How many copies do records sell?

i predict the new Girls ALoud single has sold 80,000 this week - but i'm not basing that on anything concrete, other than in relation to the pre-release sales orders for previous Pop Idols which were 200,000 and upwards i think so combine that with the supposed deterioration in singles sales and there you go

i wonder how many 80s Matchbox B-Line Disaster will have sold to scrape the top 30 this Sunday...perhaps just 5000?

In the US there is indeed a gigantic ultimate database called Soundscan which has been tracking record sales for 10-15 years. Access to it is expensive, but when people sneak one some of the data its often very interesting.

As a guide, Rhino Handmade seem to make their issues available in "limited edition"s of between 1,000 and 5,000.

When I interviewed Knox of The Vibrators a while back be told me that they reckoned they were lucky if they managed to sell 5,000 copies of any new studio album and that this wasn't enough for them to live on and that one way or another they're still making more money from their first few singles and couple of albums than they do from the rest of their catalogue (14(?) studio albums, fuck knows how many live ones, compilations, singles etc. etc.).

Hope that helps answer your question.

Soundscan numbers for Sonic Youth, circa 1999:

100% SONIC YOUTH GDGC S 06/30/92 16991
1991: THE YEAR PUNK BROKE SONIC YOUTH GDGC V 04/13/93 28046
ANAGRAMA SONIC YOUTH SYRS A 06/24/97 12972
BAD MOON RISING SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 04/25/95 21812
CONFUSION IS SEX SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 02/28/95 24326
CONFUSION IS SEX SONIC YOUTH SST A 12/14/87 5995
DAYDREAM NATION SONIC YOUTH ENI A 10/19/88 7462
DAYDREAM NATION SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 11/23/93 84228
DIRTY SONIC YOUTH PID A 03/31/98 34
DIRTY SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 07/21/92 273048
DISAPPEARER SONIC YOUTH GDGC S 12/28/90 3757
DIRTY BOOTS SONIC YOUTH GDGC S 02/26/91 13115
EVOL SONIC YOUTH SST A 12/14/87 2423
EVOL SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 09/27/94 30389
EXPERIMENTAL JET SET TRASH SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 05/03/94 226726
FAN CLUB PACK SONIC YOUTH TEC A 11/29/93 1280
GOO SONIC YOUTH PID A 03/31/98 43
GOO SONIC YOUTH ANAD A 04/09/96 274
GOO SONIC YOUTH ULT A 04/09/96 874
GOO SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 06/26/90 126036
GOO SONIC YOUTH GDGC V 07/25/91 8774
HOLD THAT TIGER SONIC YOUTH GOOF A 08/25/98 3698
I DREAMED OF NOISE SONIC YOUTH RUTA A 01/01/97 20
INVITO AL CIELO SONIC YOUTH SYRS A 03/10/98 9131
MADE IN THE USA-SOUNDTRACK SONIC YOUTH ATLG A 02/28/95 19985
MASTER DIK SONIC YOUTH SST A 12/14/87 142
MUSIC FROM MADE IN USA SONIC YOUTH ATLG A 02/14/95 27
SCREAMING FIELDS OF SONIC L SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 04/25/95 35941
SCREAMING FIELDS OF SONIC L SONIC YOUTH GDGC V 04/25/95 4920
SISTER SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 10/11/94 30449
SISTER SONIC YOUTH SST A 12/14/87 19905
SILVER SESSION SONIC YOUTH SNTH A 07/21/98 5599
SLAAPKAMERS MET... SONIC YOUTH SLR A 09/30/97 12159
SLAAPKAMMERTS MIT SLAGRAAM SONIC YOUTH MSI S 09/09/97 50
SONIC YOUTH SONIC YOUTH SST A 12/14/87 3975
SONIC DEATH SONIC YOUTH SST A 07/01/88 5442
SONIC YOUTH SONIC YOUTH IMGE V 09/06/95 229
STARPOWER SONIC YOUTH SST A 07/25/88 1001
SUNDAY SONIC YOUTH PID S 06/02/98 431
SUGAR KANE SONIC YOUTH GDGC S 03/02/93 4332
THOUSAND LEAVES SONIC YOUTH MSCR A 05/05/98 3801
THOUSAND LEAVES SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 05/12/98 54032
WASHING MACHINE SONIC YOUTH GDGC A 09/19/95 133479
TV SHIT SONIC YOUTH/YAMATSUKA EY ECP A 03/01/94 5140

There is a man of my acquaintance who must sell 40,000 copies of his first album in order to get a second.

What the h3ll is this? I've never understood.

wow, Daydream Nation scanned fewer copies than Washing Machine? I hope that has something to do with the date Soundscan actually started recording data..

I would be over the moon to sell 500 copies of anything I did

but are these figures trustworthy? i'm always weary of taking too seriously anything that i read on the internet... if it's not official (and if it is, well...).

I really doubt Evol sold less than 3,000 copies in its SST run: They probably sold that much in NYC alone.

This is a great question, one that gets at the heart of a lot of issues surrounding "pop." For one thing, as with Arbitron ratings, I wonder exactly what Soundscan measures, and how well it measures even that. I wonder how well record companies measure how many records they've actually sold to buying customers. And then, just to throw in another wrinkle, I wonder if there's a way to measure not just sales but ownership: In other words, how many copies of a CD go directly back into the used pile? There's no way to tell how many promotional copies stay in people's collections, or how many flood the used CD market, but this seems worth figuring out, too.

My suspicions (and they're only suspicions) are as follows: 1.) That a lot of "bestseller" CDs are products that nobody actually needs to own or buy for them to be bestsellers, that it's all based on pre-ordering by chain stores and projected sales based on current sales. 2.) That best-sellers are also the most resold in the used CD market, and the most likely to be bought up as overstock and put in the cutout bin. 3.) That independent success stories like early Husker Du or current Atmosphere aren't adequately measured by Soundscan or any other official sales counters. I mean, how does soundscan account for somebody selling something out of his backpack?

I'm willing to believe my suspicions are wrong, but so much of music seems like a predetermined scam to me that I'll have to do a lot of investigation before I'm convinced one way or the other...