Streaming Has Transformed the Music Charts. NewsWire

NewsWire: 12/14/21

• Why are the Billboard charts in December full of old Christmas songs? Making the Top 100 used to be based on record sales; now it’s based on streaming figures. (The Economist)
• NH: In December, Christmas songs start taking over the Billboard Hot 100. But you’re unlikely to see any of today’s top artists on there. Instead, the charts are dominated by classic songs that are decades old. Among the songs in the top 10 today are “Jingle Bell Rock” (released in 1957), “A Holly Jolly Christmas” (1964), and “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree” (1958). The most recent holiday song is “All I Want for Christmas is You,” which came out in 1994.
• This didn’t used to be the case. As recently as 2016, the Christmas charts contained only newly released songs. Billboard used to measure songs’ popularity based mostly on record sales, as well as radio play. But its revamped formula now gives the greatest weight to streaming figures. “Jingle Bell Rock” isn’t selling many CDs, but it’s played constantly in December.
• The economics of streaming mean that what’s old is new again. Veteran artists can get more revenue from their classic hits, which has led investors to flock to their back catalogues. Last year, Bob Dylan sold his entire catalogue to Universal Music Group for a sum estimated at over $300M--the biggest acquisition of its kind ever. Stevie Nicks sold a majority stake in her catalog for an estimated $80 million. The fact that many Boomer-era rock stars still loom large in pop culture and have found fans among younger generations is also part of what's making these huge deals possible.
• The British investment firm Hipgnosis Songs Fund, which was founded in 2018, exists solely to buys back catalogues. To date, it has acquired the rights to more than 57,000 songs by artists as varied as Blondie, Jack Antonoff, Mark Ronson, and Barry Manilow. The Nashville-based record company Concord, meanwhile, shelled out $100M+ just for a portion of Imagine Dragons’ back catalogue.
• The frenzy has grown to the point where some music industry execs argue that big music companies will ultimately end up spinning off catalog rights into separately-held companies. In the streaming era, ownership of hit songs pretty much means guaranteed returns--while basically doing nothing--every year.