Top 20 Music
Moments Of 2013
(By Billboard Staff, Billboard magazine, December 26, 2013)
It was a
year of blockbuster comebacks, surprise albums, game-changing moves in hip-hop,
twerking teddy bears and tearful goodbyes of all kinds. For sure, 2013 kept us
busy. These are the 20 biggest music moments in a 12 month span that was
crammed with milestones.
20
1D's
Memorable Moves
Another
year, another smashingly successful One Direction album. "Midnight
Memories" sold over 500,000 copies in its first week (according to Nielsen
Soundscan) making the heartthrobby quintet the first
group to debut at No. 1 with each of its first three albums. The group
explored more mature, guitar-based sounds on the new set, which featured a pair
of top 10 singles ("Best Song Ever" and "Story of My Life")
and another pair that reached the top 20 ("Diana" and "Midnight
Memories"). Outside of album sales, the band introduced its best-selling
perfume (dubbed "Our Moment") and starred in the behind-the-scenes
tour film "This Is Us," which proved a box office triumph.
19
Kendrick
Takes 'Control'
Somehow
with no album out this year, Kendrick Lamar still created the type of buzz that
most acts only get when they're in-cycle. The rhymer's guest
verse on Big Sean's "Control," a throwaway cut from his
"Hall of Fame" album no less, attacked lazy rappers and respectfully
challenged (and named!) Drake, J. Cole, Wale and more to step their games up.
That's after the Los Angeles stud proclaimed himself the "King of New
York." Oh yeah, Kendrick
ruffled feathers.
18
Tragic
End to a Fallen Country Star
In a series
of events too macabre even for country music, singer Mindy McCready ended
her life on Feb. 17 with a shot of a gun, in the same spot that her
ex-boyfriend, David Wilson, killed himself a month before. Nearby lay his dog,
shot dead by McCready. The grim scene was the end of a turbulent decade for the
"Guys Do It All the Time" singer, which included several arrests, a
pair of suicide attempts, a tabloid scandal tied to an alleged underage
relationship with Roger Clemens, and her ill-advised appearance on
"Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew."
17
YouTube
Made the Hot 100 Star
If you
knew Baauer and Ylvis before 2013, you were either one of a select few or
simply from Norway. Exiting 2013? Nearly everyone knows those names -- or at
least recognizes "Harlem Shake" and "The Fox." And thanks
to our revamped Billboard chart methodology (which now factors YouTube plays
along with digital sales, radio spins and streaming plays), each act vaulted
high on the Hot 100. Baauer's "Harlem Shake" became the first
benefactor by vaulting to No. 1 on the Hot 100 (announced
on the cover of Billboard) -- and held that spot for five weeks total.
Months later, it was comedy
duo Ylvis, whose "The Fox (What Does the Fox Say?)" peaked at No. 6
on the strength of, again, a massive amount of downloads and YouTube spins.
Both songs became the first of many to receive assists from massive amounts of
video streams and rocket higher on the charts than ever before, making that
nationwide hit all the more reachable for even the most small-time of artists.
16
BBMAs
Light Up Las Vegas
Not to
toot our own horn, but this year's Billboard
Music Awards rocked. On May 20, 9.5 million viewers across America tuned in
to watch a galaxy of A-list musicians light up the stage at Las Vegas' MGM
Grand. Taylor Swift, Bruno Mars, Nicki Minaj, Lil Wayne and Icon Award
recipient Prince turned in top performances, Madonna turned up to grab her Top
Touring Artist award, and Miguel turned red after a miscalculated stage jump
had fans in the pit ducking for cover. Most notable of the night was Justin
Bieber, who performed twice, took home the fan-voted Milestone Award, and made
headlines for calling out the haters in his acceptance speech. Take that, non
#Beliebers!
15
Justin
Bieber Hits Highs & Lows
As
usual, Justin Bieber was constantly in the spotlight during 2013. This year,
however, the headlines weren't always flattering. On the plus side, there were
the flurry of top 10 hits from his 2012 album "Believe," a Milestone
Award-win at the Billboard Music Awards (see No. 16), and a 10-song set dubbed
Music Mondays that kept new music in the ears of his Beliebers. But there was also Mally, the singer's pet
capuchin monkey who was quarantined
in Germany due to improper documentation. There were the backstage fainting
spells in London. His hope that Anne
Frank "would have been a belieber" didn't go over so well. And
most recently, the singer embarked on a whirlwind South American tour that saw
him end
a concert early in Argentina, anger Brazilian police by spraying
graffiti on a wall, and get caught leaving an alleged brothel in Rio
de Janeiro. Bieber ends 2013 on an up note, with the release of second
movie, 'Believe,' and 'Journals,'
a collection of his Music Mondays singles. After that, his manager Scooter Braun says that Justin will
"(take) a break just to make music and relax, take some time for himself
for the first time since he was 12." After his chaotic '13, we're sure he
could use the rest.
14
David
Bowie and More Triumphant Rock Revivals
David
Bowie celebrated his 66th birthday on Jan. 8, but his fans got the best gift
when the long-dormant legend unexpectedly dropped
a new single and announced "The Next Day," his first album in 10 years.
Bowie's surprise kicked off a year of unanticipated returns from some of
alt-rock's heaviest hitters. On Feb. 2, British shoegaze giants My Bloody
Valentine broke
the Internet after self-releasing 'm b v,' their first album of new
material in 21 years. Then, on May 21, Trent Reznor announced that Nine Inch
Nails wasn't as defunct as he'd led fans to believe: later that summer, the
project released
its eighth album "Hesitation Marks" and hit the road for the
first time since 2009.
13
Death at
Electric Zoo
New
York's Electric Zoo wasn't the first EDM festival to be plagued by the loss of
life due to drug overdoses. But after two
attendees passed away during the first two days of the annual event this
past September, promoters cancelled the third day. It sent a clear message that
death wasn't an acceptable part of dance music culture, prompting larger
discussions about rave safety and the dangers of "Molly."
12
Jay Z's
New Rules
Before
Beyoncé stunned the world with the promotion-free release of her self-titled
album, her husband Jay Z installed
some "new rules" of his own. Less than a month after surprisingly
announcing its debut date through a three-minute Samsung ad, Jay Z (yeah, no
more hyphen) collaborated with Samsung to release his album, "Magna Carta
Holy Grail," for free to the first one million Samsung Galaxy users on
July 4. Even after its unique promotion, Jay earned his 13th No. 1 album when
"Magna Carta" debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, selling 580,000
in its first week according to Nielsen SoundScan. Jay broke countless chart
records with his unconditional marketing and continued to tour on one of this
year's most successful stadium tours, Legends of the Summer, alongside Justin
Timberlake.
11
Swedish
House Mafia Bids Fans Farewell
They
came, they raved, they left. EDM supergroup Swedish House Mafia closed the book
on the relatively
brief phenomenon of its career in March. The trio (Axwell, Steve Angello,
and Sebastian Ingrosso) disbanded after their whirlwind, 52-date One Last Tour,
including sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden and five at San Francisco's
Bill Graham Civic and with one final and very
emotional last hurrah at Ultra Music Festival in Miami.
10
The
Night We (Thought We) Lost Lil Wayne
In
March, TMZ reported sobering news for rap fans: Lil Wayne was on his deathbed after
suffering
a seizure. But not hours later, Weezy himself quashed fears, tweeting
"I'm good everybody." Though reports swirled that his hospitalization
was due to a codeine overdose, Wayne later asserted it was due
to stress and his past medical history. True enough, the scare offered a
deeper glimpse into the life of the popular rapper, especially after coming out
later that month as an epileptic in a radio interview and revealing that,
though he'd had plenty of seizures, this time he'd experienced three in a row
and came close to death.
9
Robin
Thicke Winks His Way to the Summer's Top Song
In 2013,
Robin Thicke knew exactly what you wanted. After carving out a modestly
successful career, the singer teamed up with Pharrell and T.I. for
"Blurred Lines," the inescapable
hit of the summer that spent 12 weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100, effectively
ruining the chances of songs like Daft Punk's "Get Lucky" to get its
share of the glory. But "Blurred
Lines" transcended mere radio airplay; during Miley Cyrus' MTV Video Music
Awards performance last August, Cyrus came
out during "Blurred Lines" to twerk up against Thicke, causing a
ruckus that eventually became the most-tweeted-about event ever. Couple that
with accusations
of plagiarism from Marvin Gaye's family and controversy surrounding the
song's subject matter, "Blurred Lines" was more than a hit song -- it
was a phenomenon.
8
Daft
Punk's Random Acts Pay Off
It
started with two helmets: one gold, one silver, on a black, wordless poster. It
became a media event -- from a TV ad during "Saturday Night Live" to
a fan-map of billboard sightings on Reddit -- ushering
the return of the pioneering French duo known as Daft Punk and its new
album, "Random Access Memories." Made with real instruments and
featuring Pharrell Williams, Nile Rodgers and the legendary Giorgio Moroder,
the album spent its first two weeks atop the Billboard 200 and lead single
"Get Lucky" reached No. 2 on the Hot 100. And they look set to have a
big 2014 as well: In January, Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo and Thomas Bangalter
will perform at the Grammys and compete for five awards.
7
Rock and
Country Reel From Huge Losses
There's
really no way to measure just how important both Lou Reed and George Jones were
to their own corners of the music world. Reed was an occasionally polarizing
punk poet who preferred challenging his listeners ("Berlin") over
churning out hits ("Walk on the Wild Side"). "I'm not a human
jukebox," he once said. Jones could literally fill that jukebox with
his signature odes to heartache ("He Stopped Loving Her Today"),
booze ("White Lightning") and other country tropes -- often enduring
those same hardships in his real life. Jones
was 81 when he passed away on April 26, spoiling a final tour that would
have wrapped up in November. "I will surely miss my fans and the good
people I have met along this journey," he told Billboard. Reed
died on Oct. 27 of liver disease at 71, leaving behind a legacy of fierce
independence that spanned his years in Velvet Underground and a wide-ranging
solo career.
6
Macklemore
& Ryan Lewis, Lorde Lead Class Of New Superstars
One of
the pleasures of closely following mainstream music is to watch fresh-faced artists
shake up the scene in real time, and 2013 was stocked with new talent. Witness
Macklemore & Ryan Lewis, the first duo to ever take their first two singles
to the top of the Hot 100, who also happened to score
the biggest hit of 2013 ("Thrift Shop"), pen a moving gay-rights
anthem ("Same Love") and land multiple
Grammy nominations in the process. Speaking of Grammys, Lorde also has a
shot of winning multiple trophies, after the 17-year-old New Zealander released
an out-of-nowhere
smash hit on her first try ("Royals") and issued a dark,
gorgeously written debut album around it. While Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and
Lorde were two of the brightest new figures in pop, artists like Ariana Grande,
Imagine Dragons, Florida Georgia Line, Kacey Musgraves, Capital Cities, Icona
Pop and A Great Big World also shone in their own right.
5
Kanye
West Careens Through 2013
Highs
and lows were constants in Kanye's 2013. This time last year, he announced that
his then-girlfriend (now fiancé) Kim Kardashian was pregnant with their first
child. "Yeezus," his sixth solo album (arriving in June just days
after his daughter
North was born), reflected none of the joy a first time parent typically
boasts. Instead, it was the soundtrack of frustration, harsh and militant --
punk and aggro. The anti-establishment "Yeezus" sentiments were
echoed often in radio
interviews, where Kanye often said he felt marginalized by fashion houses
not willing to back his own line. But the tide has turned a bit since then.
He's currently on an ambitious tour and Adidas recently announced that West has
signed
with them (his line is expected to be out next fall). Kanye's also revealed
that he's working on a new, potentially more hit-filled album as well. Happier
days seem to be ahead for Mr. West.
4
Justin
Timberlake Suits Up for a Busy Comeback
On the
evening of Sunday, Jan. 13, just after pop culture fans had finished digesting
the Golden Globe Awards, another bombshell dropped -- Justin
Timberlake had returned to music, dropping his first new song since 2006.
Timberlake released "Suit & Tie," a debonair, horn-laced single
featuring Jay Z, and announced that his third album, "The 20/20
Experience," was due later in the year. "Suit & Tie" and
"Mirrors" both cracked the Hot 100's top 5, and "The 20/20
Experience" enjoyed a dominant debut, selling 968,000 copies in its first
week, according to Nielsen Soundscan. Timberlake followed with a second edition
of the "20/20 Experience" on Sept. 27, which helped him stay in the
headlines for the rest of the year. To get the word out, Timberlake and his
team succeeded in saturating the pop culture world with all things JT: a
week-long residency on "Late Night," an 'N Sync reunion at the VMAs,
more performances on the Grammys and American Music Awards, and a musical guest
spot on "SNL" to close out the year. Meanwhile, JT rocked shows big
and small, from the Legends of the Summer with Jay Z and the opening dates of
the 20/20 Experience World Tour, to buzzworthy gigs like SXSW and Super Bowl
weekend in New Orleans. In one of the most tireless years for a performer in
recent memory, Timberlake's twin albums went on to sell a combined 3,071,000
units, according to Nielsen Soundscan.
'Glee'
Fans Mourn for Monteith
Cory
Monteith had run for a long time, but in 2013, his demons finally caught up
with him. On July 13, the singer, actor and "Glee" star was found
dead in his Vancouver hotel room from a combination of alcohol and heroin.
The 31-year-old had documented a struggle with substance abuse since he was a
teenager, but had begun to seek treatment for addiction earlier this year.
Unfortunately, it was too much to overcome, leaving in his wake a stirring
tribute at the 2013 Teen Choice Awards by fellow "Glee" mainstay
-- and girlfriend -- Lea Michele, as well as a show episode honoring his
character of Finn Hudson this fall.
2
Boom
Goes Beyonce
Remember
back in February when Beyonce played the Super Bowl and many fans expected her
to drop a new single? Even though that didn't arrive until more than 10 months
later, it was still Beyonce's year. After causing a minor
lip-syncing scandal at President Obama's second inauguration, she delivered
the second
most-watched Super Bowl Halftime performance ever (104 million viewers),
debuted new music with Pepsi and H&M, stomped her way (in stilettos!)
through the Mrs.
Carter World Tour -- all before delivering the ultimate
mic drop just before midnight on Dec. 13. "We went through everything
to keep it sacred and a surprise," the singer also known as Sasha Fierce,
Mrs. Carter and now "Yonce" said at a screening for the
"Beyonce" visual album held in New York Dec. 21. "Because
there's joy in that and it's missing, and that's something I was able to
experience as a kid." Based on all the breathless,
Christmas-morning-like video reactions -- which were followed by stunning
chart and sales debuts -- Beyonce made us all feel like kids again, too.
1
Miley
Can't Stop: The Year's Most Talked-About Pop Star
Miley
Cyrus was a maelstrom that expanded and grazed nearly every aspect of pop
culture in 2013, from stop-in-your-tracks performances to salacious
music videos, from the tabloid sections to the "twerking"
enthusiasts. At the eye of that storm, however, were some of the biggest
and best singles of the year. A veteran recording artist at the ripe old
age of 21, Cyrus reinvented herself this year with the trap-happy party cut
"We Can't Stop," which rode a Mike WiLL Made-It beat to No. 2 on the
Hot 100 chart. Its follow-up, "Wrecking Ball," was even more
inescapable, smashing the listener with a chorus as powerful as its titular
object and giving Cyrus the first No. 1 single of the career (and about a
million viral parodies to coincide with that achievement). Sure, Cyrus courted
controversy throughout 2013, but her antics were bolstered by raw musical
talent; consider her American Music Awards performance, which paired
a context-free blinking cat with a moving performance of "Wrecking
Ball." Cyrus was savvy enough to rule the headlines and the charts
this year, making the "Bangerz" star the most enduring figure of
2013.
Digital Music
Sales Fell For The First Time In The Itunes Era
(By Marc Hogan,
Spin, January 3 2014)
The numbers are in, but they might be a little
disappointing. Yes, Justin
Timberlake's The 20/20 Experience (one of SPIN's 50 Best Albums of
2013) was last year's biggest selling album, as Billboard reports, using Nielsen SoundScan data. And sure, Robin
Thicke's "Blurred Lines" (one of SPIN's 50 Best Songs of
2013) was the single-song champion. But
those were the top sellers in a dwindling market. 20/20 was the only
album with sales of more than two million this year. Its 2.4 million units
shifted made it the lowest selling year-end leader of the SoundScan era, which
began in 1991. Perhaps more significantly, digital download sales decreased for
the first time. The possible
role of streaming in all this is an open debate.
Overall, domestic album sales last year
totaled 289.4 million, down 8 percent from almost 316 million in 2012. Sales of
physical CDs dropped 14 percent. Digital album sales slipped to 117.6 million,
a less than 1 percent decrease from their best-ever total of 117.7 million a
year earlier. But that's still their first drop since SoundScan started keeping
track in 2003. What's more, digital track sales were 1.3 billion units, down
5.7 percent, according to Billboard. Vinyl sales kept rising — to 6 million, up from
4.6 million a year ago. Timberlake's 20/20
displaces Lil Wayne's 2008 album, Tha
Carter III, the previous lowest selling year-end champ with sales of
almost 2.9 million. The two are the only full-year top-sellers since SoundScan
that failed to crack the three million mark. For comparison, the biggest
selling release of 2012 was Adele's 21,
which moved 4.4 million copies in that 12-month frame. The year before that,
the top-seller was ... also 21, which sold 5.8 million in 2011.
As for the rest of the top-selling albums:
Eminem's
The Marshall Mathers LP 2 is, as befits its title, No. 2 (1.73
million), marking his sixth time in the year-end top 10 — 2010's Recovery and
2002's The Eminem Show were their years' respective victors. Luke
Bryan's Crash My Party ends in third (1.52 million), the best
showing for a male country singer since the time of Billy Ray Cyrus and Garth
Brooks. Next up were Imagine Dragons' Night
Visions (No. 4, 1.4 million), Bruno
Mars' Unorthodox Jukebox (No. 5, 1.4 million), and Florida Georgia
Line's Here's to the Good Times (No. 6, 1.35 million), followed by Drake's
Nothing
Was the Same (No. 7, 1.34 million), Beyoncé's
Beyoncé (No. 8, 1.3 million), and Blake Shelton's Based on a True
Story (No. 9, 1.1 million). Jay
Z's Magna Carta…Holy Grail closes out the top 10 (1.1 million), the
first time a husband and wife have separately fared so well with SoundScan.
Among tracks, Thicke's Pharrell- and
T.I.-assisted "Blurred Lines" sold almost 6.5 million copies. No. 2
was Macklemore & Ryan Lewis' "Thrift Shop" (6.1 million),
followed by Imagine Dragons' "Radioactive" (5.5 million). In 2012,
Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know" led the way (6.8 million). Rounding out the top 10: Florida Georgia
Line's "Cruise" (No. 4, 4.7 million), Lorde's "Royals" (No.
5, 4.4 million), Katy Perry's "Roar" (No. 6, 4.4 million), Pink's
"Just Give Me a Reason" (No. 7, 4.3 million), Macklemore & Ryan
Lewis' "Can't Hold Us" (No. 8, 4.3 million), Bruno Mars' "When I
Was Your Man" (No. 9, 3.9 million), and Rihanna's "Stay" (No.
10, 3.85 million). Incidentally, none of these can touch the Black Eyed Peas'
"I Gotta Feeling," the best-selling digital track ever with 8.4
million.
The Year In Pop 2013: Miley Cyrus, Rihanna, Anna
Kendrick Score Offbeat Hits
(By Jason Lipshutz, Billboard, December 13, 2013)
This year found the biggest artists in pop
music staying on top through risk-taking and innovation, with Miley Cyrus most
assuredly leading the charge. Lest we forget after months of twerking and
tongue-wagging that "We Can't Stop" -- a snapping, big-butt-praising
club track with a wonky tempo and a Mike WiLL Made-It beat -- was a daring
choice of a lead single, and a marked departure from the clean pop of Cyrus'
"Party in the U.S.A." days. "We
Can't Stop" was a hit, clocking in at No. 17 on Billboard's year-end Hot
100 chart and erasing the memories of Cyrus' lackluster "Can't Be
Tamed" era. Similarly, Justin Timberlake returned from a seven-year album
break not with more electronically charged bangers from his "FutureSex/LoveSounds"
days, but instead with slick love songs delivered with blue-eyed sincerity; the
approach paid off, as "Mirrors" became a Top 40 staple and finished
at No. 6 on the year-end Hot 100.
Meanwhile, Rihanna's biggest hit of 2013
wasn't a breathless dance song like "We Found Love," but a somber
ballad that showcased her vocal power: "Stay," featuring Mikky Ekko,
was an incisive change-up, and a Top 5 hit with legs. And while Taylor Swift
turned ever-so-slightly to the dubstep world for the enduring "Red"
single "I Knew You Were Trouble," EDM maestro Avicii nodded to the
country world with "Wake Me Up!," his Aloe Blacc-assisted single that
proved to be the biggest of his career thus far. In 2013, superstars changed
lanes without losing an ounce of their mojo.
As for the breakout artists of 2013, how
exactly does one predict that a wacky thrift-shopping ode with the phrase
"Damn, that's a cold-ass honky" included would become the No. 1 Hot
100 song of the year? Love it or hate it, Macklemore & Ryan Lewis'
"Thrift Shop" was undeniably singular, but the duo was hardly the
only outlandish new act scoring No. 1 singles on the Hot 100 chart this year.
The sparseness at the heart of Lorde's debut single, "Royals," made
the song sound unlike anything else on radio -- one of the reasons why the
anti-luxury anthem dominated so many formats, from Alternative to Top 40.
Baauer unwittingly rode the viral phenomenon of "Harlem Shake" to a
multi-week stay atop the Hot 100, despite the kinetic dance song's utter lack
of anything resembling a hummable hook. Imagine Dragons'
"Radioactive" possessed a refrain, but the chorus was coiled tightly
around stuttering techno, soulful backing vocals and twinkling piano… making
the song the biggest rock hit of the year.
Of course, there were some trends snaking
around the oddball jams. 2013 was a huge year for sumptuous R&B, from Robin
Thicke's inescapable summer single "Blurred Lines" to Timberlake's
"Suit & Tie" to Daft Punk's pristine comeback single "Get
Lucky." Also, songs like Zedd's "Clarity," Swedish House Mafia's
"Don't You Worry Child" and Calvin Harris' "Sweet Nothing"
demonstrated that the EDM explosion of the past half-decade is still causing
serious ripples. If one were to squint, more dots can be connected between
wrecking balls and holy grails, between diamonds and mirrors, between most of
the biggest songs of 2013. But then again, how exactly does one try to lasso
Anna Kendrick's "Cups (Pitch Perfect's When I'm Gone)" into a tidy
category? Once a 76-second song in a throwaway scene in "Pitch
Perfect," a film that did not top the box office upon its September 2012
release, Kendrick's elongated version of the song climbed into the Top 10 of
the Hot 100 in its 28th week, and (rather amazingly) ranks at No. 21 on the
year-end Hot 100 chart. If the rise of "Cups" demonstrates anything,
it's that this enjoyably bizarre year in pop music was defined by the
undefinable.
Justin Timberlake's '20/20' 2013's Best Selling
Album, 'Blurred Lines' Top Song
(By Keith Caulfield, Billboard, 02 January 02, 2014)
Justin Timberlake's "The 20/20
Experience" and Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" finish 2013 as
the year's top selling album and song in the United States, respectively,
according to Nielsen SoundScan. Timberlake's
"20/20," which was released on March 19, sold 2.43 million in 2013
and is the only album that sold more than 2 million copies this past year. The 2013 sales tracking year began on Dec. 31,
2012 ended on Dec. 29, 2013.
"20/20" is also the
smallest-selling year-end No. 1 album since SoundScan began tracking music
sales in 1991. Previously, the SoundScan-era low was set in 2008, when Lil
Wayne's "Tha Carter III" was the top seller, with 2.87 million.
("20/20" and "Tha Carter III" are the only year-end SoundScan
No. 1 albums to finish a year with less than 3 million.) A year ago, the top selling album of 2012 was
Adele's "21," with 4.41 million sold in 2012. "21" also
reigned in 2011 as the top selling release, with 5.82 million that year. 2013's second-biggest selling album is Eminem's
"The Marshall Mathers LP 2," with 1.73 million. It's the sixth time
Eminem has placed an album among a year's top 10 sellers. In 2010, he owned the
No. 1 album of the year with "Recovery" (3.41 million), while he was
also the champ of 2002 with "The Eminem Show" (7.61 million). He also
finished among the top 10 in 2009 (No. 9 with "Relapse"), 2004 (No. 3
with "Encore") and 2000 (No. 2 with "The Marshall Mathers
LP").
Luke Bryan's "Crash My Party" is
2013's third-biggest album, with 1.52 million sold. It's the highest-ranked
year-end album by a male country artist since 1992, when Billy Ray Cyrus'
"Some Gave All" and Garth Brooks' "Ropin' the Wind"
finished as that year's Nos. 1 and 2 albums (4.83 million and 4.10 million,
respectively).
"Crash My Party" was one of two
No. 1 albums for Bryan in 2013 on the weekly Billboard 200 chart. It followed
his compilation "Spring Break… Here to Party," which also debuted at
No. 1 in March. It finishes 2013 as the No. 39 overall seller, with 543,000. Imagine Dragons' "Night Visions" is
2013's fourth-biggest album, with 1.4 million sold in the year. The set was
released in 2012, and sold 417,000 that year (making it the No. 61 album of
2012). "Night Visions" is also
the top selling rock album of 2013, while Timberlake's set is the best selling
R&B/hip-hop set. "The Marshall Mathers LP 2" is naturally the
biggest rap album of 2013, while Bryan's "Crash" is the year's best
selling country release. "Night
Visions" is also the highest-ranked album on the year-end best sellers
list that did not hit No. 1 on the weekly Billboard 200 chart. It debuted and
peaked at No. 2.
Bruno Mars' "Unorthodox Jukebox"
is No. 5 on the year-end list, with just under 1.40 million, while Florida
Georgia Line's "Here's to the Good Times" is No. 6 with 1.35 million.
Both albums were released in 2012. Mars' set sold 480,000 in 2012 (making it
the No. 47 album of that year) while "Here's to the Good Times" sold
181,000 in 2012. Drake's "Nothing
Was the Same" is the No. 7 album of 2013, with 1.34 million, while
Beyonce's self-titled album is ranked at No. 8 with 1.3 million.
"Beyonce" is also the youngest title among the top 10 albums of 2013,
having only been released on Dec. 14. "Beyonce"
is also 2013's best-selling album by a woman. The next-highest ranked leading
lady is Katy Perry, with "PRISM," at No. 14 for the year (969,000). Blake Shelton's "Based On a True
Story" is the No. 9 seller of 2013 (1.11 million), while Beyonce's husband
-- Jay Z -- is No. 10 with "Magna Carta…Holy Grail" (1.1 million).
This is the first time in the SoundScan era that a husband and wife have both
separately placed albums among the top 10 sellers in a calendar year.
During the 52 weeks that ended Dec. 29,
overall album sales in the U.S. fell by 8% to 289.41 million from 315.96
million in 2012. Physical CD sales were
down 14% in 2012 while digital album downloads were also down -- for the first
time -- by less than 1% to 117.58 million. (2012 marked the best year for album
downloads, with 117.68 million.) SoundScan
began tracking digital sales in 2003. 41%
of all albums sold in 2013 were downloads -- up from 37% in 2012 (and 31% in
2011). The top selling digital album of 2013 was "The 20/20
Experience," with 1.03 million. It is the only album sell a million downloads
in 2013. For the sixth straight year,
more vinyl albums were sold than in any other year since SoundScan launched in
1991. In 2013, 6.1 million vinyl LPs were sold -- up 33% compared to 2012's
haul of 4.55 million. 64% of all vinyl albums sold in 2012 were purchased at an
independent music store (3% less than compared to indie stores' share in 2012).
Notably -- and not surprisingly -- 75% of all vinyl albums sold in 2013 were
rock albums. The top selling vinyl album
of 2013 was Daft Punk's "Random Access Memories," having sold 49,000
last year. Vampire Weekend's "Modern Vampires of the City" was in
second place with 34,000. (A year ago, the top selling vinyl album was Jack
White's "Blunderbuss" with 34,000 LPs sold.)
As for digital songs, 2013 was the first
year that download sales declined. 1.26 billion songs were sold last year --
down 6% compared to the record of 1.34 billion sold in 2012. SoundScan began
tracking song download sales in the summer of 2003, shortly after Apple's
iTunes Music Store launched in April of that year. Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines,"
featuring Pharrell and T.I., was 2013's top selling song, with 6.5 million
sold. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis'
"Thrift Shop," featuring Wanz, was the year's second-biggest song,
with 6.15 million. They were the only
two songs to sell more than 6 million in 2013, and are among the only 26 cuts
to have moved more than 6 million in history. (The biggest selling digital song
ever remains the Black Eyed Peas' "I Gotta Feeling," with 8.44 million.)
Imagine Dragons' "Radioactive"
was the year's third biggest song (5.5 million), followed by Florida Georgia
Line's "Cruise" (4.69 million) and Lorde's "Royals" (4.42
million). Katy Perry's "Roar"
is No. 6 with 4.41 million, while P!nk's "Just Give Me a Reason,"
featuring Nate Ruess, is No. 7 with 4.32 million. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis' "Can't Hold
Us" finishes the year at No. 8 with 4.26 million, while Bruno Mars'
"When I Was Your Man" is No. 9 with 3.93 million. Rihanna's
"Stay," featuring Mikky Ekko, closes out the top 10 with 3.85
million. A total of 106 songs sold more
than 1 million downloads in 2013 -- down from the 108 that did it in 2012 (and
112 in 2011). 38 moved 2 million in 2013 (vs. 41 in 2012 and 38 in 2011).
The Year In Touring 2013:
Beyond The Numbers
(By Ray Waddell, Billboard, December 13, 2013)
For the touring
industry, these are now —officially— the best of times. "The concert
business is basically on fire," says veteran agent Dennis Arfa, president
of Artists Group International (AGI). Anecdotal
information from virtually every stakeholder in the live music
business—including buyers, sellers, venues, vendors, ticketers and other
ancillary providers—confirms the touring industry has been having a banner year
since last spring. Now Billboard's own
metric, the Boxscore chart, validates these boom times from a numbers
standpoint, with the most positive and promising trends of this century. The dark days for the industry that marked the close of
this millennium's first decade are not only firmly in the rear view, but now
appear to be an anomaly, as 2013 Boxscore reports soared to a record level of
$4.8 billion in gross ticket sales worldwide. That's up nearly 30% from last
year and up 9% over the biggest Boxscore year ever—2009—the year before the
touring bubble burst after a decade of growth.
In 2009,
warning signs were plentiful as grosses outpaced attendance and a handful of
mega-tours belied an industry with a distorted value proposition and
disenfranchised fans. But, four years later,
all signs point toward continued growth as the industry remains focused on
providing value and customer service, international markets continue to open,
new artists are developing solid foundations and selling tickets across several
genres, and new-media marketing tools come to bear in quantifiable ways. Unlike Nielsen SoundScan figures, Boxscore
numbers depend on the consistency and accuracy of reports from promoters,
venues, agents and managers, and represent just a fraction of the overall value
of the live business. Therefore, if Boxscore only shows us a slice of what's
actually going on out there, the metric is still a useful barometer for gauging
the overall health of the industry. If nothing else, Boxscore brings numeric
context to what those in the trenches have been telling us all year—and those
two metrics don't always run in parallel.
But this year,
numerous indicators, including the Boxscore chart, point to a robust business
that is still very much in growth mode. In fact, with all the non-reporting
tours, concerts, events, soft-ticket shows, casinos, private concerts and
international plays, the touring industry is surely at its highest level ever,
with fans worldwide ponying up a conservative Billboard estimate of more than
$15 billion annually for the in-the-moment experience that only live
performance can offer. It is a rare
situation for the news to be so positive in every aspect, with double-digit
increases in many different metrics. Worldwide, concert attendance is up 26%,
according to Boxscore, with the number of shows increasing by only 5.8%. Also
from a global perspective, per-show gross is up 20% and per-show attendance is
up 18.5%.
North America
has had a remarkable resurgence for a business that not so long ago seemed to
have lost its place in the public consciousness. The total gross is up 26% and
total attendance up 23%, with the total number of shows up less than 5%. By
contrast, in 2012, North American Boxscore grosses were up a modest 1.7% and
attendance was down 6%. The North
American numbers hold up on a per-show basis, with the average gross in North
America up 17.4% and average attendance up 17.8%, the first time the latter has
outpaced the former perhaps ever in the modern era, and a reflection of more
conservative pricing overall. More important,
the pricing doesn't skew downward due to deep discounting or fire sales, as the
industry at large has moved away from price slashing and focused more on
"right pricing" out of the gate.
What's true in
North America for the overall business is also true for Live Nation, the
world's largest promoter. In North America, Live Nation concert ticket sales
are up 15% year-on-year to more than 20 million, with prices remaining
relatively flat for the past several years, according to Live Nation North
American Concerts co-president Bob Roux.
"We're obviously ecstatic about the results this year," Roux
says. He adds that Live Nation amphitheaters enjoyed their best year ever,
which flies in the face of any concerns that the burgeoning festival business
might be negatively affecting sheds during the summer months. And the North American numbers aren't skewed
by a red-hot Canadian market, as has been the case in the past. In that most
mature concert marketplace of all, the United States, gross ticket sales are up
30% and attendance is up 27%, with the number of shows increasing just 6.6%.
These are just
numbers to crunch. But no one would argue that 2013 hasn't been a fortuitous
year, and by far the most robust one for the live industry since the Great
Slump of 2010, a year marked by cancellations, postponements, sudden
"illnesses" and widespread industry finger-pointing. In the end, the
tailspin of 2010 led to a large-scale cessation in Boxscore reporting that
still hasn't resumed previous levels. For
example, midway through 2010, as the downturn started hammering summer tours,
Live Nation, the world's largest promoter, stopped reporting all shows as a
matter of course, although it still does frequently report certain top-end
tours upon request and all shows from its Global Touring division. Live Nation
claims to present some 20,000 shows annually, and this year only reported 2,623
to Boxscore. But, in perhaps yet another positive indicator of the business'
health, Live Nation reported 54% more shows this year than last.
WHAT'S DRIVING
THE NUMBER?
Touring is, as
ever, a cyclical business, and mega-tours by U2, the Rolling Stones or Madonna
tend to skew the numbers upward due to higher ticket prices, larger venues and
global footprints. But this year's strong numbers came in a year short on such
mega-tours, with even the Stones playing a comparatively paltry 23 shows. This
year's top 25 tours, while populated with acknowledged superstars, featured
artists with more conservative ticket prices. This was a "meat and
potatoes" kind of touring year, yet one where fans turned out to see a
wide range of acts, in varied stages of their career arc, from diverse genres,
all of which bodes well for the overall popularity of live music. "I've never seen so many superstars in
so many genres," AGI's Arfa says, pointing out that the fragmentation once
considered a bane of the industry is now a bonus as multiple genres are fielding
solid acts capable of selling lots of tickets. "There's something for
everybody. There's a lot of population out there, and most people are bored to
death. So going to a show is a big event for most people," Arfa says.
"And you don't need the same audience for every show. If a fan goes to a
few shows a year, that's all we need, whereas we used to need them to go to 10
or 12. My generation, we had to get everybody to go."
Getting people
to go depends on the industry presenting acts that fans want to see at prices
they're willing to pay. But first the fans have to know about the show. One
primary reason why more tickets are selling today is because of the extremely
targeted and efficient marketing opportunities afforded by new media and
strategic use of mobile, social, email, channel marketing and digital sales
channels. Many in the business would agree that this is the year the industry
at large significantly moved the needle in using data analytics to sell more
tickets and tackle one of touring's great obstacles: lack of awareness.
As far as
fielding compelling tours and pricing them correctly, 2013 was a year where the
stake-holders got it right. "I hate
comparing years, but as an overall theme [2013] was one of the most
intelligently booked, promoted and embraced concert years in my recent
memory," Creative Artists Agency managing partner/head of music Rob Light
says. "The packaging was smart, the scaling was smart, ticket pricing was
smart, the way shows were put on sale was smart, across everybody. People
really went at it with a very intelligent, fan-friendly point of view for the
most part."
THE PROMOTERS
With a $3
billion annual talent budget, the touring business depends on a healthy Live
Nation, the industry's only public company, which posted record earnings in
2013. Among the tours and concerts that
Live Nation promoted in 2013 were Justin Timberlake/Jay Z, P!nk, Beyoncé,
Rihanna, One Direction, Luke Bryan, Jason Aldean, Tim McGraw, Swedish House
Mafia, Bruno Mars, Maroon 5, Roger Waters, Kid Rock, Mumford & Sons,
Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles and Imagine Dragons.
Live Nation also increased its presence in the EDM festival space, with
record attendance at Electric Daisy Carnival, HARD, Paridiso and Digital
Dreams, "and we also had record attendance in our festival, amphitheater,
arena, and clubs and theater divisions," Live Nation Entertainment CEO
Michael Rapino says. "On a global
basis, live music is exploding," Rapino said at the sold-out Billboard
Touring Conference (yet another positive indicator). "Artists are pricing
better, there is great fan demand, [and] it's the best place to spend two hours
for the price. We're seeing a great supply of artists filling the venues, [and]
when you add globalization to that, we think that the live business is booming
and has a long growth period ahead of it."
AEG Live, the
second-largest promoter, put up record numbers in 2013, as predicted by former
CEO Randy Phillips a year ago. With tours by such acts as Bon Jovi, the Rolling
Stones, Taylor Swift, Kenny Chesney and George Strait (the latter three with
the Messina Group), along with a busy global network of regional offices, AEG
Live reported grosses of more than $1 billion for the first time in its
history, up a staggering 97% from 2012. AEG Live’s Goldenvoice division also
produced the Coachella and Stagecoach festivals in Indio, Calif., with the
former producing the highest boxscore in history at $67.2 million.
The boom times
extend to independent pro- moters like Phoenix-based Danny Zelisko, who says
his Danny Zelisko Presents promoted more than 150 shows this year primarily in
Phoenix, Las Vegas and Albuquerque, N.M.
"The top acts that toured in 2013 did better than ever before. The
public's thirst for their favorite stars seems to be unquenchable,"
Zelisko says. “Very few empty seats is music to my ears." Austin-based C3 Presents' reported boxscores
increased by more than 57% in 2013, with involvement in more than 800 shows
that generated $124.3 million in box office. C3 remains a force in the booming
festival business, with Lollapalooza in Chicago selling out in advance and the
Austin City Limits Music Festival success- fully expanding to two weekends.
"The festival business was stronger than ever this year," C3 partner
Charlie Walker says, "and in talking to our peers, it seemed like that was
true for most of the promoters."
That seems to
be true in San Francisco, where Another Planet Entertainment enjoyed "our
best year ever," according to Gregg Perloff, president of APE, co-producer
of the Outside Lands festival with Superfly Presents. "We took on a new
festival, Life Is Beautiful in Las Vegas. The Fox Theatre in Oakland [Calif.]
continues to be the hottest venue I've ever been involved in. We were up in
Tahoe, we were up at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley—sales were very strong. It
was a spectacular year. I've got no complaints."
APE, which
Perloff says presented about 700 shows in 2013, thrives on diversity,
presenting acts ranging from Placido Domingo to a five-night run by Swedish
House Mafia that sold 42,000 tickets at the 8,500-capacity Bill Graham Civic
Center in San Francisco. "I'm in the middle of a market that's on fire
with the tech industries. We have a very young and active audience that has
disposable income," he says. "I wish I could tell you it's all of us,
but we're very fortunate we do business here."
BOOM TIMES
CONTINUE
One would be
hard-pressed to find a year where so much optimism prevails for the coming
year. "Next year will continue the same run," Light says. "The
packages will continue to be really smart, the whole marketing of tours is
smart — although it's happening much further in advance. When I look at
everything we've got on the road, international is going to be bigger than
ever. The major tours are going to be enormous. I feel really good about next
year. I don't think this was a blip. I believe we —the business— really got it
right this year on so many levels, and we're going to continue. I'm very, very
bullish."
If there's a potential speed bump, it's a familiar one. "The only pitfall I see is when, as an industry, we get greedy, start to push the ticket pricing, stop packaging, oversaturate markets, push artists too fast in their growth process," Light says. "But as an industry, we're just much more aware of how we put tickets out there. Generationally, where we are now, I don't see people making the mistakes of the past." Perloff does see one area where the business is potentially breaking bad. "Some producers are putting shows on sale way too early," he ays. "It's good to get up and on sale, but when you're 180 days away from a date, they're hurting acts and the business. There's an appropriate length of time when you should go on sale. When the greed factor takes over and you just want to bank money, that's a mistake. This is people's hard-earned money- why should you be holding their money for 180 days on just a regular show?"
Not only do
some shows that go up months in advance lose their sense of urgency, Perloff
believes that when fans buy way out, they might not be able to afford a ticket
to a show that's happen- ing sooner. "As an industry, if you really want
to do the right thing for an artist, you've got to be careful about when you
put a show on sale," he says. But,
in general, Light feels the industry will continue to "grow upon what
we're learning," he says. "If there's one thing that will be
interesting over the next year or two years, it is how labels approach the
whole process of putting out records, because I'm just not sure that a 12-song
CD is critical anymore to the process. That will be the most interesting thing
for me to watch: how artists release music as it relates to their touring, and
how we both use it to promote tours and how we use tours to promote album
releases." Today, touring is "the
gold mine of the music business. That is what this is," Arfa says.
"It's a great time to be a successful live act."
The Top 25 Tours Of 2013 Compiled From Billboard Boxscores
(Reported from Nov. 14, 2012, to Nov. 12, 2013)
Total Gross: $205,158,370
Total Attendance: 2,178,170
Total Capacity: 2,178,170
No. of Shows: 90
No. of Sellouts: 90
2 : Michael Jackson The Immortal World Tour, By Cirque
Du Soleil
Total Gross: $157,299,100
Total Attendance: 1,425,442
Total Capacity: 1,853,022
No. of Shows: 205
No. of Sellouts: 0
3 : P!nk
Total Gross: $147,947,543
Total Attendance: 1,581,939
Total Capacity: 1,583,801
No. of Shows: 114
No. of Sellouts: 111
4 : Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band
Total Gross: $147,608,938
Total Attendance: 1,389,778
Total Capacity: 1,454,499
No. of Shows: 53
No. of Sellouts: 36
Total Attendance: 1,389,778
Total Capacity: 1,454,499
No. of Shows: 53
No. of Sellouts: 36
5 : Rihanna
Total Gross: $137,982,530
Total Attendance: 1,595,161
Total Capacity: 1,600,851
No. of Shows: 87
No. of Sellouts: 84
6 : The Rolling Stones
Total Gross: $126,182,391
Total Attendance: 326,998
Total Capacity: 326,998
No. of Shows: 23
No. of Sellouts: 23
7 : Taylor Swift
Total Gross: $115,379,331
Total Attendance: 1,363,510
Total Capacity: 1,363,510
No. of Shows: 66
No. of Sellouts: 66
8 : Beyoncé
Total Gross: $104,358,899
Total Attendance: 883,062
Total Capacity: 934,021
No. of Shows: 59
No. of Sellouts: 40
9 : Depeche Mode
Total Gross: $99,972,733
Total Attendance: 1,390,141
Total Capacity: 1,400,298
No. of Shows: 54
No. of Sellouts: 51
10 : Kenny Chesney
Total Gross: $90,932,957
Total Attendance: 1,186,925
Total Capacity: 1,214,694
No. of Shows: 44
No. of Sellouts: 31
11 : Rogers Waters
Total Gross: $81,305,650
Total Attendance: 830,123
Total Capacity: 915,081
No. of Shows: 27
No. of Sellouts: 0
Total Attendance: 830,123
Total Capacity: 915,081
No. of Shows: 27
No. of Sellouts: 0
12 : One Direction
Total Gross: $78,311,383
Total Attendance: 1,223,144
Total Capacity: 1,236,308
No. of Shows: 81
No. of Sellouts: 43
13: Justin Bieber
Total Gross: $77,423,264
Total Attendance: 959,886
Total Capacity: 982,523
No. of Shows: 65
No. of Sellouts: 55
14 : Madonna
Total Gross: $76,752,277
Total Attendance: 577,169
Total Capacity: 577,169
No. of Shows: 16
No. of Sellouts: 16
15 : Jay Z & Justin Timberlake
Total Gross: $69,753,905
Total Attendance: 622,559
Total Capacity: 622,559
No. of Shows: 14
No. of Sellouts: 14
16 : Paul McCartney
Total Gross: $69,584,403
Total Attendance: 565,705
Total Capacity: 566,696
No. of Shows: 21
No. of Sellouts: 15
17 : Fleetwood Mac
Total Gross: $61,899,473
Total Attendance: 554,548
Total Capacity: 579,480
No. of Shows: 45
No. of Sellouts: 13
18 : Maroon 5
Total Gross: $54,354,974
Total Attendance: 930,953
Total Capacity: 933,867
No. of Shows: 60
No. of Sellouts: 57
19 : Dave Matthews Band
Total Gross: $52,960,667
Total Attendance: 882,287
Total Capacity: 1,152,025
No. of Shows: 61
No. of Sellouts: 17
20 : André Rieu
Total Gross: $49,983,266
Total Attendance: 484,599
Total Capacity: 558,467
No. of Shows: 70
No. of Sellouts: 5
21 : Jason Aldean
Total Gross: $47,814,095
Total Attendance: 1,004,303
Total Capacity: 1,043,158
No. of Shows: 62
No. of Sellouts: 42
22 : Lady Gaga
Total Gross: $46,957,070
Total Attendance: 544,333
Total Capacity: 550,122
No. of Shows: 23
No. of Sellouts: 22
23 : Bruno Mars
Total Gross: $46,417,795
Total Attendance: 666,926
Total Capacity: 668,110
No. of Shows: 48
No. of Sellouts: 44
24 : Luke Bryan
Total Gross: $45,558,589
Total Attendance: 1,143,727
Total Capacity: 1,153,536
No. of Shows: 75
No. of Sellouts: 65
25 : Iron Maiden
Total Gross: $44,980,749
Total Attendance: 684,200
Total Capacity: 764,186
No. of Shows: 34
No. of Sellouts: 13
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