Sales Down in the Music Business

Source: Celebrity Cafe

In recent years, music sales have been declining, and 2009 is no different. Album sales dropped 12.7%, marking this as the eighth time in nine years that a decline has occurred. Unfortunately for the music business, this is a new low since ratings started being published in 1991.

However, this does not necessarily mean that certain artists were not successful. The death of the “King of Pop,” Michael Jackson, in July helped him to become the top selling artist of the year. Similarly, artists like Taylor Swift and The Beatles also had top selling albums even though they did not release anything new in the past year. Swift’s 2008 album, Fearless, was the top-selling album of the year, followed by Britain’s Got Talent sensation Susan Boyle, whose album was titled I Dreamed a Dream.

Music reps attribute this decline in album sales to the increased volume of internet music piracy and also the increased popularity of using sites such as iTunes
instead of buying the album. In addition, it seems as though the general population has focused its attention more on movies and live music events rather than on album music in the past year. The failure of music stores like the Virgin Megastore and Circuit City have not helped matters, either.