Entertainment retailer HMV is expecting another year-on-year rise, this time to the tune of 31%, in UK vinyl sales by the end of this year.
Liam Gallagher‘s As You Were already has the biggest first week sales on vinyl in 20 years, and with Ed Sheeran still shifting puzzling amounts of his latest record Divide, and Noel Gallagher joining the party this week with his third solo album Who Built The Moon?, HMV is hoping for a grand total for 2017 of a size not seen since the late eighties.
“A strong year for new releases from artists such as Ed Sheeran and Rag’n’Bone Man has been followed up with a really strong back end, with the Gallagher brothers driving the LP sales into the final quarter,” HMV’s music manager John Hirst has said.
“Sales also continue to soar across our back catalogue, perhaps as people use streaming as a discovery tool alongside wanting to browse and collect physical music formats.”
The BPI has also made its own prediction, and is anticipating sales in excess of four million on the vinyl format.