Of course Coldplay’s anti-streaming strategy worked. Duh.
I wrote about this recently when the world first learned that Coldplay won’t be giving their album to Spotify, Rdio, and other such streaming sites. It was a straight up money grab, and now the evidence is in. Mylo Xyloto has sold nearly half a million copies during it’s first week. That amount of money would have been cleaved considerably if Coldplay let their album stream from the start.
There’s now more data to support Coldplay’s anti-Spotify strategy. According to first-week, US-specific stats just published by Nielsen Soundscan, Coldplay shifted a cool 447,000 units of Mylo Xyloto during its first week. That’s easily enough for the number one, and easily complements a similarly-robust British figure.
Kelly Clarkson’s Stronger landed a distant second, with 163,000 units.
Actually, Coldplay scored a digital album sales record in the UK, where the band crossed the heretofore unsurpassed 80,000-mark. That was 40 percent of the British first-week tally, and we’ll be updating the US-based figure shortly to see how it compares.
The question now is: what next? Coldplay is monster band that just made a monster move, one that could stir imitators. The Coldplay strategy is widely regarded as a money play – that is, preserving whatever money is left for high-end superstars. And, simply stated, physical formats and digital channels like iTunes pay better. Much better.
But wait: there’s more. Because there are also some rumblings of reinvigorated windowing strategies from major labels, a shift that would put players like Spotify last in line. That is, when most of the juice has already been squeezed from CDs, LPs, and iTunes. (Via Digital Music News)
Music Consciousness
Voyno
2 Comments
I wouldn’t be surprised if they offer it to streaming later. It will either be a timed thing (six weeks from release, one year, etc) or it will be based on sales. Once they hit a million sales in the US or once sales per week get down to 50k or something like that.
I can’t imagine they’ll never offer their catalog to streamers. Maybe they’ll wait for a big payout from Spotify to include their catalog. That would be a smart use of their clout, especially if they wait until they’re no longer the current “it” band (think Rolling Stones, ACDC, etc).
Agreed Chris. They will definitely eventually go streaming.
-V