Eagles Greatest Hits tracklist:

1. Take It Easy
2. Witchy Woman
3. Lyin' Eyes
4. Already Gone
5. Desperado
6. One of These Nights
7. Tequila Sunrise
8. Take It to the Limit
9. Peaceful Easy FEeling
10. Best of My Love

Thriller tracklist:
1. Wanna Be Startin' Something
2. Baby Be Mine
3. The Girl Is Mine
4. Thriller
5. Beat It
6. Billie Jean
7. Human Nature
8. PYT
9. The Lady in My Life


Eagles has 4, maybe 5 true "hits" on their Greatest Hits albums.

Thriller has 7 hits, 5 of which were absolute smash hits.

Thriller wins.

Quote:

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1. Wanna Be Startin' Something
4. Thriller
5. Beat It
6. Billie Jean

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I'm not sure where you see 5 "absolute smash" hits

AGnCS said:

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Quote:

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1. Wanna Be Startin' Something
4. Thriller
5. Beat It
6. Billie Jean

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I'm not sure where you see 5 "absolute smash" hits

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I guess it depends on your definition of smash hit. The Girl is Mine reached number 2 on the Hot 100.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Eagles Greatest Hits tracklist:

1. Take It Easy
2. Witchy Woman
3. Lyin' Eyes
4. Already Gone
5. Desperado
6. One of These Nights
7. Tequila Sunrise
8. Take It to the Limit
9. Peaceful Easy FEeling
10. Best of My Love

Thriller tracklist:
1. Wanna Be Startin' Something
2. Baby Be Mine
3. The Girl Is Mine
4. Thriller
5. Beat It
6. Billie Jean
7. Human Nature
8. PYT
9. The Lady in My Life


Eagles has 4, maybe 5 true "hits" on their Greatest Hits albums.

Thriller has 7 hits, 5 of which were absolute smash hits.

Thriller wins.

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Even if you were right about "hits", there's a reason one album keeps selling and the other doesn't at the same pace.
One has music that has stood the test of time, the other didn't.
There have been a ton of "smash hits" that aren't even remembered today, or remembered with "what were we thinking?"- heck, the Macarena was a "smash hit", the damn thing sold 11 million copies its first two years and was the number one song for 1996.
The longer burn is and should be the standard.

I agree.

You're sort of supporting my argument actually. About half (or more) of the Eagles' track listing hasn't really carried over into newer generations, whereas I'm fairly sure almost every kid is familiar with Thriller, Beat it, and Billie Jean.

Further proof that popularity has nothing to do with quality.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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I agree.

You're sort of supporting my argument actually. About half (or more) of the Eagles' track listing hasn't really carried over into newer generations, whereas I'm fairly sure almost every kid is familiar with Thriller, Beat it, and Billie Jean.

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Actually given that eagles are outselling thriller even now (despite being 10 years older), I think the opposite is true. It isn't all olds buying it. That was what I was saying.
But I don't think there's demographic data to back up either argument.

Take any 10 kids aged 10-18, play them both albums. I guarantee you they recognize more songs off Thriller.

The Eagles are somewhat baffling to me. Were they that big in the 70s? It was before my time, but I've just never heard (or seen online) someone say that the Eagles were there favorite band, or even in the top 10. Yet their greatest hits album is the best selling album of all time.

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The Eagles are somewhat baffling to me. Were they that big in the 70s? It was before my time, but I've just never heard (or seen online) someone say that the Eagles were there favorite band, or even in the top 10. Yet their greatest hits album is the best selling album of all time.

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I'm a Class of '80 Ag, so they were in "my time".

We listened to the radio so much back then, and an Eagles song was a welcome respite for many of us from the very popular disco music of the era.

Then that beautiful invention came along - FM - stations that played albums and songs not on the Top 40 playlist.I listened to a lot of Eagles songs on FM, after I installed my Panasonic quadrophonic 8-track/FM player in my car.

The Eagles would fill up stadiums when they toured.

After Already Gone and they became well known, all their later albums were #1 on the charts. They did this in the era of the great music (for my age group). Were they my "favorite" group. Probably not. I anxiously awaited the next ZZ Top, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Who, Springsteen, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, AC/DC, Bad Company, Steve Miller, Yes, Rolling Stones,... the list goes on and on. It was a great era for music. But I bought Eagles albums (or tapes) because they were good and we listened to them late at night parked on the canal levees in south Texas.

I was among the group that was not into disco, not into country, not into pop. The Eagles were a crossover and they were the first group I was aware of in the "country rock" genre (at least while Bernie was with them).

They were in that group that included Linda Ronstadt and Jackson Browne and plenty of us loved the sound.

I could play Thriller to my kids (10-12) and they wouldn't know any of the songs. Maybe Thriller. They would however know some Eagles songs because I listen to stations that play the Eagles and their grandfathers are both listeners of the Eagles.

I was never a huge fan of the Eagles, but I have heard them for 40 years so they have some staying power for sure.

BES - Go watch the documentary on the Eagles on Netflix.

Saw the documentary very shortly after initial release

I like Witchy Woman and several other songs quite a lot, it's excellent yacht rock, but I literally have at least 100 cds that deserved to sell more copies

I think something that you really have to consider when you're talking about the Eagles popularity is the fact that they have so much crossover with rock and country audiences, and that's huge.

And you could also say the same thing about rock/pop and urban audiences with Michael Jackson . To sell that much, you would have to have a crossover on two major audiences like that .

Aust Ag said:

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And you could also say the same thing about rock/pop and urban audiences with Michael Jackson . To sell that much, you would have to have a crossover on two major audiences like that .

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MJ had the benefit of MTV as well.

Seen it. It's good.

I'm actually an Eagles fan.

I was a young kid with a transistor radio listening to the Eagles in the mid 70s, then a Gen X MTV kid in high school and college during MJ's heyday. I have all the pertinent music from both artists. The Eagles broke up/ went on hiatus at the apex of their popularity; hard to describe to younger folks just how much they were on the radio, being a crossover act. Music changed and MJ absolutely owned the next chapter. I was a fan like most everyone else.
One act is still alive (to some extent and form) to promote their music, and their music seems easier to listen to as one gets older. The other is deceased, with a now-mixed public perception. I anticipate this sales gap will continue to grow over the next decade, with a final spike when Henley passes on.

Child molesters

the eagles documentary said it best.

Their songs became the soundtrack to our lives. Like it or not, those songs have never stopped being played on the radio or somewhere for 40 years.

Here's probably my most unpopular take of all time:
I would rather see a triple headlining bill of Nickelback/Limp Bizkit and an earth shattering Creed reunion than listen to an Eagles song.

I just hate the Eagles. They are an instant change the station for me.

superunknown said:

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Here's probably my most unpopular take of all time:
I would rather see a triple headlining bill of Nickelback/Limp Bizkit and an earth shattering Creed reunion than listen to an Eagles song.

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To each their own. I'm with you but substitute the Eagles for the majority of grunge in your example.

But folk and rock and roll are not the same without the Eagles. They took a very underground segment, did it better than anyone could ever imagine, and brought it to mainstream. They could have also been trendsetters as a purely acapela unit had they gone that route. Their harmonizing was one of a kind.

mazag08 said:

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superunknown said:

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Here's probably my most unpopular take of all time:
I would rather see a triple headlining bill of Nickelback/Limp Bizkit and an earth shattering Creed reunion than listen to an Eagles song.

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They could have also been trendsetters as a purely acapela unit had they gone that route. Their harmonizing was one of a kind.

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One of a kind for the 70s maybe. Beatles did a decade earlier.

And perfected by System of a Down.

62strat said:

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mazag08 said:

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superunknown said:

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Here's probably my most unpopular take of all time:
I would rather see a triple headlining bill of Nickelback/Limp Bizkit and an earth shattering Creed reunion than listen to an Eagles song.

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They could have also been trendsetters as a purely acapela unit had they gone that route. Their harmonizing was one of a kind.

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One of a kind for the 70s maybe. Beatles did a decade earlier.

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Fair enough.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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And perfected by System of a Down.

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I don't think you trust!

mazag08 said:

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62strat said:

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mazag08 said:

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superunknown said:

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Here's probably my most unpopular take of all time:
I would rather see a triple headlining bill of Nickelback/Limp Bizkit and an earth shattering Creed reunion than listen to an Eagles song.

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They could have also been trendsetters as a purely acapela unit had they gone that route. Their harmonizing was one of a kind.

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One of a kind for the 70s maybe. Beatles did a decade earlier.

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Fair enough.

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And the Beach Boys too

And the Four Seasons

62strat said:

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VW Bus Guy said:

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AustinAg2K said:

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I wonder if you buy all the songs individually, does that count as an album sale? What if they are bought over a long period of time?

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Per the article linked above 1500 streams of a song or 10 downloads of a song equal 1 album sale.

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which is kind of jacked up.. some modern pop princess can have one huge song.. no one downloads the album, yet she can have millions of album sales because the song was downloaded tens of millions of times.

it's just not the same as it used to be.

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It's been an interesting couple of years as Billboard has been trying to navigate the waters now that streaming is the main way people listen to music. But overall I think we are seeing better data with streaming of what people are actually listening to than ever before. Scorpion from Drake had all 25 songs chart on the Billboard Hot 100 because enough people streamed the whole album to push it on the charts. It's crazy having 25 songs on the same album on the hot 100 but it's an honest reflection of what people were actually listening to that week.

I see you're point about single songs driving an album but it's not really different than how it's always been. People have always bought full albums for one song, but sale still counted the whole album (The full Titanic soundtrack sold 10 million copies).