Neilsen & Billboard Release 2011 Music Industry Report
Wednesday, January 11th, 2012
For the past 21 years, Neilsen SoundScan & Billboard have released their annual Music Industry Report. It’s always an interesting read and offers a great insight into the current state of the music industry.
Some of the highlights from 2011 are as follows:
-For the first time, total music purchases reached the 1.6 Billion mark for the year.
-Overall Album sales (including Albums and Track Equivalent Album sales) were up 3.2% compared to 2010.
-There were 228 million physical album sales in 2011, a decline of 5% over 2010. This is significantly less than the 19.5% decline in 2010.
-Adele’s 21 finishes the year as the biggest selling album with just more than 5.8 million sales. This is the first time since 2004 that an album sold more than 5 million copies in a year (Usher’s Confessions sold nearly 8 million copies in 2004).
-For the fourth consecutive year, more vinyl albums were purchased than any other year in the history of Nielsen SoundScan.
-In 2011, vinyl album sales reached 3.9 million in sales, shattering the previous record of 2.8 million LP album sales in 2010. Note that 67% of all vinyl albums were purchased at an independent music store during 2011.
-Katy Perry ends the year as the most played artist over the airways in 2011 with more than 1.4 million spins; edging out Bruno Mars by 17,000 spins.
-Seven out of the top 10 played artists in 2011 all had more than 1 million detections for the year.
-Lady Gaga claimed the top spot as the most streamed artist in 2011 with more than 135 million streams.
-Nicki Minaj’s “Super Bass” was the most streamed song and music video in 2011 with 84.9 million audio streams and 71 million video streams.
Read the full report here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20120105005547/en/Nielsen-Company-Billboard%E2%80%99s-2011-Music-Industry-Report