BBC Radio 1’s Head of Music George Ergatoudis – the man responsible for the station’s vomit inducing playlists – has taken it upon himself to sound the death knell for traditional albums.
Speaking to BBC Newsbeat, Ergatoudis has expanded on Twitter comments made earlier this week in which he claimed, ‘With very few exceptions, albums are edging closer to extinction’, by declaring that, ‘In the future most people are going to be effectively renting their music from a music streaming service’.
“I’m not saying that artists are going to stop making albums, I’m not saying that albums aren’t artistically relevant and there will still be some amazing artists recording amazing albums,” he said.
“We’re moving from this world of old music purchasing leading to people buying albums and singles, to a world where predominantly in the future most people are going to be effectively renting their music from a music streaming service.”
Fortunately, in the face of this kind of mainstream door-slamming, new, passionate initiatives such as Record Store Day have helped to significantly boost interest in traditional music formats; 2014 proved to be the best year yet for the campaign with sales rising 30% year-on-year.
