US Charts: 'Billboard' ratings

for Procol Harum and Robin Trower

From The Billboard Book of Top Forty Albums by Joel Whitburn, 1995 

Page 248
Procol Harum – British rock group formed in 1967 by Gary Brooker (vocals, piano) and lyricist Keith Reid. Included Matthew Fisher (organ), Dave Knights (bass), Ray Royer (guitar) and Bobby Harrison (drums). Royer and Harrison left after recording [sic – no mention of Eyden] of A Whiter Shade of Pale – replaced by Robin Trower and Barry [sic] J Wilson (died 1989 [sic]). Knights and Fisher left in early [sic?] 1969; bassist [sic – and organist] Chris Copping added. Trower left in mid-1971, replaced by Dave Ball. Bassist Alan Cartwright added while Copping switched [sic] to keyboards. Ball left in mid-1972; replaced by Mick Grabham (ex-Cochise). Cartwright left in mid 1976; Copping moved to bass; keyboardist Pete Solley joined. Band split up in 1977. Reunited in 1991 with Brooker, Reid, Fisher and Trower. In Latin 'procol' [sic?] means beyond these things.

Page 314:
Robin Trower – born 3 / 9 / 45 in London. Rock guitarist. Original member of Procol Harum, 1967-72 [sic – 71]. James Dewar vocalist (except on BLT album).

From: The Billboard Book of Top Forty Hits – by Joel Whitburn – 1996:

Page 489:
Procol Harum: British rock group formed in 1967 by Gary Brooker (vocals, piano) and lyricist Keith Reid. Many personnel changes. Robin Trower was lead guitarist 1968 [sic] – 71. Band reunited in 1991. Procol [sic?] is Latin for beyond these things.

Comments by Joan May, who kindly transcribed all the above for 'Beyond the Pale':

I'm glad Whitburn identified Gary Brooker as pianist rather than the more common and misleading 'keyboardist, ' and that he named Sleepers Awake, rather than Air on a G String, as the more influential Bach piece on AWSoP. But the organist on said piece and on Homburg certainly deserved a mention, especially as Robin Trower was inaudible on Homburg and absent on the other two singles and he rated a mention – bigger Name I suppose ... sadly there were no sales figures for the singles. We know AWSoP went multi-platinum, but exactly how multi?

According to The Billboard Book of Albums (page 7): 'The Record Industry Association of America (RIAA) began certifying gold albums in 1958, platinum in 1976 and multi-platinum albums in 1984. Before these dates, there are most certainly some albums that would have qualified for these certifications.'

I found some albums from the 70's designated as Platinum in the book, but those were albums that continued to sell bigtime after 1976. So I wonder if Procol Harum Live! or some of the Trower albums actually went Platinum and not just Gold?