Beatles top US end of decade chart

Tuesday December 15, 2009

Based on sales from the period of January 2000 to November 29 2009 in the US, 1, the greatest hits compilation by the band, released in 2000, accrued sales of 11,515,000. The EMI release beat artists such as N*Sync, Norah Jones and Eminem - who has three releases within the top 50 – to the top spot.

British artists fared slightly better within the Top Artist by Album Sales of the Decade chart - which takes sales from all album releases into account - with appearances from the Beatles, Rod Stewart, Coldplay and Pink Floyd within the top 50.

The Beatles came second to Eminem, who achieved album sales of 32,241,000, while the Liverpudlian quartet garnered sales of 30,182,000.

Rod Stewart was 31st in the list with sales of 15,511,000 as Coldplay came in at 34 with 14,604,000 album sales. Pink Floyd beat artists such as Shania Twain, Ludacris and Enya to come in at 36 with 14,164,000 album sales over the last decade.

The figures released by Nielsen Soundscan also highlighted the effect that music piracy is having on the industry, with sales steadily decreasing from 2000 to 2009.

In 2000, 202 albums released in the US achieved sales of at least half a million – a figure that decreased to 49 this year. Similarly, 32 albums in 2002 sold 2m copies, while just two did in 2009.

The figures also showed the effect that digital downloads have had on music purchases. Pre 2004 and the digital music boom physical CD sales fluctuated between 712 million and 635.8 million.

Since then, physical CD sales have sunk to 249.1 million, while sales of digital tracks reached 1,069.6 million in 2008.

http://www.musicweek.com/story.asp?sectioncode=1&storycode=1039426&c=1