And lastly, Grammy nominations and wins for the album or any of its songs. 2 through 10, nine points for 11 through 20, eight points for 21 through 30, and so on and so forth through 91-100, which netted it one point. Since BEA also tracks by year, we awarded 15 points if the album is listed as the top in its release year, 10 points if it landed no. Ranking on the chart-aggregation website Best Ever Albums, which uses more than 50,000 critic and user charts to determine the best albums, well, ever. Number of top-10 singles in the Billboard Hot 100, with one point for each one (three for a no. Billboard 200 peak, giving an album five points for a top-10 placement (with two extra points for a no. RIAA certifications, giving it a half point for a gold plaque and one point for every platinum level it reached (a record that went two times platinum would get two points, and so on). (An early finding from that initial list we probably didn’t need a study for: Major artists typically stay clear of each other’s release dates, which makes jam-packed days kinda rare.) From there, we measured each album by five categories: We ended up with about 100 days across 30 years. We started with 1991-roughly the start of the SoundScan era, which changed how record sales were accounted for and much of what we knew about popular music-and ran through the present, singling out days with several big-ticket releases. The idea was to find dates with multiple high-impact releases that have stood the test of time. So we devised a formula that accounts for both commercial performance and critical accolades in hopes of arriving at a conclusion. We wanted to prove whether that September 1991 day is in fact the most important date in modern album history, or whether there were any that surpassed it. (Also a late-period record by Van Morrison, if you’re being a completist.) Subjectively, it’s considered one of the greatest release dates in history-perhaps even the absolute best.īut subjective isn’t good enough for us here at The Ringer. In the U.S., that day saw the release of three undeniable classics-Nirvana’s Nevermind, A Tribe Called Quest’s The Low End Theory, and Red Hot Chili Peppers’ Blood Sugar Sex Magik-plus heralded releases by Soundgarden and the Pixies. To say September 24, 1991, is one of those instances that called for divided attention is something of an understatement. And if you were really lucky-or unlucky, if you had a budget-there’d be more than one album on the same day that demanded your hard-earned cash. Often in the CD era, it didn’t-who among us hasn’t paid $18.99 for an LP with two hot singles and 14 tracks of filler? But occasionally, the album was worth the price. It was a release for fans and the culmination of months of hype: It was time to finally hear whether the new music of a beloved artist lived up to your hopes. “Sure, grandpa, let’s get you to bed,” you say, but seriously: Before the first widespread MP3 leaks-and the arrival of new music delivery playlists like Release Radar on Spotify ( The Ringer’s parent company)-those drop dates meant something to many. And if the release was big enough, record stores would open at midnight so fans could grab the album as soon as it could contractually go on sale. before the advent of Global Release Day-thousands would schlep to their local mom-and-pop or chain store and plop down between $10 and $20 for an actual, physical copy of an album. Every week-typically on Tuesdays in the U.S. It’s something Gen Xers and old millennials will tell their grandkids about: the hallowed release date. #Korn unplugged blonde hair plus
To celebrate the occasion, we’re looking back on September 24, 1991, by diving into the legacy of Nevermind and The Low End Theory, plus using math to determine whether any other release day in the past three decades stacks up. Thirty years ago Friday, one of the most consequential days in modern music history occurred when Nirvana, A Tribe Called Quest, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Soundgarden all released seminal albums.
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