You know, there could be a chance that "A Hard Day's Night" includes the original UA soundtrack in its certification.........I mean "With the Beatles" has only gone gold since it was released here in the late eighties......yes, Capitol had "A Hard Day's Night" since the late seventies when they acquired the rights as you said, but I still find it unlikely that it has sold four million copies since then. With "Meet the Beatles" selling five million, most of which came in 1964, I could see the UA soundtrack having sold two million or so in 1964 (partly because of the competition with "Something New").....and then A Hard Day's Night could've sold a further million from then on until the eighties, and then another million when it was finally released here in 1988.
Not too likely. Capitol would have needed the internal distribution and sales documents of UA to get pre-1978 sales certified. There is too much involved in that. Things like that don`t happen.
But of course you do have a point with 'With The Beatles' only being certified with sales of 500,000. It took ca. 10 years to sell that much. But then again, 'Please Please Me' sold twice as much in the same time. One would have expected these two albums to sell about the same, or in the case of one outselling the other, 'With The Beatles' would have appeared to be the safer bet of leading in sales, since it is a more iconic album (classic sleeve, LP that sparked UK Beatlemania, first ever Beatles LP to sell over 1 million in UK).
If PPM sold 1 million in ten years, then it is not impossible for AHDN to have sold 4 million in 23 years. It is a more recognizable album than PPM, as it had always been part of the US catalog and is linked to the first Beatles movie. Add to that that it is generally referred to as the best of the early Beatles albums, it wouldn`t be a big surprise if it kept on selling quite well. Don`t forget that it probably did enjoy extra sales generated by John`s murder in 1980 and also by the media buzz surrounding the Beatles' 20 year anniversary of arriving in the US in 1984.
AHDN did sell an awful lot of copies during 1964. Check out this item from Billboard:
"United Artist`s decision to issue A Hard Day`s Night ahead of the film`s release proved to be a wise one. On July 1, 1964, the company announced that the LP had sold and delivered 1 million copies in just four days. Billboard, in a story titled "Beatles` LP: 4 Days That Shake The Industry", reported the news in its July 11 issue, stating that the album had become one of the fastest selling LPs in the history of the record business."It sold 1 million copies in four days, now imagine what it sold in the 14 weeks it stayed at the top of Billboard`s albums charts? Must have been more than 2 million. I think it was the second biggest selling LP of 1964 right behind "Meet The Beatles!". Assuming it sold roughly over 3 million in '64, by the end of the 60s, it should have been approaching the 4 million mark, or if that is too optimistic, let`s say by 1978. And that is a conservative approach to AHDN`s American sales.
I don`t think these pre-1978 sales are a factor in the RIAA awards.
