Cassette revival: Billie Eilish and The 1975 help tape sales hit 15-year high in UK
Written by News on 31/07/2019
Get your pencils ready for a retro rewind, because the humble cassette is making a comeback.
Hot on the heels of the vinyl revival, sales of tapes are at their highest in 15 years, according to new figures revealed by the Official Charts Company.
While sales remain small in comparison to downloads, streams and CD sales, with cassettes making up just 0.2% of albums sold in the UK this year, the figures are still on the increase, and up 112% year-on-year so far.
In total, some 36,000 cassettes have been sold in the UK so far this year, according music industry trade body BPI and the Official Charts Company.
The 1975’s A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships is the biggest seller of the decade so far, earning 8,000 sales since its November 2018 release.
Californian teenager Billie Eilish – who was born in 2001, when tapes were all but defunct – takes the title for the highest-selling cassette of 2019 so far, chalking up 4,000 copies of her debut album When We Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? since its release in March.
The return of the cassette coincides with the 40th anniversary of the Sony Walkman this month.
Listeners’ desire for retro collectables appears to be behind the trend, with the top 20 best-selling cassette artists featuring those with a devoted fan base interested in tangible items.
Eilish’s album was released on cassette in limited-edition black, orange and ultraviolet green.
Other singers who have made the cassette chart this year are Catfish & The Bottlemen, with their third album The Balance in second place, and Madonna’s Madame X in third.
Kylie’s Step Back In Time: The Definitive Collection and Lewis Capaldi’s chart-topping debut Divinely Uninspired To A Hellish Extent are fourth and fifth respectively for 2019.
Following The 1975 among the decade’s highest sellers are Minogue’s 14th studio album Golden and the two 80s-inspired Guardians Of The Galaxy soundtracks, as well as Eilish.
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(c) Sky News 2019: Cassette revival: Billie Eilish and The 1975 help tape sales hit 15-year high in UK
