Morrissey's record sales

Can anyone provide a link to Morrissey's album sales? Not overall but for each album?

 

In the UK or US? Or worldwide?
In the US he sold 2,5 million records in the Soundscan-era (from 1992) up to 2007:
Your Arsenal: 366,047
Bona Drag: 360,977
Vauxhall & I: 293,017
Viva Hate: 234,804
You Are The Quarry: 230,169
Kill Uncle: 221,293
Best of Morrissey: 179,746
Ringleader of The Tormentors: 97,502
Maladjusted: 88,554
World Of Morrissey: 69,357
Southpaw Grammar: 67,451

See here: https://www.morrissey-solo.com/article.pl?sid=08/03/05/1811210

In the UK I don't know the exact numbers.
Quarry went platinum and sold about 350,000.
Viva Hate, Vauxhall and I and Ringleader and also Suedehead, the Best of and Greatest Hits went gold, thus all sold 100,000-300,000.
The other ones 50,000-100,000.

His worldwide album sales must be something from 10-15 million I would say.

 

Thank You! Any idea what World Peace sold?

 

Nope, some were certified silver (60,000) in the UK others weren't.
From Wikipedia, it looks like Kill Uncle, Maladjusted and Years of Refusal went silver (60,000-100,000).
But Your Arsenal, Maladjusted and World Peace didn't (so under 60,0000). Think Maladjusted might have sold in the 30,000s.
World Peace sold 18,000 in week 1 and I think was withdrawn after about 4 weeks. Probably didn't make 40,000.

 

Seems odd that Your Arsenal - his best selling album in the US - is actually one of the worst selling in the UK.
Maybe the bad press at the time (NME) did have its effects on record sales after all, if so, it doesn't bode well for LiHS.

 

Yes, it is an anomaly. Just shows that critical acclaim doesn't always equate to big sales.
The singles didn't get any decent airplay - that was the main reason. For the following album, The More You Ignore Me was all over the radio.

 

I think so. The USA was in the midst of peak Moz-mania around that time while in England the press were trying to bury him.

 

Yes, Your Arsenal was actually released into much the same atmosphere as the new album. Lots of negative press and songs like We'll Let You Know and The National Front Disco being routinely dismissed as racist or right wing - in much the same way, say, I Bury The Living is being misread now. The difference today I suppose is the internet and social media only amplifies these things even further...

 

Yes, it was also released at the same time as a high-profile Smiths-comp (Best...1) which entered at nr 1 in the UK, maybe further reinforcing the idea that Moz lost it whereas the Smiths were great, much like now with TQiD-reissue.

 

I was checking the record sales of other artists. I was surprised to see how one of the most influential albums of all time, "Never Mind the Bollocks" has sold 1.3 million copies ( http://whitgunn.freeservers.com/Davemusic/S/sex-pistols/never-mind-the-bollocks.html ).

Whilst Green Day's first album has sold 20 million copies ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Day_discography )

The Sex Pistols are certainly more relevant than Green Day.... even if the first album of Green Day was sold 20 million copies and the only album of the Sex Pistols only 1.3

The relevance of a band or an artist is hard to judge by Record Sales.

 

Quite. People in the music world often bang on about the fact that the Velvet Underground hardly sold any albums, but most of the people that bought them went on to form bands themselves.

 

Exactly... Morrissey has never been incredibly popular. I don't even need to look at the numbers, I am sure that Nirvana has sold more records than The Smiths + Morrissey together. It's just a wild guess, but I would be VERY surprised if I am wrong.

What you've said about the Velvet Underground is true for a lot of bands (the band Suicide comes to my mind).

In the same way that I am sure that Stephen King has sold more books than William Burroughs + Jack Kerouac + Allen Ginsberg + Gregory Corso united.

In the same way that I am sure that a single film by Steven Spielberg probably has had a bigger audience than the whole filmography of Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol, Eric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette, Louis Malle, Alain Resnais and Agnes Varda...

So one thing is the relevance of an artist.. and the sales are something different.

Quentin Tarantino named his production company (A Band Apart) after a film by J. L. Godard... probably everyone here has seen "Pulp Fiction", but maybe a lot of persons have never watched a single film by Godard. However if you want to write a book on the history of cinema, then you won't find a way to avoid mentioning Godard, whilst the book will remain the same if you do not mention Tarantino.

"The importance of being Morrissey" is not about how many records he has sold... I am sure that Beyonce has sold more records than Morrissey and I do not find it surprising.

LOL... if his BIG ISSUE was selling records, he could have sold maybe 50x times more albums than he did... it's easy (i.e, an album of duets with Justin Bieber, Eminem, Miley Cyrus, etc... I assume most of them would have accepted... the result would be hilarious, but it would sell very well).