[klaatumail] US album sales rise for first time since 2004
- From: "Bradley, David" <David_Bradley@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "'klaatumail@xxxxxxxxxxxxx'" <klaatumail@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2012 15:26:01 +0000
US album sales rise for first time since 2004
By RYAN NAKASHIMA, AP Business Writer Ryan Nakashima, Ap Business Writer - Thu
Jan 5, 6:31 am ET
LOS ANGELES - U.S. album sales rose more than 3 percent last year for the first
gain since 2004 - a sign that rising digital sales are finally stemming the
decade-long decline of compact discs.
The uptick to 458 million album sales was helped by the hugely popular
sophomore album "21" from British singer Adele, which sold 5.8 million,
according to Nielsen SoundScan. Huge interest in Adele also led to the sales of
856,000 copies of "19," her debut album from 2008.
Michael Buble's "Christmas," which was released in late October, racked up 2.5
million album sales. Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" sold 2.1 million, boosted by a
massive sale at Amazon.com earlier in the year for a heavily discounted 99
cents.
Digital album sales rose nearly 20 percent to 103 million, while CDs fell
nearly 6 percent to 225 million.
The rest of the total is made up largely of digital single tracks, where 10
tracks are counted as one album. Digital singles sales rose nearly 9 percent to
1.27 billion.
The digital sales gains are likely here to stay, said Dave Bakula, senior vice
president of analytics at Nielsen. He noted more consumers are using high-end
mobile devices, and Google Inc. has launched its online music store, giving it
a way to sell music to users of smartphones on its Android platform.
"It shows there's still a lot of growth potential in digital," he said. "That's
something I don't see falling down."
Sales of older albums rose nearly 9 percent to 151 million, thanks to heavy
discounting, including a Father's Day promotion at some big box retailers and
iTunes that touted Journey's greatest hits and the work of other older rock
bands.
The Nielsen tally does not include growing subscriptions to all-you-can listen
music plans, which have been rising thanks in part to the entry of Swedish
service Spotify to the U.S. market in July.
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