Shawn Mendes, The Weeknd, Hozier, Kendrick Lamar, and More Go Platinum After RIAA Rule Change

17 different albums have gone either gold or platinum now that RIAA has announced that they will track streams to tally album certifications.

On Monday, the Recording Industry Association of America announced that it will begin to factor streams of singles and albums into its certification process. The new legislation puts 17 albums into very interesting circumstances. Retroactively, the albums are now certified either gold or platinum. This affects many of the tops acts in the industry, including Kendrick Lamar, The Weeknd, Coldplay, Shawn Mendes, and even the late Michael Jackson.

RIAA’s Chairman and CEO Cary Sherman said, via Rolling Stone, “For nearly six decades, whether it’s vinyl, CDs, downloads or now streams, the Gold & Platinum Program has adapted to recognize the benchmarks of success in an evolving music marketplace. We know that music listening — for both albums and songs — is skyrocketing, yet that trend had not been reflected in our album certifications. Modernizing our Album Award certifications to include music streaming is the next logical step in the continued evolution of Gold & Platinum Awards, and doing so enables RIAA to fully reward the success of artists’ albums today.”

A photo posted by Kendrick Lamar (@kendricklamar) on Mar 10, 2015 at 9:41pm PDT

The RIAA’s new rule means that 1,500 streams will be the equivalent of 10 single-song sales or one album sale. Even though this pushed Kendrick Lamar’s 2015 album, To Pimp a Butterfly to platinum status, Kendrick’s manager tweeted today that he doesn’t play by these new rules:  

we don’t stand behind this @RIAA bs. ole skool rules apply, 1 million albums sold is platinum.until we reach that #, save all the congrats. — dangeroo kipawaa TDE (@dangerookipawaa) February 1, 2016

 
Take a look at all the albums affected by the change below:

Alt-J, An Awesome Wave (Atlantic Records): Gold
Big Sean, Dark Sky Paradise (Def Jam Recordings): Platinum
Brett Eldredge, Bring You Back (Atlantic Nashville): Gold
Coldplay, Ghost Stories (Atlantic/Parlophone): Platinum
Elle King, Love Stuff (RCA): Gold
Fifth Harmony, Reflection (Epic): Gold
Halsey, Badlands (Astralwerks): Gold
Hozier, Hozier (Columbia): Platinum
Kendrick Lamar, To Pimp a Butterfly (Top Dawg Entertainment/Interscope): Platinum
Michael Jackson, Thriller (Epic/Legacy): 32X Multi-Platinum
Miranda Lambert, Platinum (RCA Nashville): Platinum
Romeo Santos, Fórmula Vol. 2 (Sony Latin): 11X Diamante/RIAA Latin G&P Program
Sam Hunt, Montevallo (MCA Nashville): 2X Multi-Platinum
Shawn Mendes, Handwritten (Island Records): Platinum
The Weeknd, Beauty Behind the Madness (XO/Republic Records): 2X Multi-Platinum
Vance Joy, Dream Your Life Away (Atlantic Records): Gold
Wale, Ambition (Atlantic Urban): Gold

BLAKE & WYLDE