A Little Knowledge… #46

Welcome to A Little Knowledge #46 – our free weekly LinkedIn newsletter.

?? BULLETIN NEWS: BPI reveals music consumption in the UK grew by 10% in 2023

British labels body the BPI has published its annual report on music consumption in the UK:

The data covers the number of sales and streams, but not the revenue generated from them – that data will be published by another body, the Entertainment Retailers Association, in the near future.

• The headline figure is that overall music consumption grew by 10% in 2023 to 182.8 million 'album equivalent sales' – a measure of volume that blends streams and sales, including giving more weighting to streams by paying subscribers.
• Brits streamed 179.6bn audio tracks last year, up 12.8% year-on-year. Streaming now accounts for 87.7% of the market (in terms of consumption), up from 63.6% in 2018
• The overall consumption growth of 10% is a notable leap from the 4.3% increase recorded in 2022
• A sharp increase in consumption sounds good, but it will need to be cross-referenced with ERA's data to understand whether that's paying off in terms of spending.
• The BPI also highlighted a diversity stat: women artists topped the UK's official singles chart for 31 of the 52 chart-weeks in 2023 – the biggest total since the chart's launch in 1952
• In fact seven of the top 10 tracks in the UK last year (and four of the top five) were by women, with Miley Cyrus' 'Flowers' leading the way.
• The top 10 albums sparked some discussion, however. Only one of them was released in 2023, with three having been released in 2022. A further four were compilations, none of which was released in 2023.

??? Read our analysis in full here.

??? Music Ally Focus podcast: two recent episodes you may have missed

?The Music Ally Focus podcast explores topics across the industry with a host of experts:

• In early December, our editor Joe Sparrow interviewed Lior Tibon, the co-founder of music-financing platform Duetti (and previously COO of Tidal). Duetti aims to let smaller and mid-range artists sell part or all of their catalogue. Lior has experience in both the investment and streaming sides of the industry and so we talk about two things that are distantly, yet directly, connected: the recently mooted artist-centric payment systems that divide up money to artists from streaming platforms in new ways – and the service that Duetti provides, giving artists another route to the money that their songs will make.? Listen (or get links to your preferred service) here.
• The final episode of 2023 saw Nur Ozdamar, Artist & Label Development Lead at YouTube, join Joe to explain how her artist and label development team for Europe, Middle East & Africa (EMEA) supports the careers of artists and its label partners. She described the help that they provide, how they choose which emerging artists they eventually partner with – and how her team consider the changing face of music consumption on YouTube. Listen here.

?? Explore all 135 episodes of the Music Ally Focus Podcast here.

?? MUSIC ALLY JOBS

The latest and best jobs for the global music business, trusted by both top music industry companies and experienced professionals on top of their game.

Are you looking for a job? Click here to see the full list of vacancies!

?? A LITTLE SOMETHING EXTRA...

?And finally… our daily Bulletin newsletter is loved by subscribers for its instant industry analysis - but secretly, the part they like most is the ‘A Little Something Extra’ section at the bottom of the email. Here's a few of the best recent links:?

• Your impressive (possibly) dinner-party conversation for the next week is explaining to people?the FULL background behind the latest Tetris record.
• Drive & Listen?is a website to virtually drive around various cities while listening to their local radio.
• How long can you survive in?1D Pac-Man?

This is only a glimpse into this week's The Knowledge newsletter – subscribe for FREE?and every Friday it’ll arrive in your inbox with:

?? Exclusive access to selected courses in our LEARNING HUB; ????The best new platforms in TOOLS;??? Highlights from our latest COUNTRY PROFILE REPORTS; ?? ???Some great and/or strange music in SOMETHING 4 THE WEEKEND; ?? A look back in TIME MACHINE; ?? The Music Ally Focus PODCAST; and????more links to our favourite unusual stuff in A LITTLE SOMETHING EXTRA.