Sunday, November 29, 2009

US Reggae Record Sales in Decline?

Recent reports in Jamaica’s Star and Gleaner have stated that according to sales tracker Nielsen-SoundScan reggae album sales have plummeted in the USA. Collectively reggae / dancehall music has sold a mere 502,171 units for the first 10 months of the year. In a great year for reggae album releases, with a lot of artists going back to a more rootsy sound. Buju Bantons excellent ‘Rasta Got Soul’ has so far only sold just over 8,000 copies, while Queen Ifrica’s summer release ‘Welcome to Montego Bay’ has a woeful return of only 2,726
However this may not be all gloom and doom for reggae artists. After all we are just starting to come out of what has been the worst global recession ever and CD sales across all genres have been affected. Also these figures do not include download sales, which is now according to industry reports accountable for around 20% of worldwide music sales. I myself, as someone who swore they would always only ever buy vinyl and not CD’s, before finally giving into their rise, now rarely buy CD’s and prefer the convenience and versatility of mp3 downloads. There is also the problem for more established artists of the ease in which it is possible for people to get music out via the net, so competition is now greatly increased. Lots of unsigned bands can put there music out with out the need of CD’s for instant download and often for free, so people may be tending to experiment more with new sounds, especially in times of financial difficulty. Then of course there is file sharing, a problem for artists that I think will never go away.
So with all these hurdles in it is maybe not the time to start panicking about lack of sales. Once all the figures are in and the fuller picture is revealed this will hopefully give a better outlook. Artists and their record companies may also have to look at longer-term sales figures, as consumer confidence grows, before the real success or failure of their product can be measured. The only thing that has maybe held these sales back is not their lack of quality but the unfortunate and testing times that they have been released in.
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1 comment:

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