Streams Archives - Haulix Daily

The Nielsen mid-year music report is here, and it shows the reign of streaming services over the industry is far from over.

Nielsen is widely considered to be the authority on the business of entertainment, and their latest mid-year report reveals the music industry is in good standing. The recently published data found the first half of 2019 shattered previous 6-month records with more than 507 billion on-demand combined music and video streams and milestones led by singles and albums from Ariana Grande, Billie Eilish, Halsey, Khalid, BTS, and Bad Bunny.

The fall is widely considered the busiest time of the year for music, so it is likely the total on-demand combined streaming numbers will be equal to, if not greater than the statistics above. If true, that would mean 2019 is on pace to be the first year where streams of recorded music surpass one-trillion plays in the United States and Canada.

To date, many of this year’s most significant music moments were aided by exposure in popular films. The success of A Star Is Born, for example, gave Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper’s smash hit duet “Shallow” a major boost following the Acadamy Awards. The song has earned more than 684,000 track downloads, 316 million on-demand song streams, and over one-billion audience impression on the radio to date.

Nielsen sites other areas of entertainment as playing a very influential role in the rise of the year’s most popular songs. The music featured in film and television continued its upward trend from 2018 when soundtracks accounted for two of the year’s top 10 biggest sellers (The Greatest Showman and Black Panther: The Album). The impact good placement has on songs can be understood by looking at the success of Post Malone and Swae Lee’s “Sunflower” ( 47.6 million U.S. streams), which appeared in the equally popular animated film Into The Spiderverse, or through the continuing success of rock biopics such Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocketman.

There is a wide range of Global pop genres that made a sizeable impact in the U.S as well, including K-Pop and Latin. K-Pop’s global domination, which reached record peaks in 2018, continued to reach new audiences.

230,000 equivalent album units earned for BTS’ Map of the Soul: Persona, a career-best for the K-Pop group, during the week ending April 12.
BTS and Halsey’s “Boy With Luv” reached 125 million on-demand streams so far this year, including spikes after their performance at the Billboard Music Awards on May 1.
18.6 million first week on-demand streams for BLACKPINK’s “Kill This Love,” which broke the band’s own record for highest-charting single by a K-Pop girl group on the Billboard Hot 100.

Nielsen Music’s Mid-Year 2019 Charts:

2019’s Mid-Year Top 10 Albums (Based on Overall Equivalent Album Units)

1. Ariana Grande, Thank U, Next (1,552,800)
2. Billie Eilish, When We Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? (1,304,000)
3. Khalid, Free Spirit (929,000)
4. Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper, A Star Is Born (Soundtrack) (889,000)
5. A Boogie Wit da Hoodie, Hoodie SZN (810,000)
6. Post Malone, beerbongs & bentleys (756,000)
7. Drake, Scorpion (718,000)
8. Queen, Bohemian Rhapsody (Soundtrack) (705,000)
9. Juice WRLD, Death Race for Love (675,000)
10. Jonas Brothers, Happiness Begins (663,000)

2019’s Mid-Year Top 10 Selling Albums

1. Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper, A Star Is Born (Soundtrack) (404,000)
2. Jonas Brothers, Happiness Begins (374,000)
3. Billie Eilish, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? (343,000)
4. BTS, Map of the Soul: Persona (343,000)
5. Backstreet Boys, DNA (299,000)
6. Queen, Bohemian Rhapsody (Soundtrack) (253,000)
7. Ariana Grande, Thank U, Next (228,000)
8. Soundtrack, The Greatest Showman (181,000)
9. P!nk, Hurts 2B Human (158,000)
10. Lauren Daigle, Look Up Child (154,000)

2019’s Mid-Year Top 10 Selling Vinyl Albums

1. Queen, Bohemian Rhapsody (Soundtrack) (61,000)
2. Queen, Greatest Hits (49,000)
3. Billie Eilish, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? (47,000)
4. Soundtrack, Guardians of the Galaxy: Awesome Mix Vol. 1 (33,000)
5. The Beatles, Abbey Road (33,000)
6. Pink Floyd, The Dark Side of the Moon (32,000)
7. Bob Marley & The Wailers, Legend (30,000)
8. Fleetwood Mac, Rumours (29,000)
9. Michael Jackson, Thriller (29,000)
10. Billie Eilish, Don’t Smile at Me (28,000)

2019’s Mid-Year Top 10 Selling Digital Songs

1. Lil Nas X, “Old Town Road” (958,000)
2. Lady Gaga & Bradley Cooper, “Shallow” (684,000)
3. Post Malone & Swae Lee, “Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)” (488,000)
4. Ariana Grande, “7 Rings” (420,000)
5. Halsey, “Without Me” (388,000)
6. Post Malone, “Wow.” (381,000)
7. Jonas Brothers, “Sucker” (357,000)
8. Lauren Daigle, “You Say” (322,000)
9. Taylor Swift featuring Brendon Urie, “Me!” (322,000)
10. Ava Max, “Sweet But Psycho” (321,000)

2019’s Mid-Year Top 10 On-Demand Song Streams (Audio and Video Combined)

1. Lil Nas X, “Old Town Road” (1,337,995,000)
2. Post Malone & Swae Lee, “Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)” (850,194,000)
3. Ariana Grande, “7 Rings” (776,696,000)
4. Travis Scott, “Sicko Mode” (623,498,000)
5. Halsey, “Without Me” (599,335,000)
6. J. Cole, “Middle Child” (582,748,000)
7. Post Malone, “Wow.” (582,633,000)
8. Blueface, “Thotiana” (588,277,000)
9. Marshmello & Bastille, “Happier” (528,640,000)
10. YNW Melly, “Murder On My Mind” (498,806,000)

2019’s Mid-Year Top 10 On-Demand Audio Streams

1. Lil Nas X, “Old Town Road” (596,113,000)
2. Post Malone & Swae Lee, “Sunflower (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse)” (458,470,000)
3. Ariana Grande, “7 Rings” (433,904,000)
4. Post Malone, “Wow.” (416,231,000)
5. J. Cole, “Middle Child” (395,872,000)
6. Meek Mill featuring Drake, “Going Bad” (337,025,000)
7. Halsey, “Without Me” (319,879,000)
8. YNW Melly, “Murder On My Mind” (287,219,000)
9. Lil Baby & Gunna, “Drip Too Hard” (284,613,000)
10. Travis Scott, “Sicko Mode” (276,802,000)

This is going to sound a little crazy at first, but the availability of your material online is just as important to curving piracy in 2015 as the need to actively combat the proliferation links through Takedown Notices. That may seem counter-intuitive, as the spread of your unreleased material is typically not something you want easily available to anonymous people online, but there comes a point in every album promotion cycle where the exact opposite becomes true. Allow me to explain…

Let’s pretend for a moment that we are all in the same band. Our new album, which we have been working on for the past several months, is due out in the near future. Pre-orders have been going strong for a while now, but with a new tour starting 10 days before the album’s release we’ve decided that we will have copies of the record available for sale at every date of the run. This means that, for about a week and a half, anyone who attends a concert of ours will be able to purchase our new album early, which on paper seems like a good deal for everyone involved: Fans get music early, and we begin seeing an early return on our creative efforts.

There is a catch, however, and that is the fact that anyone with early access to our album also has the ability to leak that record online. 10 days may not seem like a long time when you step back and think about a career in music as a whole, but in the world of piracy it’s equal to a lifetime. The Expendables 3, for example, leaked online a little more than two weeks before its theatrical release date. Within 24 hours more than 100,000 people had downloaded the original leak, and countless more had shared their download with family/friends. When the film eventually hit theaters, its box office take on opening weekend was less than ½ the amount made by The Expendables 2 in that same time frame.

Our band might not have the same size audience as The Expendables franchise, but our album could suffer a similar fate if we do not take steps to curve the proliferation of illegal downloads online. The first round of defense is, of course, asking fans to wait and purchase the album. The second, and honestly – most important of all – is that we MAKE THE ALBUM AVAILABLE ONLINE.

The key to winning the battle against piracy, especially over the longterm, is taking whatever steps you can to make your music available to fans. This includes, but is not limited to: Soundcloud album stream, Spotify stream, Rdio, Pandora, and Bandcamp. As soon as a physical version of your album is available for sale you need to have a digital stream available and ready to be shared with press and fans alike. By offering a free and completely legal way to access music fans have less reason to even look for leaks, let alone download them. Why should they? Streaming is the number one way people experience music today, so if streaming is an option for your fans they won’t feel the need to engage in piracy. Everything they want is already available, it’s free as well.

A recent report showed that almost ¼ of an album’s total sales happen BEFORE the scheduled release date. Leaks can help sales, but more often than not they have the opposite effect. Streams on the other hand, can encourage consumers to purchase the album, as well as aide in promoting tours and other upcoming events. By hosting the stream yourself the power is entirely in your hands, which is something most artists rarely experience in the modern business.