If you would have asked me the question about who was the best selling musical artist from the northwest, say yesterday or maybe five minutes before I read this report from RIAA I’d have thrown out Jimi Hendrix or Nirvana. Heart would have certainly ranked up there with my guesses and I might have have tossed Pearl Jam and/or Alice In Chains into the mix as well. But never in a million years would I have thought the answer was Kenny G. Apparently he’s the guy and come to think of it, I guess he has been around for a long time. According to the RIAA this provider of elevator music is the 27th best-selling artist of all time with 48 million music units sold and that puts him at the top of the northwest, ahead of all the bands I mentioned before. The next highest ranking was Pearl Jam in 57th place with sales of 31 million.
Here’s the top ten music unit selling northwest acts of all time:
View top 250 best-selling artists of all-time:
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is the trade organization that supports and promotes the creative and financial vitality of the major music companies. Its members are the music labels that comprise the most vibrant record industry in the world. RIAA® members create, manufacture and/or distribute approximately 85% of all legitimate recorded music produced and sold in the United States. The RIAA also certifies Gold®, Platinum®, Multi-Platinum™ and Diamond sales awards as well as Los Premios De Oro y Platino™, an award celebrating Latin music sales.
For the sake of argument we classified the northwest as Oregon to British Columbia.
How about a little Kenny G to soothe your aching head after reading this list.