The market share of Rock singles on the charts has dipped to its lowest number in the last 50 years according to research done in the UK. Just this week we reported that album sales had dropped for a sixth straight year in the UK.
Music Week reports that only three of the top 100-selling UK singles of 2010 were from the rock genre, down from 13 in 2009. Hip-hop and R&B songs were the big winners – they accounted for 47 of the tracks, while 40 were classified as pop songs and the 10 remaining tracks as dance music. Look back just 2 years and you’ll find that 27 tracks in the top 100 charts were classified as rock. Only rock oldie ‘Don’t Stop Believing‘ (released in 1981) by US veterans Journey managed to place (#25) in the top quarter of last year’s list.
(Journey, ‘Don’t Stop Believing’)
The UK album charts showed a slightly brighter side towards rock with 27 songs represented in last year’s 100 top-sellers. Hardly a rock group, Mumford and Sons came out on top of all band’s classified as a rock act and placed “Sigh No More” at the number 10 spot in the list.