There’s been something of a buzz on Nielsen’s data for US music sales in 2008. Not surprisingly it shows CDs hit by purely digital music, but also a sharp increase in LP sales. Lucas Mearian’s article Back to the future: Vinyl record sales double in ’08, CDs down is worth reading even though it suffers a little from the usual misplaced credulity toward the medium seen often in the more ignorant digerati. This was heard in depth on the BBC World Service Business Daily where a short trip from Shepherd’s Bush to The Walrus would have disabused them of their failure to research. More on that when the podcast comes out.
On to the Nielsen data, the overall stats are:
TOTAL LP ALBUM SALES (12/31/07 – 12/28/08) |
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(LP/VINYL ALBUMS – IN MILLIONS) | |||||||||||||||
UNITS SOLD |
2008 |
2007 |
% Chg. |
|
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1.88* | .99 | 89% |
But what’s the juice on what people are actually buying?
2008 TOP TEN VINYL ALBUMS (12/31/2007-12/28/2008) |
2008 TOP TEN VINYL ARTISTS (based on vinyl album sales from 12/31/2007-12/28/2008) |
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Title/Artist |
Units Sold |
Artist |
Units Sold |
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1 |
In Rainbows/ Radiohead |
25,800 | 1 | Radiohead | 61,200 | ||||||
2 |
Abbey Road/ Beatles |
16,500 | 2 | Metallica | 39,500 | ||||||
3 |
Chinese Democracy/ Guns ‘N Roses |
13,600 | 3 | Beatles | 20,400 | ||||||
4 |
Funplex/ B-52’s |
12,800 | 4 | Elliott Smith | 17,800 | ||||||
5 |
Third/ Portishead |
12,300 | 5 | Bob Dylan | 15,200 | ||||||
6 |
In the Aeroplane…/ Neutral Milk Hotel |
10,200 | 6 | Portishead | 15,100 | ||||||
7 |
Dark Side of the Moon/ Pink Floyd |
10,200 | 7 | Ryan Adams | 14,000 | ||||||
8 |
Fleet Foxes/ Fleet Foxes |
9,600 | 8 | Coldplay | 13,900 | ||||||
9 |
Death Magnetic/ Metallica |
9,400 | 9 | Guns ‘N Roses | 13,600 | ||||||
10. |
O.K. Computer/ Radiohead |
9,300 | 10. | Neutral Milk Hotel | 13,200 |
Abbey Road and Dark Side of the Moon??? What cotton-picking cloth-ears is going out and buying these?
Well so far, only data in for America, not been able to see what the stats are for UK and Europe or global and would love to see what Japanese ears have been listening to. Equally useful would be data on 2nd hand sales, this must be massive with vinyl, especially with sites such as eBay and Discogs.
If anyone has any data, please do let me know.