by Shane Christensen

Created on: July 02, 2008

In the history of recorded music, there are five acts that have sales of over 500 million units, which puts them at the top of the musical heap. They are the Beatles, Bing Crosby, Elvis, Frank Sinatra, and Michael Jackson.

The Beatles are the highest selling band of all time and still out-sell most contemporary acts today, although they officially broke up about 38 years ago. Even when the Beatles Anthology television series and albums were released in the mid-Nineties, they went on to sell in record breaking quantities as old and new fans alike devoured the unprecedented volume of previously unheard of material which was finally released for public consumption.

In the year 2000, an album comprised of their number one singles (entitled 1) was strategically rolled out before the Christmas shopping frenzy and went on to sell over 10 million copies in the U.S., and another 20 million worldwide, to become one of the biggest selling albums in history. Not bad for a group that last recorded over 30 years before.

The Beatles changed popular music forever with the release of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, which brought in a new era of selling albums over singles, and this had a profound effect on the music industry. Prior to that, artists like Elvis, Bing, and Frank would place more emphasis on releasing a hit single that would go on to sell millions, while their albums sold poorly by today's standards.

But there is no doubt that Elvis was the King of Rock as he went on to sell hundreds of millions of singles across the world, and greatly influenced acts like the Beatles and others who followed in his footsteps.

Another band that had a profound effect on musical direction was Led Zeppelin, and they would go on to outsell all other acts in the Seventies with superlative releases such as Led Zep IV and Led Zep II. Both of these albums set the musical direction for years to follow in much the same way as Sgt. Peppers, Abbey Road, and Are You Experienced (by Jimi Hendrix Experience) did a few years earlier.

Another British band that competed with both the Beatles and Led Zeppelin has gone on to sell over a hundred million albums as well. Mind you, the Rolling Stones took a lot longer to accomplish this feat, but no one can deny the impact they had on popular music, especially during their heyday in the late Sixties and all through the Seventies.

Other top selling artists in the Seventies were the Bee Gees, Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Stevie Wonder, Abba, Peter Frampton, Pink

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