Michael Jackson has been gone for nearly 8 years now but his legacy continues. Today, his iconic album Bad has received a Diamond certification from RIAA for moving in excess of 10 million copies in the U.S. alone.
Bad was released on August 31, 1987 via Epic Records and spawned a record five Billboard Hot 100 number one singles. It’s worth noting that while the album took almost 9 years to go from 8x Platinum to 9x Platinum, it’s only taken it 4 years to hit the Diamond mark. This can be attributed to new rules of factoring streaming numbers into Gold & Platinum certifications.
Apart from this, MJ’s biggest album Thriller has also received a new certification of being 33x platinum. Back in 2015, it had become the first album ever to be certified 30 times multi-platinum for U.S. sales. It continues to be the highest certified album in music history.
‘Bad’ is now the second Michael Jackson album to reach RIAA-certified diamond status. pic.twitter.com/H3Kypto3A3
— Michael Jackson (@michaeljackson) February 16, 2017