REALLY?? Top 100 Best-Selling Songs of All Time

UNEXPECTED! Ranking by sales is actually mindblowing.

Edited by Connor Gilkinson
Planned by August Green
Thumbnail by Rikard Tholen

[ceilinh]

It's unreal how big "My Heart Will Go On" was. When I was 17, I went to the Dominican Repulblic with a group of students on March Break, and we visited a radio station for some reason. While we were getting our tour, someone at the station was like "You're Canadians? Celine Dion is Canadian. Sing 'My Heart will Go On' for us, and we'll broadcast it, " so we did. We weren't even a choir or anything-just a random group of Canadian students. 😂

[Manueelaa]

I really like Roomie as a Youtuber, but with every video I realize more and more that we have such different tastes in music and different musical backgrounds, it's crazy. Literally the one song he doesn't know is the song my parents listened to non-stop when I was a kid, or when he said the guitar sound in "Zombie" is weird, I was like "but that is exactly what makes the song so recognizable and iconic".

[firelight]

Makes sense that "My Heart Will Go On" is number one when you think about how it was THE song in a movie that had been in the top three highest grossing films for 25 years, 12 of those years being number 1.

[faheem_]

Fun fact: My city Leicester in England was the hub for production of leather jackets back in the 70's and 80's that went all over the world. My dad worked for a company that made custom leather jackets in the early 80's and he actually made the red jacket that Michael Jackson wore in the Thriller music video after the designer gave the contract to his company to make it.

[girlwithaguitar]

Regarding one of your 'hot takes', the nasty guitar tone on The Cranberries' "Zombie" was on purposeful. The song is an angry response to The Troubles in Ireland killing so many innocent people, and according to the band, they just kept making the tone darker and grungier until that's what they ended up with. An angry tone for an angry song.

[kathleenhudson]

“Money for Nothing” was written when Mark Knopfler was at a department store and was listening to two workers talking. He wrote down what they said and made a song of it, which was a big hit. What made Dire Straits great was Knoppfler’s story telling and guitar playing abilities.

[jackdawalker]

Having the only commentary left for “Thunderstruck” being Joel saying “thunderstruck” in that voice is comedy gold.

[anthonypecorara]

As a baby Gen Xer who graduated high school in the mid/late 90s, this list is essentially my playlist.

[heli_]

Love that Roomie has been uploading so regularly lately!

[christianelind]

They say that in the 80s and 90s artists went on tour to sell albums, now they release albums to sell concerts. People spend a lot of money on music today as well, but more is on tickets.

[mewgiah]

Boston has one of the best debut/ self titled albums of all time. Every track on it is a banger. But I agree a lot of those 70s era bands didn’t do the best at marketing themselves. Probably because the industry was more focused on the actual music.

But they are super underrated. Also the lead singer passed away recently. Rip

[SteelMoments]

Madonna's voice is not pitched by tape speed adjustment on Like A Virgin. In 1984 she was 25 and that's how she sang. Google the live version... It's exactly the same.

[RoomieOfficial]

This is album equivalent sales based on just one song - the usual counting example is 1 album equivalent sale counts as 10 song downloads or 1500 song streams

[ximenaallessandrij.]

I just love how when Black or White and Thriller came in the video, Joel talked about how well produce they are, it made me happy and proud 🥰✨️

[graciesugarbee]

I know it may seem small to some people but thank you so much for putting a flashing/strobe warning! I have photosensitive seizures and it can be such a pain to watch videos because you never know when something is going to come up that can trigger a seizure. I appreciate it so much!

[The_Original_Truebrit]

The fact that there are not more Beatles songs in the list makes question it's validity.

[jediconnor]

I already knew Bohemian Rhapsody had to be in the top 10. If it wasn’t, I would’ve been extremely shocked.

[heymikey]

I’m a 65-year-old baby boomer and I just wanted to let you know that I very much enjoyed watching this video of yours. I enjoyed listening to the opinions of a younger person on the music that I listened to as a young adult, and then as an older one. I didn’t agree with all your opinions, but I did enjoy listening to them. You come across as a very likable person, and I enjoyed the way you spoke and your mannerisms. Your comment about “they made music about installing microwave ovens“ actually had me rolling. Anyways, I went ahead and subscribed to your page. Keep up the good work young fella. 😊

[trueblueviola]

I was surprised about some of these songs, but honestly I can see why they are so well known, they're amazing songs. Honestly, I'm gen z and I know more 80s/90s songs than todays hits :0

[mx.benzedrine]

Roomie saying that U2 was forgotten after the 80s/90s cracked me up because my middle name, Grace, came from the song of the same name and it's something I share as an anectote every so often.

My parents (and by proxy, me, ) are still very much U2 fans and I want them to tour outside of Vegas SO BADLY so I can see them live at least once and pray that I can hear live what made me a namesake. I can hear within the song on streaming the feeling that it gave my dad, but I feel like hearing Grace live would be one of the best concert experiences ever.