ARIA REVEALS FIRST HALF SALES

The team at the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) has revealed sales results for the first half of 2009 - and from all accounts, the signs are relatively encouraging. And while sales of the physical product continues to decline, the decline is more than compensated by the growth of the digital variant.

SINGLES : Sales of physical singles are in freefall - from sales of 647,088 units in the first half of 2008, to just 342,740 units from January to June this year. The dollar value of those physical singles dropped from 1.65 million dollars in 2008 to $924,000 in 2009.
Digitally, it's a completely different story. In the first half of 2008, music buyers snapped up a total of 12,144,498 digital tracks. In the first half of 2009, that figure grew to an impressive 16,740,521 tracks.
The dollar value of digital tracks grew from 13.25 million dollars to 18.05 million dollars.

ALBUMS : Albums-wise, we also see a slight decline in the sales of the physical product, though it's not nearly as pronounced as the sales of the physical single format. In the first half of 2008, 16,131,484 physical albums were sold (with a total value of 131.4 million dollars). In the corresponding six months this year, 15,179,688 physical albums passed across store counters, with a total dollar value of 125.5 million dollars.
The sale of the digital album, like the digital single format, has also grown. 593,726 digital albums were sold between January and June 2008, worth 5.92 million dollars. Between January and June this year, that figure grew to 974,167 digital albums - worth 9.28 million dollars.

ARIA reports that Aussie artists fared well in the sales figures, with the locals making up 13.81% of sales on the combined singles front for the first half of the year and an impressive 21.25% of sales on the albums front. Stronger sales figures are expected in the second half of 2009.

And it's the second half of the year which traditionally results in larger sales of both album and singles, with big name artists releasing in the months before Christmas. ARIA name checks the likes of Robbie Williams, Norah Jones, Rihanna, Bon Jovi, John Mayer, Ronan Keating, Leona Lewis, Snow Patrol and even The Pope among those who'll release between now and Christmas.