Posted January 9, 200817 yr Leona sitting pretty as the age of the single returns Source: MW Monday January 7, 2008 By Alan Jones As female talent mirrors the albums market at the chart summit and Mika tops the list of new talent, the single format remains alive and well thanks to the digital age’s phenomenal impact on the market. In unit terms, we’ve never had it so good. Considered dead and buried in 2004 when, according to OCC data, BPI-certified shipments of 31.4m generated sales of 26,495,154, the single is back in rude health. The immediate and cheap availability of downloads produced compound growth rates of 48.4% in 2005, 38.7% in 2006 and 29.3% in 2007, when sales reached the dizzy heights of 86,562,355. That is one of the three highest figures ever – even possibly the highest. Shipments during the ‘disco boom’ in 1978 and 1979 were higher at 88.8m and 89.1m, respectively, but these included singles sent overseas and returns. The impact of the digital age is felt most keenly not at the top end of the market but at the lower end. In 1998 and 1999, no fewer than 20 singles sold more than 500,000 copies but last year only two managed to reach the tally, but the number of singles to sell more than 10,000 copies last year at 1,124 was by far the highest ever – and sales of the number 5,000 single for 2007 were more than 20 times the level they achieved in any year between 2000 and 2003. The physical sector declined 37.8% in 2007, and accounted for just 8,606,153 sales. The seven-inch single has trailed its 12-inch cousin for more than 20 years but reasserted its superiority in 2007, accounting for 1,040,008 sales (a 0.6% dip), while 12-inch sales were trimmed 35.8% to 803,211. The CD single was off 41.4% at 6,663,010, while DVD video single sales fell a similar 40.7%. The physical format’s best performance, bizarrely, came from the cassette, which spurted 45.3% - though even that meant that just 715 were sold in the year. After missing out last year, when her debut single A Moment Like This was second to Gnarls Barkley’s Crazy, Leona Lewis came up with a second blockbuster in the form of Bleeding Love, which sold 787,653 copies in the last 10 weeks of 2007 to emerge as the year’s biggest seller. Lewis is the first British female solo star ever to top the annual singles list, and only the fifth to date, following Americans Britney Spears (…Baby One More Time in 1999), Cher (Believe in 1998), Whitney Houston (I Will Always Love You in 1992) and Jennifer Rush (The Power Of Love in 1985). Although Bleeding Love spent seven weeks at number one, it was not the year’s longest-reigning hit – that honour fell to Umbrella, the soundtrack to a truly soggy summer, by Rhianna feat. Jay-Z. Umbrella was number one for 10 weeks - one of the longest reigns at number one in chart history, being inferior to only four of the previous 1,057 chart-toppers, namely I Believe by Frankie Laine (18 weeks at number one in total, split into separate runs of nine, six and three weeks), (Everything I Do) I Do It For You by Bryan Adams (16), Love Is All Around by Wet Wet Wet (15) and Rose Marie by Slim Whitman (11). Cara Mia by David Whitfield and I Will Always Love You by Whitney Houston also spent 10 weeks at number one. Umbrella sold slow and steady, with sales of just 61,015 in its peak week but it has been a chart fixture for 33 weeks, accumulating the year’s second best tally of 512,732 sales. For all its success, Bleeding Love also failed to secure the highest weekly sale in the year. Its opening week’s tally of 218,805 was eclipsed in the year’s penultimate week when her successor as X Factor champion, Leon Jackson, sold 275,742 copies of his debut hit When You Believe. TV also provided the impetus for the third and last single to sell more than 100,000 copies in a week – (I’m Gonna Be) 500 Miles. The Comic Relief single paired The Proclaimers with Peter Kay and Matt Lucas’ wheelchair-bound comic creations Brian Potter and Andy Pipkin, and sold 126,211 copies on its debut, and 336,138 in the year. The Sugababes and Girls Aloud collaboration Walk This Way was also for Comic Relief, and topped the chart a week before The Proclaimers single but sold far less well, with 108,995 buyers to the end of 2007, placing it 72nd for the year. It is not how you start but how you finish that counts, and topping the chart on the first week of release is not necessarily an indication of big sales. That much was proved in May, when McFly secured their seventh number one single with Baby’s Coming Back/Transylvania. It opened at number one with first week sales of 30,683, but dropped like a stone, progressing 1-20-39-59 before exiting the chart altogether. Its total sales of 50,759 spread over 34 weeks are barely a quarter of the 188,989 copies Nelly Furtado’s number 10 hit Say It Right sold and are less even than the 53,339 copies that Queen’s Don’t Stop Me Now sold in 2007 without even entering the Top 75. On the plus side, Baby’s Coming Back/Transyvania was one of just 18 number ones in the year – the lowest annual tally since 1995. It was also one of the singles that helped the pop genre to increase its share of the Top 100 singles substantially following three years of dramatic losses. From a 50% share in 2003, pop slumped to 32% in 2005 and 18% in 2006, but picked up to 26% last year. Although the leading singles genre for the third year in a row, urban (hip-hop/R&B) continues its slow decline, and posted a 30% share in 2007, just ahead of rock (27%). After arresting a four-year decline in 2006, dance slips from 20% to 17%. Groups and duos continue to account for more than three in every five hits for the fifth year in a row, while Universal’s domination reaches a new peak, with 42.5% of the Top 100 singles coming from its vast library. Sony BMG is still way behind but moves into second place with a 29% share. Finally, two years after half of all hits were by Americans, the US share of the market is down to 34% with UK talent accounting for a 49.5% share of the Top 100 – its top tally for five years.
January 9, 200817 yr Although Bleeding Love spent seven weeks at number one, it was not the year’s longest-reigning hit – that honour fell to Umbrella, the soundtrack to a truly soggy summer, by Rhianna feat. Jay-Z. Pathetic lazy journalism, it wasn't the "soundtrack" to our summer cos of the weather. Edited January 9, 200817 yr by Marcus
January 9, 200817 yr It doesn't say it was the soundtrack because of the weather :unsure: Its says it was the soundtrack to a soggy summer, not because of the soggy summer that it was the soundtrack.
January 9, 200817 yr Although Bleeding Love spent seven weeks at number one, it was not the year’s longest-reigning hit – that honour fell to Umbrella, the soundtrack to a truly soggy summer, by Rhianna feat. Jay-Z. Pathetic lazy journalism, it wasn't the "soundtrack" to our summer cos of the weather. :lol: and I thought you were calling them lazy as they spelt RIHANNA wrong :lol:
Create an account or sign in to comment