BEA 5-Year Changes in the Overall Chart

[sp4cetiger]

TracyJacks' recent thread to keep track of chart changes inspired me to go back in time and see how the BEA overall chart has changed over the years. Here is a snapshot of the overall chart from about 5 years ago:

BEA Overall Chart 2008

Below I have color-coded our current chart based on how much (and in what direction) an album has moved since 2008. Green is for risers and red is for fallers. Bold indicates a big rise or fall. Regular black is no change, while black italics means it wasn't on the chart in 2008 (NR), at least as far as I went on the chart (~200).

Caveats:

- The snapshots of the individual pages on the overall chart were not all taken at the same time, so all changes should be considered approximate, especially at the bottom end of the chart. This also means that albums can slip through the cracks; that is, if it was on page 4 when the page 3 snapshot was taken and on page 3 when the page 4 snapshot was taken, I could miss it entirely and it would be given "NR".
- NR can also mean that an album hadn't been released yet in 2008.
- Some of these changes can be due to AM changing the algorithm, they don't necessarily indicate historical or demographic trends.

1 OK Computer (Radiohead) 0
2 The Dark Side Of The Moon (Pink Floyd) +1
3 Revolver (The Beatles) -1
4 Abbey Road (The Beatles) -1
5 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (The Beatles) +1
6 Nevermind (Nirvana) +2
7 Led Zeppelin IV (Led Zeppelin) +2
8 The White Album (The Beatles) -2
9 Funeral (Arcade Fire) +33
10 Kid A (Radiohead) +3
11 London Calling (The Clash) -4
12 The Velvet Underground And Nico (The Velvet Underground) -2
13 Pet Sounds (The Beach Boys) -2
14 The Bends (Radiohead) 0
15 Wish You Were Here (Pink Floyd) +1
16 In Rainbows (Radiohead) +11
17 Highway 61 Revisited (Bob Dylan) -5
18 Doolittle (Pixies) +23
19 In The Aeroplane Over The Sea (Neutral Milk Hotel) +31
20 The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars (David Bowie) +1
21 Rubber Soul (The Beatles) +3
22 The Queen Is Dead (The Smiths) +4
23 The Wall (Pink Floyd) 0
24 Who's Next (The Who) -9
25 Is This It (The Strokes) +41
26 Blonde On Blonde (Bob Dylan) -6
27 Exile On Main St. (The Rolling Stones) -2
28 Are You Experienced (The Jimi Hendrix Experience) -11
29 The Doors (The Doors) -10
30 The Stone Roses (The Stone Roses) -12
31 The Joshua Tree (U2) -9
32 Loveless (My Bloody Valentine) +24
33 Ten (Pearl Jam) 0
34 Blood On The Tracks (Bob Dylan) -5
35 Led Zeppelin II (Led Zeppelin) +3
36 (What's The Story) Morning Glory? (Oasis) -8
37 Rumours (Fleetwood Mac) -3
38 Born To Run (Bruce Springsteen) -3
39 Unknown Pleasures (Joy Division) NR
40 Let It Bleed (The Rolling Stones) +3
41 The Suburbs (Arcade Fire) NR
42 Grace (Jeff Buckley) -12
43 In Utero (Nirvana) +22
44 Automatic For The People (R.E.M.) +2
45 Daydream Nation (Sonic Youth) +9
46 Kind Of Blue (Miles Davis) -8
47 Elephant (The White Stripes) NR
48 Achtung Baby (U2) -3
49 Marquee Moon (Television) +8
50 Appetite For Destruction (Guns N' Roses) -18
51 Astral Weeks (Van Morrison) -7
52 Whatever People Say I Am That's What I'm Not (Arctic Monkeys) +62
53 Led Zeppelin (Led Zeppelin) -4
54 A Night At The Opera (Queen) -7
55 What's Going On (Marvin Gaye) -16
56 Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (Wilco) NR
57 Hunky Dory (David Bowie) -9
58 Never Mind The Bollocks Here's (The Sex Pistols) -27
59 Definitely Maybe (Oasis) -22
60 Closer (Joy Division) -9
61 A Rush Of Blood To The Head (Coldplay) -6
62 Remain in Light (Talking Heads) +57
63 Forever Changes (Love) -2
64 Disintegration (The Cure) NR
65 Electric Ladyland (The Jimi Hendrix Experience) -28
66 In The Court Of The Crimson King (King Crimson) +56
67 Animals (Pink Floyd) +74
68 Thriller (Michael Jackson) -6
69 Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (The Smashing Pumpkins) +1
70 Sticky Fingers (The Rolling Stones) +14
71 Siamese Dream (The Smashing Pumpkins) +9
72 Ágætis Byrjun (Sigur Rós) NR
73 Physical Graffiti (Led Zeppelin) 0
74 After The Gold Rush (Neil Young) +33
75 The Soft Bulletin (The Flaming Lips) +2
76 Back In Black (AC/DC) -36
77 Surfer Rosa (Pixies) +11
78 Pink Moon (Nick Drake) +47
79 Paranoid (Black Sabbath) -12
80 Master Of Puppets (Metallica) -24
81 Neon Bible (Arcade Fire) NR
82 Houses Of The Holy (Led Zeppelin) -18
83 Magical Mystery Tour (The Beatles) NR
84 The Blue Album (Weezer) -13
85 Bringing It All Back Home (Bob Dylan) -26
86 Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots (The Flaming Lips) +13
87 Fleet Foxes (Fleet Foxes) NR
88 Blood Sugar Sex Magik (Red Hot Chili Peppers) -27
89 Low (David Bowie) -13
90 Absolution (Muse) +15
91 Dummy (Portishead) +7
92 Rage Against The Machine (Rage Against The Machine) -34
93 Illinois (Sufjan Stevens) +77
94 Turn On The Bright Lights (Interpol) +55
95 Rain Dogs (Tom Waits) +15
96 Merriweather Post Pavilion (Animal Collective) NR
97 My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (Kanye West) NR
98 MTV Unplugged In New York (Nirvana) +3
99 Harvest (Neil Young) -12
100 For Emma Forever Ago (Bon Iver) NR

Fell off: A Love Supreme (Coltrane), Trout Mask Replica (Captain Beefheart), Amnesiac (Radiohead), Purple Rain (Prince), The Clash, Urban Hymns (The Verve), Tommy (The Who), Innervisions (Stevie Wonder), Metallica (Metallica), American Idiot (Green Day), Parachutes (Coldplay), Hotel California (Eagles), Blue (Joni Mitchell), Californication (Red Hot Chili Peppers), Legend (Bob Marley), Screamadelica (Primal Scream), Horses (Patti Smith)

General trends:
- It looks like angry music took a big hit, either due to changing trends in music or changing demographics on the site. Biggest fallers include the Sex Pistols, AC/DC, Metallica, and Rage Against the Machine.
- On the other extreme, melancholy pop/rock albums did very well. Biggest risers include Arcade Fire, Neutral Milk Hotel, Sufjan Stevens, and Nick Drake.
- Classic rock was a mixed bag, with some rising and some falling. Dylan, the Doors, and Hendrix all have fallen, while influences on the indie scene, like Bowie and the Talking Heads, tended to rise. The Beatles remained relatively steady on average.
- Jazz was already underrepresented in the top 100 in 2008, but the loss of A Love Supreme leaves only one jazz album in the top 100.

Other thoughts?

[Dingerbell]

Wow, Loveless, Unknown Pleasures, Forever Changes and Electric Ladyland weren't in the top 100, but Parachutes was? Couldn't imagine that.

On the whole though, most albums that have move up have so deservedly.

[sp4cetiger]

[nutso42]

This is awesome. Thanks for putting the work into this. I'll pore over it some more before posting "thoughts".

[Goodsir]

Funny how back then it only took 1,000 rank score to get an album in the top 100.

[sp4cetiger]

[Listmeister]

Fascinating! Thanks for doing that.

[sp4cetiger]

One more thing to note: Whatever People Say I Am That's What I'm Not had been released very recently at the time of the snapshot I looked at, so its big rise (+62) may be just from the fact that a lot of people weren't familiar with the band at that point.

[Jasonconfused]

Holy hell. I hope the trend that I'm seeing here doesn't continue
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[Kiki]

Good chart.