Technological developments in the early 20th century led to sweeping changes in the way recorded music was made and sold. Prior to the LP, the standard medium for recorded music had been the 78 rpm gramophone record, … See more

The period from the mid 1960s to the late 1970s was the era of the LP and the "golden era" of the album. According to BBC Four's When Albums Ruled the World (2013), "These were the years when the music industry exploded to become bigger than See more

At the turn of the 2000s, Kot published a faux obituary for the 33⅓ rpm LP form in the Chicago Tribune. In it, he argued that the LP had "been … See more

• Album-equivalent unit
• Cultural impact of the Beatles
• List of best-selling albums
• List of best-selling albums by country
• List of best-selling music artists See more

Concept albums and Rubber Soul (1964–1966)
The arrival of the Beatles in the US in 1964 is credited by music writers Ann Powers and Joel Whitburn as heralding the "classic album era" or "rock album era". In his Concise Dictionary … See more

Decline of LP records and other cultural shifts (1979–1987)
The fall of LP record sales at the end of the 1970s marked the end of the LP-driven "golden age", as the music industry faced competition from a commercial resurgence in the film industry and See more

Music industry insiders and writers in the 2010s, such as Jon Caramanica and Kevin Whitehead, have described this period in the album's history as the "post-album era". Over the course of the decade, record labels generally invested in streaming platforms … See more