Top 100 Albums
Virgin	up to 2000	100	100	UK	voted for	Virgin Radio in UK
WXPN	up to 2004	885	885	internet	social network	Listener's favourite albums from WXPN
NARM	up to 2007	100	100	US	voted for	National Association of Recording Merchandisers
Channel 4	up to 2004	100	100	UK	voted for	Top 100 albums voted for by Channel 4 viewers (from very limited list)
RIAA	up to 2005	277	277	US	album sales	Claimed volumes for album sales in US (but counting didn't start until mid 1970's and some of the values are inconsistent)
Global	up to 2000?	177	177	world	album sales	Claims to be total album sales for whole world
Internet	up to 2003	119	119	internet	album sales	Claimed worldwide album sales (focus is really US)
Acclaimed	up to 2006	3000	3000	US	critic's pick	Top 3000 albums selected on a web site source www.acclaimedmusic.net/
Definitive 200	up to 2006	200	200	internet	critic's pick	The definitive 200 sourced from www.definitive200.com/200_list.php

Album Entries Chart

The chart above shows how the 59,438 entries in the album charts varies with the declared year. The profiles of each of the 26 album charts is shown below.

Channel 4

Top 100 albums voted for by Channel 4 viewers. Not only was the list that viewers could pick from quite limited but the votes appear to have been distorted by organised block voting.

Definitive 200

A list of the "definitive 200" albums sourced from www.definitive200.com/200_list.php

Fox101

List from 101 The Fox Classic Rock & Roll Radio

France Best

Best magazine has been publishing since 1968. During the 80s they listed the best albums of each year. Actually they produced two lists, one selected by the critics and one by the readers, I have merged them (biasing towards the readers views). The original lists came from disques.de.l.annee.free.fr/

Global

Claims to be total album sales for whole world. Like all these types of lists there are obvious omisions and exaggerations.

Grammy

Winner of the Grammy for best album each year as listed in Wikipedia. The year listed is the year for which the album won, not the year when the award was presented. (source en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammy_Award_for_A lbum_of_the_Year)

Guinness

Top 100 from the book 'Guinness All Time Top 1000 Albums' published in 1994

Internet

These figures claim to be worldwide album sales, in fact they are skewed towards US based acts and the list is probably related to the RIAA claimed sales list (but it is different).

Italy

The annual top 100 album list from 1965-2006 (source www.hitparadeitalia.it/)

Melody Maker

Top annual album list published in the magazine 'Melody Maker'

NARM

National Association of Recording Merchandisers a US based organisation of music retailers.

Norway

Historical Top 40 charts from norwegiancharts.com/archiv.asp

Radio2

BBC Radio 2 Music Club Top 100 Albums

RIAA

Claimed volumes for album sales in US. The counting seems not to have started until the mid 1970's and there are some clear inconsistencies with the numbers. One might suspect that these numbers are more to do with the award of 'Gold' etc records (which record companies have to pay the RIAA for).

Rolling Stone

The top 500 albums listed in 'Rolling Stone' in 2004. Notice the profile that suggests most readers prefer music from before 1980. (source www.rollingstone.com/news/story/5938174/ the_rs_500_greatest_albums_of_all_time)

RYM

The site rateyourmusic.com/ gives users the chance to rate different songs and albums. The ratings are not objective (and they shouldn't be) but the large volume of contributors makes this worthwhile (at least for modern music). These charts were extracted during Feb 2007.