mxdwn.co.uk » UK music sales

UK music hit a new high in consumption in 2024

Francesca Chiari — Wed, 08 Jan 2025 19:26:22 +0000

Figures released by digital entertainment and retail association (ERA) revealed that last year’s music consumption was the biggest it had been in twenty years in the UK. With the revival of vinyls and more physical copies being sold, consumption reached the equivalent of 201.4 million albums in 2024. Streaming alone was responsible for 178 million of that, a new record since 2004’s high of 172 albums sold. So far, ERA’s figures show music revenue grew by 7.4 % this past year. It is a new record, set by a generation that loves collecting physical copies of albums and taking time to really feel and enjoy the music.

It’s music’s world and we’re all living in it! Streaming and the vinyl revival have led music revenues to an all-time high that’s the best result for music since the CD era with sales exceeding £239m!

Read the full story here: https://t.co/lQozs6oru7 pic.twitter.com/eiAlRVNU7f

— ERA (@ERALTD) January 8, 2025

ERA CEO Kim Barkley was featured on the company’s article revealing the figures:

“2024 was a banner year for music, with streaming and vinyl taking the sector to all-time-high records in both value and volume. This is the stunning culmination of music’s comeback which has seen sales more than double since their low point in 2013. We can now say definitively – music is back.”

And music is back, but the era of streaming doesn’t necessarily exclude great sales of CDs, vinyls and cassettes. CEO Kim Barkley in fact believes that the two go together, and says:

“With nearly 14% of revenues still coming from physical, music shows the benefits of having a mixed physical-digital ecology, we continue to believe that digital and physical channels are complementary and vital for the health of the entertainment market overall.”

But what albums led the sales? Figures show that Taylor Swift’s ‘The Tortured Poets Deparment’ was the biggest selling album of the year: it sold 783,820 copies, 111,937 of which were vinyl copies. The album was also named Official Chart’s Best Selling Album of the year in a recent list by the company. Noah Kahan led singles sales with ‘Stick Season’, which sold the equivalent of 1.99 million copies and also became Official Chart’s Biggest Song of the Year.

A big factor into this growth is the revival of vinyl: thanks to events like Record Store Day and new, popular trends, vinyls have become extremely popular and have boosted the music economy. Taylor Swift had the most sold album on vinyl, followed by Oasis’s ‘Definitely Maybe‘, Chappell Roan’s ‘The Rise and Fall of a Midwestern Princess‘, Sabrina Carpenter’s ‘Short n Sweet‘ and Fontaines DC ‘Romance‘. These numbers are also boosted by new and exclusive presses being released, and artists choosing to create multiple versions of albums’ vinyls to satisfy the commercial demand and, above that, to satisfy fan request.

Music fans’ love affair with physical formats endures as @ERALTD reports overall revenues were up 6.2% YOY in ’24. Vinyl continues to be the main driver, with retail revenues up 10.5%, growing faster than streaming. All would not be possible without the hard work of UK retailers! https://t.co/wm8Krr9AZw

— Drew Hill (@DrewHill) January 8, 2025

2024 was the biggest year for music since the CD era, and perhaps it marks the beginning of a new, exciting era where streaming and physical copies are both appreciated and co-exist in the celebration of music.

‘While She Sleeps’ Start Campaign Through Launch of T-Shirt About Streaming Royalties

Yanna Avlianos — Thu, 08 Aug 2019 13:26:29 +0000

The British rock band, While She Sleeps, have released a t-shirt in a bid to raise awareness about Spotify streaming and the ways in which this has become detrimental to musicians.

The t-shirt reads, “One T-shirt is the equivalent to 5000 streams on Spotify. 76% of all music in 2019 is streamed and not bought physically or digitally. Band merchandise is the most direct way of supporting an artist.”

The group have made it very clear that this is not a campaign against streaming services, but an attempt to bring to light the effects of these services if people rely solely on them as a way of supporting musicians.

Formed in 2006, the metalcore punk band have released four studio albums, with their most recent, ‘So What?’ in March of this year. The album has been received well on the whole, with positive reviews from Kerrang and Louder Sound, describing it as “more alternative, electronic”. It is clear that the group have taken a different angle in their production with this release than their previous work, “there are plenty of riff heavy body slams, but this is a shinier, polished and melodic finish.” As with most long time rock bands that decide to go down this route, of course the record has face some backlash. Max Morin called it “a transparent attempt at marketability than genuine musical vision.”

On twitter, WSS explained the reasons behind why they have launched this t-shirt and why it is important for this message to be shared further than just their own fanbase. “If bands and artists are to survive and win the battle of art vs money, we need to find new income to keep afloat…this t-shirt isn’t just for our band, it’s for all bands and we want it to become a staple in the positive change needed in the music industry.”

This is about how you can support the music you love.
Not just our band and our music – this is aimed at every working band trying to make music and get it out there. We are launching a free-to-use design to highlight the realities of being a band today.https://t.co/84LyW9LCyZ pic.twitter.com/HEB082D6JX

— WHILE SHE SLEEPS (@whileshesleeps) August 7, 2019

In addition, the 5-piece metal core band have made this t-shirt design available to use for free, so that the message can be heard in further realms of the industry and in popular culture as a whole.

UK music sales figures finally see improvement after a decade

Peyam Zangana — Thu, 07 Jan 2016 22:42:04 +0000

Ever since the introduction of illegal downloads and free streaming websites, music sales have seen a massive change in figures. Obviously if there is a free way for the public to download the music they like – they are most likely to go for that option.

However for the first time since 2004, music sales figures have seen a huge rise due to an increase in the purchases of vinyls and digital distribution streaming websites (via NME). In 2014, the retail value of UK music totaled at £1.03 billion and this rose to £1.06 billion in 2015 partly due to the increase of vinyl sales which jumped by 64 per cent. Another factor that contributed to the rise in music sales figures was the rise in the amount of songs streamed online which totaled at 26.8 billion songs – this saw a 82 per cent rise from 2014 where less than 15 billion streams where seen according to the trade body BPI.

The rise in music streaming sales and vinyl’s has outweighed the decline in the sales of physical CDs meaning that improvements have finally been seen in the music industry when it comes to sales. BPI Chief executive Geoff Taylor stated:

The soaring popularity of music streaming and the burgeoning vinyl revival mean that UK music consumption rose again in 2015,

He then went on to explain:

Services such as Spotify and Apple Music are going mainstream as more people discover how wonderful it is to have all the music in the world to listen to, whenever and wherever you want. Millions of fans also continue to build treasured collections of favourite albums on vinyl, CD or downloads.

Even though some artists in the industry such as Adele and Taylor Swift are skeptical about the sustainability and consistency of streaming websites such as Spotify, estimated revenues from subscription streaming services like this rose by 50 per cent last year to £251 million. These websites allow users to listen to music for free by continuously showcasing adverts in hopes that the users will upgrade to the advert-free monthly paid subscriptions which clearly proved successful in 2015.

In recent years we’ve seen many iconic UK artists emerge to success which are driving the growth in sales such as global icons Adele, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith and One Direction and also newer British breakthroughs and newcomers such as Jess Glynne, Little Mix and James Bay.

Adele managed to break records by selling almost 2.5 million copies of her third album “25” since it’s release in November which on it’s own contributed to the rise in sales figures since 25 is solely purchasable physically and digitally and is not available to stream yet. Other successful UK artists this year include Ed Sheeran with his album “X” and Sam Smith with “In The Lonely Hour” as they both ended the year with almost 1 million album sales each.

So does this mean fans are actually starting to see that actually purchasing music instead of illegally downloading has more of a sentimental value to the artist and the fan itself? Let’s see what the statistics say in 2016.