Welcome to Joel Whitburn's Record Research MusicVault! We hope that your browsing experience is fun, informative and without comparison in comprehensiveness and quality.

Table of Contents

• How do I search?
• What do the headings mean for the singles search?
• What do the headings mean for the albums search?
• How do I see more search results if only 50 are shown?
• What does the 'Include songwriters' box do?
• How do I refine by a specific Billboard Chart?
• How do I sort my search results?
• How do I find an exact artist or title using quotes?
• How do I view artist bios?
• How do I view songwriters?
• How do I switch between the singles and albums charts?
• When am I charged a credit?
• The 'Bio', 'Songwriters' and 'Key to Abbreviations' buttons do not work--why?

How do I search?

For a basic search, first, simply type in your search in the box beside 'Search for:', and then click 'SEARCH'. If results are returned for your search, a credit is charged.

What do the headings mean for the singles search?

• Debut date: The date the singled debuted on the Billboard chart listed under 'Chart Title'.
• Peak date: The date the single peaked. For example, when the single hit the #1 spot.
• Peak Position: The highest ranking the single hit on the charts.
• Weeks at Peak: How long the single remained at the peak position.
• Weeks charted: How long the single remained on the charts.
• Chart title: The Billboard chart the single charted on.
• Artist: The artist credited with the single.
• A-side: The a-side of the chart hit.
• B-side: The b-side of the chart hit.
• Label & Number: The label and number of the single.
• Songwriters: A list of songwriters for the song, if available. (Click to view.)
• Bios: The biography for the artist, if available. (Click to view.)
• RIAA: Shows if the single was a gold, platinum, digital-gold or digital-platinum hit. *See 'Key to Abbrevations' for more information.

What do the headings mean for the albums search?

• Debut date: The date the albumd debuted on the Billboard chart listed under 'Chart Title'.
• Peak date: The date the album peaked. For example, when the album hit the #1 spot.
• Peak Position: The highest ranking the album hit on the charts.
• Weeks at Peak: How long the album remained at the peak position.
• Weeks charted: How long the album remained on the charts.
• Chart title: The Billboard chart the album charted on.
• Artist: The artist credited with the single.
• Album title: The album title that hit the Billboard chart.
• Symbol: Denotes a live album, greatest hits, or other album-specific data. *See 'Key to Abbrevations' for more information.
• Label & Number: The label and number of the single.
• Bios: The biography for the artist, if available. (Click to view.)
• RIAA: Shows if the single was a gold, platinum, digital-gold or digital-platinum hit. *See 'Key to Abbrevations' for more information.

How do I see more search results if only 50 are shown?

If more then 50 results return for your search, other pages will be made available. Each page costs one credit to view.

What does the 'Include songwriters' box do?

The 'Include songwriters' checkbox searches the data in the songwriters field, if available, and then returns all of the records of your search from the songwriers data. For example, 'Bruce Springsteen' has 82 charted hits, but 109 appears if the 'Include songwriters' checkbox is clicked. Clicking on this box and then clicking 'search' costs one credit, as well as removing the songwriter results.
(Continued below)

109 results now appear, including 'Manfred Mann', since Bruce Springsteen is credited as the songwriter.

How do I refine by a specific Billboard Chart?

If you click on the box beside 'Refine search by chart", you will see a drop down box with different Billboard chart categories. Click on one of these categories and then click 'SEARCH' to see the results for that category. In the example above, 109 results appear for Bruce Springsteen, including songwriters. If I refine by 'Hot 100/Pop Charts', then 40 appear.

40 results appear for under the 'Hot 100' chart. The chart for each single or album is charted on is displayed under the 'Chart Title' heading, and is shown above as 'HOT'.

How do I sort my search results?

To change the sorting order of the data, click on any of the headings. In this example, Bruce Springsteen and all of the artists that Bruce Springsteen has written songs for appear, in alphabetical order, with numbers displayed first.

If I click the 'Artist' heading again, 'Bruce Springsteen' is first. The data under the 'Artist' field is sorted by last name, first, or by the full name of the band, so that 'Bruce Springsteen' is listed after 'The Hollies', in this example. Changing the sort order of the data changes all of the data on subsequent pages as well, so that the sorting is very powerful for large searches and can greatly help a complicated search.

How do I find an exact artist or song using quotes?

Artists that have the word "The" at the beginning of their name can be searched on when including "The" with the rest of their name in quotes. For example, if you enter "Beatles" in the search bar, titles by the group The Beatles will not appear. If you type in "The Beatles" in the search bar, you will get results.

If I further want to refine my search, I can add quotes around the search input. When I put quotes around 'Bruce Springsteen' under the Hot 100/Pop Charts, 27 results appear. This refinement is best used if the artist or single's title appears in other, unrelated titles.

If you know the exact title of the record you wish to find, you can really hone in on a single title by using the artist name and song title, as shown above. I added the title 'War' after 'Bruce Springsteen' to view only that song. With over 100,000 listed singles, this makes the search a very powerful and fast tool to access specific data.

How do I view artist bios?

To view an artist's bio, click on the 'B' symbol under the 'BIOS' heading, if available.

The artist's bio will pop up in a separate window. Click on the 'X' to close the bio window.

How do I view songwriters?

To view the songwriters for a current song, click on the 'SW' icon in the songwriters tab.

How do I switch between the singles and albums charts?

To switch between albums and singles, click on the 'Albums' or 'Singles' radio button, and then click 'SEARCH'. A new search will run and the data will be accessed.

When am I charged a credit?

You are charged a credit when:

• Generating a search with results.
• Sorting or re-sorting the data.
• Moving from page to page.
• Refining the search by a Billboard chart, if the refinement wasn't added to the initial search.
• Adding or removing songwriters from the search, if this box was not clicked on the initial search.
• Moving from singles to albums charts, or vice versa.

You are not charged a credit for viewing bios or songwriters, or if no search results appear for a new search.

The 'Bio', 'Songwriters' and 'Key to Abbreviations' buttons do not work--why?

This problem is usually caused by your browser's security settings being set too high. Check Tools - Internet options from Internet Explorer, click on 'Security', and then make sure your Internet settings are set to 'Medium'. Also, check if Javascript is disabled. If you continue to have problems, please contact us at sales@recordresearch.com.