Last year is a tough period for music industry which suffered double-digit drop in CDs sales, according to Nielsen report.
According to the report, the total album sales including online downloads and CDs in US suffered 14 percent decline or a total of 428.4 million units last year from 500 million in 2007. Meanwhile, downloads of individual songs totaling to an album also experienced a sharp decline of 8.5 percent in 2008 or amounting to 535.4 million units from 585 million in 2007.
Despite dramatic decline of CD sales to almost 20 percent, digital albums (online downloads) increase to 32 percent amounting to 65.8 million units compared from 50 million in 2007.
Some experts believe that online and digital piracy aggravated by BitTorrent protocol is the main reason why CD sales continue to drop for the past couple of years. But despite this alarming trend, CDs still account to more than 80 percent of album sales in the country.
Although, total sales of albums fell, Amazon and the Apple’s iTunes, which are digital music providers, experienced a dramatic increase in sales, reaching to more than a billion units sold last year, from nearly 844 million in 2007, according to Nielsen.
These are the top-seller albums in 2008
· Tha Carter III by Lil Wayne – 2.87 million units
· Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends by Coldplay – 2.14 million units
· Fearless by Taylor Swift – 2.11 million units
· Rock N Roll Jesus by Kid Rock – 2.02 million units
· Black Ice by AC/DC – 1.92 million units
· Taylor Swift by Taylor Swift – 1.6 million units
· Death Magnetic by Metallica – 1.57 million units
· Paper Trail by T.I. – 1.52 million units
· Sleep Through the Static by Jack Johnson – 1.49 million units
· I am… Sasha Fierce by Beyonce – 1.46 million units
source: Nielsen SoundScan