Dio’s Holy Diver Has Been Certified Double Platinum

You’d be surprised by how many of the most influential and awesome heavy metal albums of all time didn’t sell incredibly well. These records, which stand as musical and cultural monuments in our collective psyche, were still relatively underground when they came out, and though their makers toured the world with foam-rubber dragons and haunted houses in tow, they weren’t exactly topping the charts (the fact that they could afford all that shit speaks to how much it cost to buy a physical record back in the day). This is why it might surprise some fans to learn that Holy Diver, the debut solo album by godlike metal singer Ronnie James Dio, is only now getting its double platinum status.

That seems fucking crazy, right? Everybody knows the opening riff to “Holy Diver,” and “Rainbow In The Dark” is one of metal’s most fun, shimmery hit singles. But according to a post on Dio’s official Twitter account, Holy Diver has only now sold two million copies in the U.S.

That’s an interesting lesson in how music can be incredibly iconic while still not selling much. Like, Motörhead do not have a SINGLE platinum album, and everyone knows their logo and huge hit single! That’s nuts!

For the record, according to Blabbermouth, here’s how the rating system works:

Presently, the RIAA awards a gold honor for 500,000 units sold, a platinum honor for 1 million units sold and a diamond award for more than 10 million units sold.

In the streaming age, each permanent digital album or physical album sale count as 1 unit for certification purposes, 10 permanent track downloads from the album count as 1 unit for certification purposes, and 1,500 on-demand audio and/or video streams from the album count as 1 unit. For songs, 150 on-demand audio and/or video streams count as 1 unit for certification purposes.

There you go. In any event, congrats to the Dio camp for this triumph. It’s well-deserved.