Arctic Monkeys Hot

The Arctic Monkeys are a band - for those of you who don't know about these things. They came to fame via MySpace.

Their latest album Your favourite worst nightmare has shot to number 1 on the UK album charts as soon as it was released. But the interesting thing is that each of the songs on the album have also charted. How? They are all available to be individually download from the web from sites like the Apple iTunes store. Changes to the way sales are accounted for by the music business mean that a physical CD single doesn't have to pass through a high street retailer in order to be counted for the chart. What is also interesting is that this very obvious example of the shift in buyer behaviour makes a mockery of the Record Industry Association's anxiety that downloads will kill their business. According to the BBC Radio 1 DJs interviewed in this story (video) the charts now have new acts that rise through the rankings, rather than meteorically arriving at the top - due to sell in and record co hype (payola) - and then sinking back down.

The times they are a changin'(had to drop that in after a Bobby Dylan fest on the weekend).

Album Reviewed here (BBC)

And here (Rolling Stone)

Comments

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