Bruce Springsteen’s Greatest Hits becomes his fifth album — and first compilation — to spend at least 52 weeks (a full year) on the Billboard 200. UNITED STATES – OCTOBER 11: REDBANK Photo of Bruce SPRINGSTEEN, Bruce Springsteen performing on stage – Born to Run Tour, 27 (Photo by Fin Costello/Redferns)
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Bruce Springsteen’s latest concert trek, The Land of Hope and Dreams American Tour, was a relatively quick affair, especially considering how long some of the rock superstar’s past ventures have run. Only 20 dates were scheduled in the United States, and the shows concluded at the end of May in Philadelphia.
Fittingly, Springsteen returns to multiple Billboard charts this week with his Greatest Hits compilation. As the set, which is packed with many of his most beloved singles – those released before the collection dropped in 1995 – it reaches a special milestone on the most competitive albums tally in the country.
Bruce Springsteen Returns With Greatest Hits
Greatest Hits bounds back onto the Billboard 200, returning to the list of the most-consumed collections of any style and any length in the U.S. The compilation breaks back onto the roster at No. 192 with 9,700 equivalent units shifted, according to Luminate. A little more than 350 of those were actual purchases, while plays on platforms such as Spotify, Apple Music and others made up the rest.
Bruce Springsteen’s Compilation Reaches One Year
As Greatest Hits reappears, it reaches 52 weeks – its first full year – as one of the 200 most-consumed albums in America. Four releases by Springsteen have previously made it to the same landmark, but Greatest Hits stands out as his first compilation to do so.
Springsteen’s longest-charting title on the Billboard 200 remains Born in the U.S.A., with 144 frames on the ranking to its credit. Another two titles, Born to Run and The River, also held on for triple-digit stints, as those studio efforts have thus far accumulated 110 and 107 weeks on the rundown, respectively.
Springsteen’s 1978 album Darkness on the Edge of Town only fails to join those three aforementioned 100-plus-week winners by a few periods. That early career success has now spent 97 turns somewhere on the 200-space roster.
Bruce Springsteen Tied with Eminem and Barbra Streisand
Springsteen is currently tied with four other artists for the honor of claiming the fifth-most No. 1s of all time on the Billboard 200. 11 of his albums, including Greatest Hits, have reached the summit, and he’s on the same level as Barbra Streisand, Eminem, Ye (formerly known as Kanye West) and Future. Only the Beatles (19), Drake and Taylor Swift (15 each), and Jay-Z (14) have landed more champions. Greatest Hits debuted at the Billboard 200 summit in March 1995, and it would spend two weeks ruling.
Greatest Hits Returns to Multiple Billboard Charts
Greatest Hits reappears not only on the Billboard 200 but also on the Top Rock & Alternative Albums chart. That list is compiled using the same methodology as the main albums roster, but it focuses on all forms of rock music. Springsteen’s Greatest Hits reenters the rundown at No. 49, in second-to-last place.
Unlike on the Billboard 200, the compilation has never dominated on the rock list. Instead, in the 14 weeks it has spent somewhere on the genre-specific tally – only a fraction of what it has thus far managed on the more all-encompassing register – Greatest Hits has topped out at No. 18.