The commercial appeal of emo and punk records is undeniable. In this article, I dove into the most commercially successful albums of the past three decades in our scene. First, I wanted to provide a couple of quick notes about how I pulled this data. I took a look at the most popular pop-punk and emo albums from a Wikipedia article and cross-referenced it with other bands that I knew would be in the vicinity of receiving a Gold (500,000 albums sold) or Platinum (1 million albums sold) RIAA certification. From there, I used the Wikipedia articles on the individual album pages to see if they mentioned any certifications of Gold or above. I then confirmed those totals on the extremely helpful RIAA website. In some cases, I either rounded up or down on the number of albums sold to make the organizing of this list a little bit easier to follow, and these totals are for US sales only. I have organized this list into the three different decades of the 90’s, 00’s and 10’s, and I found it interesting that the vast number of eligible albums occurred during the 00’s era. I hope that you will find this information as enlightening as I did, and there are plenty of surprises to be found in these lists as well.
Gold Certifications for the 90’s:
- Green Day – 1,039 / Smoothed Out Slappy Hours
- Bad Religion – Stranger Than Fiction
- NOFX – Punk in Drublic
- The Offspring – Ignition
Platinum Certifications for the 90’s:
- Green Day – Kerplunk!
- Rancid – And Out Come the Wolves
- The Offspring – Ixnay on the Hombre
- Weezer – Pinkerton
- Blink-182 – Dude Ranch
- Eve 6 – Eve 6
- Lit – A Place in the Sun
- Green Day – Insomniac (x 2)
- Green Day – Nimrod (x 2)
- Weezer – Weezer (Blue Album) (x 3)
- The Offspring – Americana (x 5)
- Blink-182 – Enema of the State (x 5)
- The Offspring – Smash (x 6)
- No Doubt – Tragic Kingdom (x 10)
- Green Day – Dookie (x 12)
Gold Certifications for the 00’s:
- Avenged Sevenfold – Waking the Fallen
- Avenged Sevenfold – Avenged Sevenfold
- Boys Like Girls – Boys Like Girls
- Brand New – Deja Entendu
- Dashboard Confessional – Places We Have Come to Fear the Most
- Dashboard Confessional – A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar
- Dashboard Confessional – Dusk and Summer
- New Found Glory – New Found Glory
- Good Charlotte – Good Charlotte
- Taking Back Sunday – Tell All Your Friends
- Weezer – Maladroit
- The Donnas – Spend the Night
- Sum 41 – Does this Look Infected?
- The Ataris – So Long, Astoria
- Coheed and Cambria – In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth 3
- The Used – Lies for the Liars
- Coheed and Cambria – GOOD APOLLO I’M BURNING STAR IV VOLUME ONE: FROM FEAR THROUGH THE EYES OF MADNESS
- Fall Out Boy – Take This To Your Grave
- New Found Glory – Catalyst
- Rise Against – Appeal To Reason
- Rise Against – Siren Song of the Counter Culture
- Rise Against – The Sufferer and the Witness
- Taking Back Sunday – Where You Want to Be
- Sum 41 – Chuck
- Jimmy Eat World – Futures
- Relient K – Two Lefts Don’t Make a Right…But Three Do
- Relient K – Mmhmm
- Relient K – Anatomy of the Tongue In Cheek
- Senses Fail – Let it Enfold You
- Plain White T’s – All That We Needed
- Plain White T’s – Every Second Counts
- Paramore – All We Know is Falling
- Yellowcard – Lights and Sounds
- Taking Back Sunday – Louder Now
- All Time Low – So Wrong, It’s Right
- Fall Out Boy – Folie a Deux
- All Time Low – Nothing Personal
- The Offspring – Splinter
- Underoath – They’re Only Chasing Safety
- Underoath – Define the Great Line
Platinum Certifications for the 00’s:
- Avenged Sevenfold – City of Evil
- Green Day – 21st Century Breakdown
- Dashboard Confessional – MTV Unplugged
- Eve 6 – Horrorscope
- The Offspring – Conspiracy of One
- New Found Glory – Sticks and Stones
- All-American Rejects – All-American Rejects
- Good Charlotte – The Chronicles of Life and Death
- Simple Plan – Still Not Getting Any…
- The Used – The Used
- The Used – In Love and Death
- Weezer – Make Believe
- Fall Out Boy – Infinity On High
- Paramore – Brand New Eyes
- AFI – Sing the Sorrow
- AFI – Decemberunderground
- Green Day – Warning
- No Doubt – Return of Saturn
- Sum 41 – All Killer No Filler
- Panic! At The Disco – Pretty. Odd.
- Weezer – Weezer (Green Album)
- Jimmy Eat World – Bleed American
- The All-American Rejects – The All-American Rejects
- Blink-182 – Take Off Your Pants and Jacket (x 2)
- Simple Plan – No Pads, No Helmets…Just Balls (x 2)
- Yellowcard – Ocean Avenue (x 2)
- Blink-182 – Blink-182 (x 2)
- Avril Lavigne – The Best Damn Thing (x 2)
- Paramore – RIOT! (x 2)
- Panic! At The Disco – A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out (x 3)
- Avril Lavigne – Under My Skin (x 3)
- My Chemical Romance – Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge (x 3)
- Fall Out Boy – From Under the Cork Tree (x 3)
- My Chemical Romance – The Black Parade (x 3)
- Good Charlotte – The Young and the Hopeless (x 3)
- Green Day – American Idiot (x 6)
- Avril Lavigne – Let Go (x 7)
Gold Certifications for the 10’s:
- A Day To Remember – What Separates Me From You
- A Day To Remember – Homesick
- Avenged Sevenfold – Nightmare
- My Chemical Romance – Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys
- Panic! At the Disco – Vices & Virtues
- 5 Seconds of Summer – 5 Seconds of Summer
- Blink-182 – California
Platinum Certifications for the 10’s:
- Paramore – Paramore
- Fall Out Boy – Save Rock and Roll
- Fall Out Boy – American Beauty/American Psycho
- Panic! At the Disco – Pray for the Wicked
- Panic! At The Disco – Too Weird to Live, Too Rare to Die
- Panic! At the Disco – Death of a Bachelor (x 2)
- fun. – Some Nights (x 3)