By: BEVERLY BUTULA//January 11, 2011//
When I usually talk about gold or platinum, I am dropping jewelry hints to my husband. However, most individuals interested in music associate the words gold and platinum with record sales. (Yes, I still call them records). The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that monitors the sales of sound recordings and distributes the awards. Their website offers a fun searchable database of gold and platinum awards back to when they began in 1958.
The database allows the researcher to search by title of recording, artist, label, format, date, etc. You can also sort by artist or certification date, so it is easy to follow the success of a particular piece. For example, if I search by the “Eagles” and look for their “Greatest Hits 1971-1975” album, I will find that it went platinum in 1976 and had a 14X multi-platinum certification in 1993.
The site also lists the top 100 albums, top selling artists, as well as other certification history and facts.