Born in The U.S.A. - Promotion and Blockbuster Success

Promotion and Blockbuster Success

"Dancing in the Dark", the first single, was released on May 4, 1984. The song quickly climbed the charts, and peaked at #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and reached #1 on the Cashbox singles charts for two weeks on June 30. "Dancing in the Dark" also provided Springsteen a Top 10 hit in several countries and the most successful single of his career. The album was released on June 4 and, after a strong debut at #9 on Billboard 200, it quickly reached the top spot on July 7, spending four weeks at the top. Then, on August 4, it slipped down to #2, surpassed by Prince's breakthrough album Purple Rain, which spent an impressive 24 consecutive weeks at #1. During that 24-week period, Born in the U.S.A. was stuck at #2 or (only in the case of three of those weeks) #3. (This caused a rare phenomenon – Purple Rain and Born in the U.S.A. remained at #1 and #2 respectively during 18 consecutive weeks, marking the longest period with a static Top 2 in the history of the Billboard 200.) (Born in the U.S.A. replaced Purple Rain on the top on January 19, 1985, remaining at #1 for three further weeks.) With Dancing in the Dark, the flip side of the single was "Pink Cadillac". Pink Cadillac became very popular on its own but was not included in the album. It became so popular that the single was included in album releases.

In late July 1984, the next single, "Cover Me", was released, and peaked at #7 by October. Then, the title track was released immediately and was another Top 10 hit, reaching #9 in January 1985. Shortly, the follow-up, "I'm on Fire", released in February, was also a big hit, peaking at #6 in May. The next month, "Glory Days" found a single release, reaching #5 in August supported also with a music video. The sixth and seventh singles, "I'm Goin' Down" and "My Hometown", released in September and November 1985 almost equaled the success of their predecessors and, even with no music videos and despite the lower airplay, they managed to reach #9 and #6 respectively.Though it was not one of the seven Top Ten hits of the album, "No Surrender" nevertheless charted on the Mainstream Rock Charts, peaking at # 40.

With this, Columbia released a total of seven singles for the album in the United States, a particularly notable feat for a rock album, especially if coming from Springsteen, who was considered at the time essentially as an "albums artist". Before Born in the U.S.A., and despite a career of over a decade, only the 1980 single from The River, "Hungry Heart" was a Top 5 for Springsteen. The album's strength in terms of hit singles is particularly significant if considering that, of all twelve Top 10 hits that Springsteen achieved to date in the U.S., seven were extracted from this album. (The radical change that the album represented surrounded some controversy at the time, with Cliff Bernstein, as manager of Def Leppard and Dokken, considered that "a sixth single is a little bit of overkill.") Thanks to these singles, Springsteen was an almost constant presence on the Billboard Hot 100 between May 1984 and March 1986. All seven received extensive promotion, enjoyed respectable sales and gained considerable airplay, and four of them were supported with music videos. During the 1985 Christmas season Springsteen equaled the record set by Michael Jackson's Thriller the year before, having had seven Top 10 singles in the Billboard Hot 100 from a single album (only one other album would subsequently duplicate the feat, Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814, in early 1991). Also, as on Billboard, all seven Born in the U.S.A. singles reached the Top 10 on the Cashbox singles chart. They reached #1 ("Dancing in the Dark"), #7 ("My Hometown"), #8 ("I'm on Fire"), #9 ("Born in the U.S.A.", "Glory Days" and "I'm Goin' Down") and #10 ("Cover Me").

The album spent 84 weeks on the Top 10, becoming both the album with the most consecutive weeks on the Billboard Top 10 and the third-most album with the most weeks on the Top 10 overall (equaling Peter, Paul and Mary's 1962 eponymous album), only behind Jackie Gleason's Music for Lovers Only (153 weeks) and the Glenn Miller album by Glenn Miller and his Orchestra (130 weeks). Born in the U.S.A. spent 139 non-consecutive weeks on the Billboard 200. Despite being released in June 1984 it went on be the best-selling album of 1985 in the United States.

In the U.S., on July 8, 1984, just one month after its release, the album received a Platinum certification by the RIAA. Further certifications were awarded throughout the following year, and on November 1, 1985 (when the final single wasn't even released and the album was still on the Top 10) it was certified Diamond (recognizing ten million copies sold in the U.S.). It eventually reached a 15× Platinum certification on April 19, 1995.