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THE BUSINESS OF MUSIC
www.musicweek.com
VIEWPOINT 18
“Major labels need to give their artists the power to sell their own music to their own fans”
16 BIG INTERVIEW
“The UK Government are fuddy duddy idiots. Reading and Leeds are too rock and roll for them”
23.08.13 £5.15
PROFILE 20
“It’s hard to be accepted as ‘credible’ when you make positive music”
X marks the Noughties T
ANALYSIS n BY PAUL WILLIAMS
he X Factor launches its 10th UK series next weekend as Music Week
reveals its acts have domestically sold a staggering 30 million singles and 18 million albums. The huge totals mean that
since the programme first aired in 2004, combined X Factor discoveries have sold more records in the UK than any corporate record group outside the majors, based on Official Charts Company data. Our exclusive analysis shows
acts uncovered during the first nine series have sold around 29.6 million singles in the UK - equivalent to 2.7% of singles sales since first winner Steve Brookstein’s debut hit was issued. They have also shifted 18.3 million albums; a 2.2% share of the artist LP market between the release of Brookstein’s introductory album and now. In both sectors the X Factor
tables are headed by Leona Lewis, whose three Syco albums have to date sold an unrivalled
3.9 million copies in the UK, while she has shifted 4.4 million singles. Olly Murs is Lewis’s closest challenger on singles and JLS on albums. Murs has accounted for 3.9 million UK singles sales, while he is narrowly behind JLS on albums with his three Epic studio efforts
attracting 2.6 million buyers. His current album Right Place Right Time alone was up to 814,686 sales by last weekend having returned to the weekly Top 20, narrowing the gap on soon-to- split JLS who have sold 2.7 million albums in total across their Epic and RCA releases.
In all, nine X Factor acts have
shifted more than a million singles in the UK. Six artists have sold at least a million albums, including One Direction whose first two Syco albums have combined shifted 1.7 million copies so far. A third album is due from them in Q4.
NEARLY 50 MILLION RECORDS SOLD AS 10TH SERIES OF COWELL’S TV BRAINCHILD NEARS The numbers would look even
more impressive with the addition of overseas sales by the brand’s UK contestants, led by OneDirection whose two albums were the third and fourth biggest sellers globally of 2012, according to IFPI data. There have also been notable international sales for Lewis and more recently acts including Murs, Little Mix and Cher Lloyd. As the home of show founder
Simon Cowell’s label Syco, Sony has been by far its biggest beneficiary with X Factor releases accounting for around 12.9% of the major’s UK singles sales and 10.3% of its artist albums business over the given periods. The 10th X Factor series
starts on ITV next Saturday (August 31) and for the first time will include shows on Saturday and Sunday nights right from the start. Sharon Osbourne returns as a judge after a six-year gap, joining Gary Barlow, Nicole Scherzinger and Louis Walsh.
n See Music Week Business Analysis - pages 12 to 15
Clery-Melin to make industry return with Kobalt
The widely-respected former boss of Co-Operative Music is to return to the industry with Kobalt, Music Week has learnt. Vincent Clery-Melin
founded Co-Op at V2 in 2005, which was subsequently purchased by Universal in 2007. The exec spent eight years at the services company, representing
artists such as Phoenix, The Black Keys and Mumford & Sons, and partnering with labels such as Bella Union and Glassnote. Co-Op was sold to rival
[PIAS] for around £500,000 in March, but Clery-Melin did not join his former colleagues. Former Co-Op general manager Jason Rackham has since
stepped up to become its MD. It is anticipated that Clery-
Melin, who spent three years at EMI prior to Co-Op, will join Kobalt Label Services early next month. KLS recently issued the Pet Shop Boys’ album Electric, which hit No.3 in the UK – the band’s highest Official Chart position since 1993’s Very.
Electric was also the band’s
first ever No.1 in Norway, and went Top 5 in Denmark, the Czech Republic, Germany, Finland and Spain. The album reached No.26 on the Billboard Top 200 in the US. Kobalt declined to comment
on the rumours when contacted by Music Week.
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