UK music consumption up as streaming grows 80%, according to the BPI

UK music consumption up as streaming grows 80%, according to the BPI

 

The British Phonographic Industry (BPI) has released new data on the UK’s consumption of recorded music for the first six months of 2015, provided by the Official Charts Company, and the outlook is a positive one. 

Streaming services are taking off big time, with an 80% growth over the same period last year, reaching 11.5 billion plays in the first half of 2015. The BPI expects this growth to be further fuelled by the launch of Apple Music, which promises to bring streaming to the attention of more “mainstream” consumers. 

Geoff Taylor, Chief Executive BPI and BRIT Awards, stated: 

“The launch of Apple Music will give further impetus to the revolution of music streaming. Millions of households are experiencing the joy of instantly playing any song they want, all around their house and on any device, and exploring a universe of new music and classic albums. At the same time, many fans are rediscovering the slower pleasure of collecting and owning music on CD and vinyl.”

Indeed, CDs held their ground with a decline of only 5.7%, and Vinyl soared growing a further 53.3% - it seems like the format’s return is far from being a fad after all.

Streaming services generated 6.3 million streaming equivalent album sales, an increase of 79.5% over last year. This meant that streaming helped offset the decline not only of physical sales, but also of digital ones bringing the album market to a healthy 4% growth. This compares very well to the 5.8% decline recorded at the same time last year. 

Digital downloads however continue to decline with Digital Albums down 6.6% (more than CDs). This trend is likely to continue into the future, and given the importance of iTunes in the downloads market, depending on the adoption of Apple Music, it could decine sharply over the next six months.

UK music is doing very well as the majority of best-selling Albums of 2015 thus far are by British artists. Taylor stated:

"With Sam Smith,  Ed Sheeran, George Ezra and Paloma Faith appealing to ever growing fan-bases and great new albums from James Bay, Florence and the Machine, Muse, Mark Ronson, Meghan Trainor and Mumford & Sons, 2015 has got off to a strong start, and the second half of the year looks promising, with more big albums to come.”

Overall, this is positive news for the UK industry showing that the promise that streaming would be able to offset the decline in physical and digital sales in the long run is starting to become a reality.

(Andrea Leonelli)