Sure, the past few weeks have been good for the recorded-music industry, what with Lil Wayne and Coldplay breaking through the 500,000-sales-in-a-week barrier that even heavyweights like Madonna and Usher couldn’t surpass. Overall, though, 2008 has been another dismal year for the biz, with this year’s 204.6 million units sold through June 29 representing an 11% year-to-year decline. (Last year’s tally at this time was 229.8 million units.) But take heart, everyone: At this point last year, album sales were on a 15.6% year-to-year slump. See? Numbers can make any semi-depressing reality look good! More stats from the reports after the jump.
CD sales are down 16.3%, but digital-album sales are up 34.4%, accounting for 31.6 million units and now account for 15.4% of album sales. Digital track sales are at 532.7 million units through June 29, a whopping 30% increase over last year.
The top three albums:
Lil Wayne, Tha Carter III (1.525,000 scans, 209,000 last week)
Jack Johnson, Sleep Through The Static (1,247,000 scans, 15,000 last week)
Mariah Carey, E=MC2 (1,063,000 scans, 17,000 last week)
Coldplay’s Viva La Vida will likely join that pantheon next week, as it’s currently at the 971,000-sold mark and it sold 249,000 copies from June 23-29.
The top three tracks:
Leona Lewis, “Bleeding Love” (2,656,000 sales, 84,000 last week)
Flo Rida, “Low (ft. T-Pain)” (2.4 million 2008 sales, 3,994,000 overall sales, 27,000 last week)
Jordin Sparks, “No Air (ft. Chris Brown)” (2,153,000 sales, 47,000 last week)
Coming up behind those tracks: Madonna’s “4 Minutes” and Lil Wayne’s “Lollipop.” (Chris Molanphy gets more into this data, and its further-reaching ramifications for the charts, in this week’s 100 & Single.)
The biggest label groups:
Universal Music Group: 31.2% (last year: 31.5%)
Sony BMG: 24.8% (last year: 25.3%)
Warner Music Group: 20.8% (last year: 20%)
EMI: 9.4% (last year: 10.4%, and who knows, those numbers may get better once the Coldplay album’s out for longer than a week)
Indies: 13.9% (last year: 12.9)
Mid-Year Sales Report: Top Sellers, Market Share And More [Billboard.biz]
Album sales down 11% in 2008 [Variety]
