Figures on 2008's music sales show both predictable trends and some surprises, according to the stats posted on music industry blog Coolfer. While album sales declined overall, dropping 15% to 430 million units, certain formats saw spikes both expected — digital album sales up 32%, with track sales up 27% — and surprising — vinyl LP sales nearly doubling, with a 92% jump. Vinyl's resurgance in popularity was forecast by statistics released earlier this year (TMT News), but this increase in sales is even more substantial than would be expected from the spring and summer figures. Coupled with a 20% decline in CD sales and the aforementioned spike in digital album sales, it seems vinyl may be acting as a minuscule buffer in the decline of physical album sales.
Meanwhile, the increase in digital sales — with 1.07 billion tracks and 62.8 million albums shifted digitally in the last 12 months — may not be quite as impressive a statement about the shifting dynamics of the music industry as it initially seems to be. A study from the tail end of ’08 shows that, of the 13 million tracks available for sale online, 10 million went completely unsold in 2008. Even more shockingly, the study found that 80% of digital sales revenue came from repeated purchases of the same approximately 52,000 tracks. Presumably, this leaves many independent artists, or even major-label artists without hit singles, gasping for air in the digital music market.
How this bodes for 2009 is anyone's guess, but my advice would be to keep your eye on two trends: the surge in vinyl sales and the concentration of digital sales increases around a comparatively small cloud of artists and songs.
Recap (via Coolfer):
- Album sales: down 15% to 430 million units
- CD sales: down 20% to 362 units
- Digital album sales: up 32% to 62.8 units
- Track sales: up 27% to 1.07 billion units
- LP sales: up 92% to 1.9 million units
