12 MusicWeek 23.08.13


BUSINESSANALYSIS 10 YEARS OF THE X FACTOR EDITORIAL


X Factor was never a certainty to make it beyond audition stage


THE X FACTOR IS now such a phenomenon it is easy to


overlook its success was far from guaranteed when it debuted on ITV1 in September 2004. Just two-and-half years after 13 million people had watched


Will Young win Pop Idol and then 1.1 million immediately bought his single audience fatigue towards reality music TV shows had already started to kick in. Pop Idol’s second – and who turned out to be last – winner


Michelle McManus’s own debut single sold just one-tenth of Young’s, while The X Factor’s first champ Steve Brookstein did reach No.1 but his sales were hardly stopping traffic. But after a hesitant start the programme is now so locked in


the national psyche it is hard to imagine it not existing, even though the run-up to the new series is yet again accompanied by


“X Factor critics get carried away with the idea the music


landscape would look totally different if the show did not exist. They are deluding themselves”


speculation it will be the last. What cannot be disputed is its commercial dominance with


Music Week research revealing its acts have shifted some 30 million singles and 18 million albums in the UK alone. But for all its success The X Factor continues to be subject to


intense levels of criticism. While some is justified, too often its critics seem to get carried away with the idea the music landscape would look totally different if the show did not exist. They are deluding themselves. In many ways what X Factor delivers is no different to what


has always occurred; only the methodology has changed. Take One Direction, for example. Yes, they were put together by a TV programme, but the only difference between them and a Take That or Spice Girls before them is it happened in front of rather than behind the cameras. And in the absence of X Factor’s pop acts others would have emerged from elsewhere. One specific accusation is the programme has made the


market more homogenised. What is true is acts on the show get more mainstream exposure than any others, but it would be ridiculous to think the charts would now be full of, say, rock acts if X Factor were not around. If that were the case other leading music markets overseas where reality TV has less of a presence would now be teeming with the likes of successful new guitar bands, but that is not the case. Musical shifts in the mainstream since X Factor launched have been largely about market changes, not least in how consumers now access music. Where, though, there is a case to answer is how the industry


became too reliant on X Factor and other reality shows as an A&R source. It should be one such outlet, not everything, and this is rightly being addressed by Sony UK boss Nick Gatfield and others. But without X Factor we would not have the UK’s biggest pop


exports in One Direction since the Spice Girls and in the continuing absence of a weekly mainstream music programme on terrestrial TV no mass-market promotional platform during Q4. Even Liam Gallagher wants to be on it, which just about says everything. Paul Williams,


Head of Business Analysis Do you have views on this column? Feel free to comment by emailing paul.williams@intentmedia.co.uk


www.musicweek.com


X-FACTOR DOMINATES POP FOR A DECADE


On the eve of The X Factor UK’s 10th series, Music Week examines just how many records the programme has sold


TELEVISION n BY PAUL WILLIAMS


X


Factor acts have sold more singles combined in the UK since the show launched than any record company outside the majors.


Exclusive Music Week analysis of Official Charts


Company data reveals that in the period after first winner Steve Brookstein’s debut RCA single was launched at the end of 2004 and until now artists broken via the programme have collectively shifted nearly 30 million singles, according to Official Charts Company data. That is the equivalent of them having a market


share of 2.7%, putting The X Factor if it were a record group in its own right below only Universal, Sony, Warner and what was EMI operating as a separate entity prior to its break up.


EXECUTIVE SUMMARY


n Around 30 million UK singles sales by X Factor acts since the show launched n The franchise’s artists have sold more than 18 million albums in the UK, led by 3 million sales of Leona Lewis’s Spirit n Leona Lewis is top-selling X Factor singles and albums act in UK n Alexandra Burke’s Hallelujah is most popular single by X Factor discovery, closely followed by James Arthur’s Impossible n Sales by X Factor acts make up 2.7% of UK singles market and 2.2% of artist albums market since show’s first releases


Further, only Adele’s incredible sales for XL


Beggars prevent a similar occurrence on artist albums with X Factor graduates accounting for around 18.3 UK million sales since inaugural victor Brookstein’s first album Heart And Soul was


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