Talk:Parallel Lines

Parallel Lines "song"
Is there any evidence behind this actually being a song? If there isn't, it should probably just be labelled as a poem as are oft found in liner notes without corresponding music. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.48.248.59 (talk) 01:31, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

parallel lines is an unrealeased song from the PL sessions —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.106.148.147 (talk) 04:10, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Fade Away and Radiate
According to the article, this song is about "falling in love with dead movie stars". I'd like to see some justification for this claim, since the lyrics seem to be quite directly about the prosaic situation of falling asleep with the television on ("The beams become my dream. My dream is on the screen.") 209.179.82.114 (talk) 02:41, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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Assessment comment
Substituted at 02:16, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

RfC: Is it acceptable to use the preposition "in" between the name of the studio and its city?
In response to this recent edit war: ... Is it acceptable to use the preposition "in" between the name of the studio and its city? Dan56 (talk) 10:15, 27 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Yes Dan56 (talk) 10:15, 27 July 2016 (UTC)

Was there no consensus at Template talk:Infobox album? --Martin de la Iglesia (talk) 13:57, 27 July 2016 (UTC)
 * This is apparently a different discussion. This is permissive. It is not asking if it should be mandated, only if its permissible. The infobox question is which should be used, and there the consensus seems to be do not use the preposition. Walter Görlitz (talk) 13:27, 5 August 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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20m sales
This is a gross exaggeration. It wouldn't fit Wikipedia's own criteria as certifucations fall well short of this. Coachtripfan (talk) 13:37, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Your certifications account for about 2m. Where are the extra 18 million sales? Yes, probably an extra million sales in the UK (no multiple platinum awards then). This figure is a joke. Coachtripfan (talk) 13:40, 12 January 2019 (UTC)


 * The rest of the world? Dan56 (talk) 18:19, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

The countries where certifications are listed account for the majority of global sales.

Blondie had little success in Japan or Latin America for example.

This 20m sale is just plucked from the air and cannot be broken down. Coachtripfan (talk) 10:11, 20 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Chartmasters (we obviously can't use it in Wiki articles) estimated the sales of the album at 8.7 million. Based on their rationale, the inflation of this album's sales is obviously very high. Bluesatellite (talk) 03:57, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

Despite this discussion has ceased; here is some older sales reports to have an idea of the trajectory of its claimed sales.

--Apoxyomenus (talk) 04:20, 13 February 2021 (UTC)
 * 5 million (1979) by The New York Times Magazine (pag. 18) : [...] "In 1978, most of these kids probably never heard of Blondie , but in 1979 , the album “ Parallel Lines , ” Blondie ' s third , latest and best , had sold more than five million copies worldwide ; and sales of the album ' s hit single , “ Heart of Glass , ” exceeded two million" | Article online by Ann Louise Bardach and Susan Lydon, August 26, 1979
 * 5 million (1980) by The New York Times Annual Review (pag. 191) : [...] "more than five million copies worldwide ; and sales of the album ' s hit single, “ Heart of Glass , ” exceeded two million" | Article online by Ann Louise Bardach and Susan Lydon, August 26, 1979
 * 7 million (1980) by Lester Bangs in his book Blondie (pag. 11) : [...] "They ' re featured on the cover of Cash Box, which reports that Parallel Lines , selling 7 million copies worldwide"
 * 20 million (1992) by Ted Greenwald in his book Rock and Roll (pag. 191) : [...] "Blondie crossed over with Parallel Lines (1978), selling a whopping 20 million copies"
 * 7 million (1996) by Lucy O'Brien in her book She Bop: The Definitive History of Women in Rock, Pop, and Soul (pag. 139) : [...] "It wasn't until they moved to Chrysalis and released the Mike Chapman - produced album Parallel Lines that Blondie took off in the States, their single ' Heart Of Glass ' going to No. 1 , the album selling seven million copies in two years."
 * 20 million (1999) by Out (pag. 81) : [...] "Back in New York in 1978, they went into the studio to record the classic Parallel Lines with producer Mike Chapman . The album has sold 20 million copies ."
 * 20 million (2006) by Billboard (pag. 34) : [...] " 1 hit on the Hot 100 in 1979 but propelled the album to sell 20 million copies worldwide."

sometimes labels don’t submit for certificates from riaa, it costs after all thousands to do so Shhsbavavaa (talk) 12:26, 10 October 2022 (UTC)

I get the the point that certifications are often out of date.

In UK, no multi platinum awards in late 70s but it has sold around 1.7m and so should be platinum x5.

In the US, perhaps another million.

But we are talking about sales of 20 million. This claim, never verified appeared in a book back in 1992 - and others have repeated it. There is no global organisation that compiled this.

This is the thing with Wikipedia, if something is claimed and published it is often taken as fact.

Better to stick to certifications which admittedly under-estimate sales. But at least they can be verified. Coachtripfan (talk) 17:37, 7 January 2023 (UTC)


 * Record Companies know how many copies were manufactured. And how many were sold to stores etc. There are a number of reasons why Certifications may be significantly lower than actual sales figures.