Weekly Register: Country Album Sales Down -19.5% YTD

With about four months left in 2014, let’s examine the Country sales slide.
The Top 75 Current Country albums sold 177K this week. The week of Sept. 29, 2013, that total was 269K. That’s a loss of 92K albums week over week.
Total sales on the Top 100 Country tracks chart this week amounted to 1.107 million. That’s about on par with the week of Sept. 29, 2013, when it totaled 1.101 million.
Year-to-date overall, all-genre album sales are down -14.7 percent, having sold 162.794 million units in 2014, compared to 190.915 million last year. YTD Country album sales are slumping significantly at -19.5 percent, having moved 20.220 million units this year and 25.130 million at the same point last year.
Overall track sales are suffering at -12.8 percent down (793.8 million TY/ 910.3 million LY). Country tracks are short -18.3 percent (100.6 million TY/ 123.171 million LY)
Marketshare: YTD Country tracks account for 12.7 percent of all tracks sold, down slightly from last year’s 13.5 percent. YTD Country album marketshare is about the same, at 12.4 percent this year, down from 13.2 percent last year.
This Week’s Charts
Meghan Trainor’s “All About That Bass” bumped its way back to No. 1 overall track, selling 312K this week and 1.687 million RTD. The vibrations sent Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off” to No. 2 with sales of 281K TW and 1.180 million RTD.
On the Country tracks chart, Jason Aldean holds the No. 1 and 2 positions. “Burnin’ It Down” sold 79K TW and 737K RTD, while “Sweet Little Somethin’” sold 58K TW to enter at No. 2 Country and No. 15 overall.
Noteworthy debuts include Maroon 5’s V selling 164K to bow at No. 1 overall. Indie traditionalist Frank Foster garnered the top Country album debut with his digital-only release selling 9.1K.
Top 5 Country Tracks this week
1 Jason Aldean “Burnin It Down” 79K
2 Jason Aldean “Sweet Little Somethin’” 58K
3 FGL “Dirt” 52K
4 Kenny Chesney “American Kids” 47K
5 Sam Hunt “Leave The Night On” 40K
Top 5 Country Albums TW
1 Miranda Lambert Platinum 17K (up 464% digital due to an iTunes sale)
2 Brad Paisley Moonshine In The Trunk 16K
3 Luke Bryan Crash My Party 15K
4 Frank Foster Rhythm and Whiskey 9.1K
5 Chase Rice Ignite The Night 8.8K
New albums this month
Sept. 9 Lee Brice, Dustin Lynch
Sept. 16 Tim McGraw, George Strait
Sept. 23 Kenny Chesney
Sept. 30 Lady Antebellum, Blake Shelton
(According to Nielsen Soundscan)