Which Genre Of Music Do We Like Best?

If you were to listen to a week of nothing but radio, you'd think that all we listen to in the U.S. is pop and country music. If you were to read a week's worth of the music news, you might think that dance/electronic/EDM was close to the top of the heap in what we enjoy. The problem with those assumptions is that they're wrong, at least according to the 2015 Nielsen Year End Music Report that, among other things, looked at the genres of music we liked the best last year.

When taking into account the total amount of music consumption, which includes physical and downloaded albums, downloaded tracks, and streams, here's the order of music genre preference that the study determined:

Rock - 24.5%
R&B/Hip-Hop - 18.2%
Pop - 15.7%
Country - 8.5%
Latin - 4.5%
Dance/EDM - 3.4%
Christian - 2.8%
Holiday/Seasonal - 1.7%
Classical - 1.3%
Childrens - 1.1%

When it came to number of albums consumed, Rock was far ahead at 32.6%, followed by R&B/Hip-Hop at 15.1% and Pop at 22.6%.

For streams, R&B/Hip-Hop came out on top at 21.1%. Rock at 17.5%. and Pop at 14.5%.

Rock might not be the hippest genre and it's frequently portrayed in the press as spiraling downward in popularity and relevancy, but it still continues to out-perform other music genres, for better or worse.

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Rock Still Isn't Dead According To A New Study

We keep on hearing that rock is dead as a music genre, but that's not the case at all, according to a study by Nielsen Music. Surprising, rock came out on top when it comes to genres of music that people consumed in the US during 2015.

If you listen to the radio, pop music dominates, but it's only #3 when it comes to favorite music. Also surprising was the fact that country and dance/EDM scored lower than other genres.

Here's what the study found.

   Rock 29%
   R&B/Hip Hop 17.2%
   Pop 14.9%
   Country 11.2%
   Dance / EDM 3.4%
   Christian Gospel 3.1%
   Holiday / Seasonal 2.6%
   Latin 2.6%
   Jazz 1.4%
   Classical 1.4%
   Children 1%

It just goes to show that in these days of music consumption online, it's more difficult than ever to determine what's really hot and what's really not.

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Old Albums Now Outsell Current Ones

According to the latest Nielsen report on the music business of 2015, catalog albums (defined as any album more than 18 months old) outsold newly released albums, which is the first time that's ever happened. That's even despite the huge sales numbers of Adele's 25.

In 2015, catalog albums sold 122.8 million units, while new albums sold 118.5 million, a drop of more than 9% from the previous year. Adele amount for around 7.5 million of those 118.5 million, which means that the figures would have been really lopsided had she waited until this year to release 25.

This is actually disturbing in that it means that new music is much less marketable than music of the past, a fact that will have A&R execs cringing in their boots.

It is good news for labels in general though, as they make far more profit from catalog sales than from current releases, since there's no production or marketing expenses involved.

If you really think about it, this really means is that we need a new trend in music, and the sooner the better.

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Adele Sets A Record For Downloads

Who says that downloads are dead?

That's not the case for Adele's new song "Hello," which set the record for most downloads sold in a weekin the US  at 1.11 million. It's the first song ever to sell that many in week since Nielsen began tracking digital and physical singles in 1991.

Not only that, the song has set records for downloads, streams and airplay in the UK and Europe, so the girl must be doing something right.

Plus the song is already #1 in the US and 14 other countries around the world.

One of the more interesting facts about Adele's past and current success is that she continues to defy the punditry of music industry analysts who insist that physical and download sales will never sell in great numbers again.

Adele's last album 21 sold in excess of 28 million worldwide, while those in the business said that there would never be another album that would ever sell more than 2 to 3 million again.

The same was said for downloads, but yet "Hello" is being purchased in record numbers at the same time as it's being listened for free online and on radio.

Many claim that Adele's popularity is the fact that she's the "anti-Lady Gaga/Beyonce/Ariana Grande, etc", but she's also managed to cross over from the usual teens that buy pop music to a much older crowd as well. Sometimes lack of controversy works in your favor.

It should be interesting to see how well her new album 25 sells when it's released.

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Superstars Account For Less Than You Think

Most of us think that only the top 1% in music, the superstars, make most of the money.

Well, they certainly do when you take touring and merch into consideration, but not when you look at sales and streams, which will surprise many industry naysayers.

Rockonomic did a recent study based upon Nielsen's 2014 music report and found the following:

• The Top Ten CD albums account for only 6.624% of total CD Album Sales.

• The Top Ten Digital Tracks account for only 3.759% of total Track Sales

• The Top Ten On-Demand (Stream) Tracks account for just 0.98% of total Track Streams.

If these figures hold true for this year as well (and there's no reason to believe they won't), it shows that when it comes to streaming, the average consumer's taste goes beyond the hits.

It seems that the music business is a lot more democratic than we give it credit for. Artists and bands should take heart in the fact that there appears to be plenty of room for other music besides what comes from the superstars.

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