The Most Expensive Record Ever Sold Has Never Been Heard
The story of the scandals and mystery behind the biggest selling album never released
The two most expensive records in history were both sold at auction in 2015. One of those albums was the first-ever copy (serial number: 0000001) of the legendary 1968 album, The White Album by the Beatles. A touchstone of Western culture, the album was released half a century previous and has influenced modern music the world over.
However, the most expensive of the two albums, at a cost of $2 million (more than double the cost of The White Album), has only ever been heard by a handful of people and is now rumoured to be owned by the United States (US) government.
The national scandal
2015 was a notable year for both the music and the pharmaceutical industry in the US.
50 years prior, Nobel Prize-winning scientist, Gertrude Elion, had developed a drug, Daraprim, that would go on to become a major part in the fight against HIV/AIDS (human immunodeficiency virus/acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) the world over.
The sole rights to this drug in the US market were bought by Turing Pharmaceuticals and it would lead to the most notorious case of price-gouging in modern…
