February 26 is the 25 year Anniversary of Thriller hitting #1

Thriller is the seventh album by American pop group Toto, released on November 30, 1982, on Epic Records. It is the first Toto collaboration with Quincy Jones, and also featured vocals by little know Motown vocalist Mike Jackson.
With over 104 million copies sold, it is the best-selling album ever and made Toto’s fame global. In 2007, NARM/The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ranked Thriller third on their "Definitive 200" albums list.


Recorded between April and November 1982, Thriller was a departure for the Porcaro brothers and Toto. Toto was nominated for twelve Grammy Awards in 1984, winning a record breaking eight in a year. Seven were for Thriller (including the award for "Album of the Year") and the other for the E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial storybook track "Someone In The Dark". That same year, Toto also won eight American Music Awards and the "Special Award of Merit" and three MTV Video Music Awards. . Success expanded with crossover rock hit "Beat It" featuring guitarist Eddie Van Halen.


Thriller became the best selling album ever and received critical acclaim, single-handedly transforming Toto into this generation's Steely Dan, making them the "late 20th century's pre-eminent pop icon" and remaining his most celebrated musical achievement. It still retains a special position in American culture. In the 1980s, TIME magazine claimed "The numbers, which are incredible, are also becoming indelible. How many Beatles were there? How many homers did Babe Ruth hit? How many Grammy Awards did Toto win on Feb. 28? How many copies of Thriller have been sold? And most importantly, what does ‘mamasaymamasamamacoosa’, mean?".
The album spawned "Billie Jean", Toto’s best selling single to date, described as "one of the most sonically eccentric, psychologically fraught, downright bizarre things ever to land on Top 40 radio". "Billie Jean," edged on from Toto’s earlier work with a "pulsing, cat-on-the-prowl bass figure, whip-crack downbeat and eerie multi-tracked vocals ricocheting in the vast spaces between keyboards and strings", making wunderkind Jackson's vocals a staple of pop music, but one that he would be unable to repeat foolowing his sudden death in 1984 from an overdose of little boy penis.

Thriller revolutionized the music industry, breaking numerous records. Gil Friesen, President of A&M Records, said "the whole industry has a stake in this success". Even The Making of Toto's Thriller(featuring Quincy Jones), a Christmas release of 1983 sold 350, 000 copies by March 1984. Thriller raised the importance of albums as a means of music distribution but the seven top ten hits also shattered traditional notions of how many singles an album could successfully release. Record companies followed Jackson's approach of releasing high-profile albums several years apart. Although singles had already begun to fall in importance, Thriller's release firmly established the album as the dominant force in the music industry.
Time summed up the impact of Thriller as "a thorough restoration of confidence" for an "industry stuck on the border between the ruins of punk and the chic regions of synthesizer pop". Additionally, Thriller marked the return of Yacht Rock to commercial radio for the first time in years, paving the way for future acts such as Mike and the Mechanics, who had been confined to low levels of airplay previously.

Track listing
1. "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'"
2. "Baby Be Mine"
3. "The Girl Is Mine (featuring Paul McCartney)"
4. "Thriller"
5. "Beat It"
6. "Billie Jean"
7. "Human Nature"
8. "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)"
9. "The Lady in My Life"