Factoid

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

According to this morning's paper, 2008 is set to be the highest-selling year for singles EVER, with total sales topping 100m for the first time (compared to 1979's 89m). Obviously physical sales are a miniscule proportion of this but even so, that's a lot of sales. (And christ only knows how many non-sale downloads are going on).

I was a bit surprised by this!

Comments

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

but didn't the artic monkeys end up with six tracks in the top 50 or something when their second alBUM came out? or was that a mistake?

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Well, if people want to buy tracks from a new album individually you can't stop them! But AFAIK more people buy albums than singles, so we can deduce there's some method which stops an 'album sale' having an effect on the singles chart.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

'so we can deduce there's some method which stops an 'album sale' having an effect on the singles chart'

yes, very dodgy ground here but it may just come down to how many times people are clicking 'buy album' rather than grabbing all or enough of the tracks individually. obviously there's a threshold before buying only the tracks you like on an album becomes uneconomical. they've been astute to keep the prices of 'albums' online fixed but cynical in making it still possible to buy all or most of the tracks individually and spend a lot more in the process - but yes only a fool would do that!

[damnspynovels.livejournal.com]

exactly. if an album has 10 tracks on it, and i only download 9 of them, are they all eligible for a singles chart placing?

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, yes! And indeed if you dl'ed all 10 individually! But from an economic point of view you would be mental if you did this, so people tend not to. Perhaps Arctic Monkeys fans can't do sums.

[damnspynovels.livejournal.com]

what's therefore peculiar about this, if it's true - is that it might possibly change the way albums are compiled, like prog rock might've been accused of doing.

will we see more intro songs, track transistions and outros available as 'album only tracks' on releases simply to increase the value of a single album. ie, a 27 track album where by 10 of those tracks are album only songs (but they're filler anyway), therefore increasing the value of an album's £10 sticker price over the purchase of 17 individual tracks at £1 each?

[bengraham.livejournal.com]

On a sort-of related note, the iPod is the most popular music playing device in the world, yes? And most people that I know who own an iPod leave it set to shuffle most of the time, because it's irritating to have to go backwards and forwards through menus to turn shuffle off (unless there's a shortcut I don't know). Therefore, when I get a new album, more often than not, I end up listening to it in an incorrect order. And gradually, as I become more familiar with it, I will rate the songs and stop listening to the ones I don't like. So I end up with the cherry-picked random mix of songs off the album anyway. Not sure where I'm going with this point... I guess just adding to the sentiment of "the album is dying and needs some new thinking to reinvigorate it".

[damnspynovels.livejournal.com]

you're right, and this kind entirely fucks up my theory that we'll see more filler crap to increase perceived value of an album, because out of context / shuffled, it'll be meaningless.

[lockedintheatti.livejournal.com]

Yeah, they did, as the tracks were available as separate downloads (as are most albums). It's easy enough for a record company to stop this from happening, by making it so you can only download the whole album at once. Interestingly that doesn't happen often.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Didn't it just happen in the US with Estelle? For like two weeks and then they realised it was a massive mistake.

A couple of times I've seen one or two tracks from an album unavailable individually but it's less likely to be the big singles than the bonus tracks or any particularly long tracks - eg you can't buy Erykah Badu's 'I Want You' (which is 10min plus) individually, you have to buy the whole Worldwide Underground album (though you can buy every other track individually.

[lockedintheatti.livejournal.com]

Yeah, happened with Estelle.

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

elbow did it, didn't they?

[lockedintheatti.livejournal.com]

In the iTunes top 100 at the moment, there are 4 tracks from Disney's "Camp Rock" soundtrack, and 5 tracks from the new Kings of Leon album (1 of which is the current single). Obviously they won't all make the top 75 singles chart next week, but there's a chance several will.