The posthumous frenzied reaction to his final studio album Blackstar and clamour for the highest points of his back catalogue made David Bowie the UK’s most popular recording artist of 2016.
In excess of 1.6m Bowie albums were either purchased or streamed in the UK last year, more than any other act despite the huge album success of Adele and single success of Drake.
“There is always a huge amount of interest when a legendary artist dies so the upturn in sales will partly be down to that,” Boyd Hilton, entertainment editor of Heat, has said.
“Bowie suddenly got loads more airplay and the Blackstar album, videos and artwork were so extraordinary anyway that they captured the public’s imagination even more than a regular new Bowie album might.”
Blackstar was released on January 8th 2016, just two days before Bowie’s passing.