Vinyl has been on the rise exponentially in the US ever since Urban Outfitters started positioning copies of Give Up next to 15-page hardcover books about having a hangover, and now it’s looking like our brothers and sisters in materialism across the pond are following suit. According to Billboard, in the first six months of this calendar year, vinyl sales in the UK have risen 55%, with 168,296 albums sold, compared to the 108,307 albums sold in the first half of 2010. Demand for vinyl has been growing steadily since 2007, at roughly the same rate as people have started to turn away from society and hole up in elaborate sound-dungeons.
Thus far, the best-selling vinyl of 2011 is The King of Limbs by a landslide of 20,000 copies, with second place going to Different Gear Still Speeding by Beady Eye (Liam Gallagher’s latest spoonful of dung) with a measly 2,374 copies. Record Store Day’s increasing popularity is also a major factor, and you can’t rule out the purchasing power of Adele-loving audiophiles that need to hear all the high end used in 21. Radiohead, for their part, seem to have picked up on this industry trend to say the least.
Back in the land of John Boehner, our mid-year vinyl sales are at 1.88 million units, and that’s not even taking into account how many were bargains and how many were $400. (NEU! have nothing against people shoplifting their box sets, right?) This number is a 41.2% increase since last year, so by 2016 we should ALL be really interesting people who care about sound quality.
