Research: Current Trends in Popular Music

In 2013 musicgenreslist.com took a poll from visitors to their site to find out which genres of music are the most popular.

From http://www.musicgenreslist.com/

Although this by no means represents all music consumers, it gives an idea of the sizes of the audiences that different genres have, with Rock, Pop, Alternative, Rap and Electronic being the most popular.

What is selling well

According to an article written at the beginning of 2014, the 5 genres of music which make the most money are:

1) Rock

2) Alternative

3) R&B

4) Country

5) Metal

Each of these genres has reportedly sold a minimum of over 30 million copies of albums produced by artists of this genre in the last year.

However, according to the current UK charts, the top selling genres of music are slightly different.

Current top 5 singles

From looking at the official UK charts (above), it seems that dance music and pop music are two of the most popular genres at the moment. This suggests that singles of these genres will be more likely to be successful at the moment as they have a large target audience. The top selling singles for all of 2014 (below) so far show a similar trend.

Top singles overall 2014

Male artists have a majority among the artists of the best selling singles so far this year, and a large majority among the top 5. This could mean that new male artists of these genres are more likely to be successful at the moment, but it also leaves gaps in the market for female artists.


Best selling albums 2014

There seems to be more of a range of genres with the best selling albums so far this year than with the best selling singles. Even though this means that these genres are also successful, it would probably be more useful to take inspiration from the singles charts when planning our music videos as they will be marketing singles.

Gaps in the market

Although the artists and genres shown above are currently the best-selling, their success leaves gaps in the market for other genres to flourish. This is because there may not be as much competition in other genres, and so there is room for new artists to become successful.

Rock and Pop music have historically dominated the charts in the UK, however as I did more research I discovered the popularity of other, less mainstream genres among different audiences, and how they reach their audiences.

For example, the internet has made less popular genres such as dance and dubstep able to reach more people, therefore expanding their audiences and causing these genres to be on the rise, rather than trying to break in to the charts the traditional way. (http://www.djtechtools.com/2012/04/19/the-next-big-thing-dance-music-genres-on-the-rise/)

The Guardian's top albums 2013 includes a wide range of genres, suggesting that there is space in the market for almost any genre if it is marketed correctly, or if the artist is good enough to catch people's attention. (http://www.albumoftheyear.org/list/260-the-guardians-40-best-albums-of-2013/)