Sounds Enumerated

In 2014, not a single artist’s album has gone platinum. Not one has managed to cross that million sales mark.

One album has managed to sell over a million copies so far this year, but it’s a soundtrack. The ever-popular Frozen soundtrack may slowly be working its way down the charts, but it is by far the best selling collection this year. Though it doesn’t have any marquee names on it — those that are usually expected to sell the best — the soundtrack has managed to move 3.2 million copies so far, and with winter coming, that number is sure to rise.

The most popular album of 2014 that was actually released in 2014 is Eric Church’s Outsiders; its highest-charting single is the song embedded above, “Give Me Back My Hometown.” It did not reach number one overall. Have you heard it? Me neither — not that many people have, in absolute terms. It’s gotten lots of radio play, and its YouTube video has nearly ten million views. In contrast, the music video for MAGIC!’s “Rude” currently has 180,359,175 views on Vevo, and Nicki Minaj’s “Anaconda” has 254,265,074. Just look at this whole page, full of obvious superstars who are sort of floating in a inter-industry void, lifted by enormous raw numbers but not at all fixed in space or time, at least officially. The music industry as it has been conceptualized for half a century does not exist.