‘Tickets to My Downfall’ Is Machine Gun Kelly’s First Platinum Album
Machine Gun Kelly's gamble on changing his sound with last year's Tickets to My Downfall has paid off in numbers. As of Sept. 1, the album has been certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for a million U.S. sales.
It's Kelly's first platinum album. The certification came quietly last week as the RIAA simultaneously updated a handful of MGK's singles awards. Gold certifications (representing 500,000 in sales) were given to his "See My Tears" (2012) and "27" (2018), and platinum awards went to Tickets to My Downfall's Halsey-featuring "Forget Me Too" as well as his 2017 song "Let You Go." (The RIAA frequently updates its awards in batches.)
The platinum album cert isn't the first indication that Tickets to My Downfall is MGK's biggest-selling effort yet — the pop-punk platter was also his first No. 1 on the Billboard 200 on release in September 2020.
But Machine Gun Kelly, the music maker and frequent actor whose real name is Colson Baker, seems tired of people comparing his past work in hip-hop with the rock sound of his latest material. In a message posted on social media, Kelly lashed out at critiques of the change.
"Me, drops a rock song — 'Oh, he doesn't rap anymore!' Me, drops a rap song — 'Oh, he doesn't do rock anymore!'" he grunted in a TikTok video last month. "Shut the fuck up! Goddamn!"
The musical progression mirrors the singer's ceaseless activity, inside and out. "I guess if I had a word to describe where I'm at right now, it would just be running," Kelly told GQ in July. "I don't allow myself to really acknowledge anything right now. I'm just running."
MGK's rock journey continues with his upcoming album Born With Horns, another collection assisted by blink-182's Travis Barker, as the drummer did with Tickets. The album's grunge-y first single, "Papercuts," arrived in August with a video that pictured MGK with a bald head.