I listen to stuff from various genres, but he seems like a complete outlier. Considering his success, he doesn't appear to have spawned any notable copycats, either. I don't mean this as a criticism, I just don't know how he sold so many albums from that position. Looking at the rest of the biggest sellers I think you can see where they all fit in: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_albums
Just break it down in simple terms : 1. rock, but not up its own backside like Prog, "year zero" like Punk, too noisy like some Metal, or too sickly like some "AOR" 2. live performance (that counts a fair bit for avid gig goers) So IMHO it hits a "sweet spot"between more tribal music buyers, and there was probably a "word of mouth" element from gig goers. On #2, and from a data anayltics viewpoint, it would very interesting to get the UK monthly chart sales of the LP from its release date. I suspect that there may be a serious upward spike in the graph after Meatloaf did a turn on the OGWT (we know how influential those moments could be) .
Bat out of Hell is an album full of 'power ballads'. People love a good old power ballad. A whole album of them is unusual, but why not...I guess? An awful lot of popular things are really a pile of old crap. The Top 50 UK albums of all time (as @ 2016) includes Take That (x3), James Blunt, David Gray, The Corrs, The Spice Girls, Dido (x2), Dirty Dancing Soundtrack, Grease Soundtrack, Robbie Williams (x2). Go into any charity shop and the CD racks are full of that stuff. BooH doesn't suffer that fate, which suggests that it has an enduring appeal and remains timeless. The rest of Meatloaf's output doesn't fare so well. People bought BooH II, but they don't listen to it much anymore.
An interesting take on how history views things, I've just looked up the selling price for a 12" copy of Bela Lugosi's Dead. It's £40 - £60, depending on condition. In the year after it was released, you could buy a copy, in Beano's record shop in Croydon Market, for 20p. They had several boxes of them...and very few takers. They sat there forever. Now, it's a classic. Then, it was viewed very differently.
ABBA's greatest hits is in there twice! Number 2 is ABBA Gold and number 48 is the slightly shorter and released later Greatest Hits.
I think there are 2 Beatles albums. 1 is a collection. Nothing by The Stones or The Who...or Led Zeppelin...or The Clash...or pretty much anyone who would appear in a table of the best albums of all time. Selling a lot of something is no indication of quality...just try and enjoy the crap MacDonalds serve up.
If I had to pick a single word to describe the list, then I think I'd pick bland. Quite funny that it features a band who released a song called U16 Girls, though: Prince Andrew's theme song?
Thanks. I get the concept. To me, what's more interesting, after decades of flicking through the racks of 2nd hand vinyl, is what remains popular years after and why?
I have never particularly followed trends - I just know that if the music resonates with me then I will look for more of the same. Popularity in terms of charts and sales was inconsequential to me, that's not to say that I wasn't delighted when records that I liked sold enough for an appearance on TOTP or when The Jam entered the charts at number1. But I am also quite happy that many of my favourite albums are like best kept secrets that just me and a few other enlightened people are aware of the brilliance of albums like At The Chelsea Nightclub by The Members, New Clear Days by The Vapors, Look Sharp by Joe Jackson, The Undertones first LP, The Crack - The Ruts and Inflammable Material by Stiff Little Fingers have all been played to death in my house and despite all of them being proceeded by quite big selling singles (SLF apart), these are albums that barely registered in chart/sales terms. As for Bat Out of Hell, I inherited a copy when I got married, my wife had about 10 LPs this was one of them. So I only listed to it in 1991 and whilst it doesn't rank amongst my favourites it was ok and a lot better than the other stuff I inherited at that point!
Pop music ownership is a Pareto distribution. The majority of stuff that ends up in charity shops is in the main clear-outs of : 1. your own stuff 2. property of the deceased 3. premises you have acquired So Pareto means the great majority should be Pop that everyone has or has no longevity, and trhe "long tail" is music the owner does not like or has no idea about. On a related note I was acquainted with someone who worked in a charity shop that had loadsa CDs, but couldn't value them. I told them that if they could get a PC barcode reader that could dump the codes into a file, I could build them a simple app that could trawl discogs etc and get them "ball park" valuations +/- mark as "for further study" .
Occasionally, I buy Record Collector magazine, but mostly I'm trying to kick the habit. ebay and fan sites makes collecting far too easy and expensive. Trawling 2nd hand record shops was a cheap hobby, comparatively.
The albums listed above probably all contain at least 1 songs that would be familiar to most people, these on the other hand may only appeal to a very select group and not all of them to the same people! And Don’t The Kids Love It – Television Personalities; Rhythm & Soul – Making Time; Kentish Longtails - Len Price 3; DHSS – Half Man Half Biscuit; Frogs, Sprouts, Clogs and Krauts – The Rumour; Word Salad – Fischer Z; How It All Began - The Gents; Strange Boutique – The Monochrome Set; Chairs Missing – The Wire
Crate digging gets you out of the house at least. People die of heart failure when I tell them of what I used to do on the 'Oxford St run in the 80s (the joys of shopping on a student budget with a notepad + one day travel card as your only weapons ) . I got weaned off collecting mainly due to the gentrification of Soho. Once Vinyl exchange closed, costs forced Sister Ray to seriously downsize its CD stock (prior to and after crossing the road) , and Reckless seemingly having less stuff coming in, the interest died.
