Billboard Rock Albums & Top Tracks, March 1981 - September 1984

There's gotta be over 50 charts in Billboard these days, but on March 21, 1981 the magazine introduced three new charts and it was a pretty big deal for white, suburban males errrrr.....I mean FM album-oriented rock radio people across the country.

Coincidentally (maybe?), early 1981 was about the time I was moving from KILT-AM (narrowly beating a format switch from Top 40 to country) to stations on the FM dial: 101 KLOL, 97 Rock, and, later, KKBQ.

Anyway, here's that first chart, "A compilation of Rock Radio Airplay as indicated by the nations leading Album oriented and Rock Tracks stations" [sic] :

That album chart is an interesting mix of pop-rock, New Wave, Southern Rock, soft rock, dance, yacht, roots rock, heavy metal, and smooth jazz. I dig! And here's the last chart to feature albums from September 8, 1984:

The Rock Albums chart was discontinued in the September 15 issue and Top Tracks was renamed Top Rock Tracks. It is currently branded as the Mainstream Rock Songs chart. Has anyone ever compiled a Whitburnesque list of the Rock albums charts (1981-84) or is that gonna need to be a new side project for me?  (As if I wasn't gonna do it anyway for shits and giggles.) Update: that rock album chart info, along with other charts, is now available at our sister website: https://albumcharts.wordpress.com/

As seen in the "Top Adds" section above, the Rock Albums list sometimes included 12" promo singles, imports, and 45s. Go figure. Sometimes the single was just a placeholder on the chart until the album was released. For example, the George Thorogood single, "Nobody but Me," placed on the charts on August 7, 1982. Then, once the Bad to the Bone album was released, the album took over the single's spot and kept the "weeks on chart" tally going. So the first time we see Bad to the Bone on the chart is the August 28 chart, where it has been on the chart for 4 weeks. Doesn't make sense? Exactly.

More to come...