Queen's 'Greatest Hits' Becomes First Album To Reach 6million UK Sales
Guitarist Brian May calls the landmark 'incredible'
Queen’s 1981 compendium ‘Greatest Hits’ has become the first album to surpass the 6million sales barrier in the UK, the Official Charts Company has confirmed.
The nation’s best selling album of all time, a mightily impressive one in three British families – or one in four British households – now owns a copy of the record.
Queen drummer Roger Taylor said of the incredible landmark: "Wonderful. Who would have thought it! And all due to the Great British public. Thank you. A great honour!"
And guitarist Brian May posted this video thank you message:
Martin Talbot, Chief Executive of the Official Charts Company said: “Becoming the first album to pass 6 million sales is a quite incredible achievement by Queen and their iconic Greatest Hits album.
“Ever since it was first released in 1981, this package of classic pop and rock tracks has been an indispensable item in every music fan’s record collection – perhaps THE definitive greatest hits album!”
Boasting the massive tracks ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, ‘Killer Queen’, ‘We Will Rock You’, ‘We Are The Champions’ and many more, the album has spent 476 weeks on the UK chart since its release and has sold more than 25million units worldwide.
Queen’s ‘Greatest Hits’ is a healthy 900,000 sales ahead of Britain’s second best selling album of all time, ABBA’s ‘Gold – Greatest Hits’, which has racked up 5.1million sales.
Despite only being released three years ago, Adele’s all-conquering ‘21’ is in fourth spot with sales of 4.7million.
Queen’s second best of compilation, 1991’s ‘Greatest Hits II’, is currently the tenth best seller having notched up a further 3.9 million UK sales to date.
The Top 5 best selling albums of all time are:
1. Queen ‘Greatest Hits’ (1981) – 6.0million 2. ABBA ‘Gold – Greatest Hits’ (1992) – 5.1million 3. The Beatles ‘Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ (1967) – 5.1million 4. Adele ‘21’ (2011) – 4.7million 5. Oasis ‘What’s The Story Morning Glory’ (1995) – 4.6million