TMV were provided the following info Marrakesh Records and Human Capital will publish a survey of over 1,000 15-24 year olds exposing their listening habits and attitudes to music discovery courtesy of the IMMF. Summary highlights are as follows.
Music is hugely important to the age group. 60% of 16-24 year olds would rather go without sex than music for a week. This increases to 70% for 16-19 year olds. So does sex sell music? Perhaps not…
Music consumption remains ubiquitous within the age group. 75% have watched a music video online in the last 3 months, 70% bought a CD, 62% listened to music on their mobile phone, 52% bought a music download and 45% played a music game on a games console. So kids are still purchasing more CDs than digital downloads. Perhaps this outlines deeper issues such as the sound quality factor different between a MP3 and a CD?
MP3 players are the most widely used device for listening to music (81% of the age group have used one in the past week), followed by the computer (80%), radio (71%), TV (68%), CD player (59%) and mobile phone (54%). So although they purchase more CDs they listen to more music in a digital format legal or otherwise…
Radio is the most important medium for finding out about new bands/artists (67%). This is followed by friends’ recommendations (63%), and MTV and other music channels (49%). General interest, music magazines/newspapers and blogs achieve very low scores at 21%, 17% and 14% respectively. To TMV this was the most surprising. So does this mean that it is us older folk who are surfing the net using services like Last.fm, myspace, spotify and others to discovery new music?
You Tube has soared into pole position as the default website that this age group turn to for checking out new artists (38%). Myspace (and a band’s own website) come a distant joint second, each scoring 15%. Does this signify audio visual is now king over audio? Or perhaps is it more to do with the catalogue and also ability for UGC use…
70% of those who expressed a view do not feel guilty about downloading music for free from the internet. 61% of the age group do not feel they should have to pay for the music they listen to. This is more marked amongst 15-19 year olds, of whom 69% do not feel they should have to pay. Our business has a real problem here. How do we rectify this? For one TMV would advocate education and also the industry needs to look at different revenue streams and business models – all of which are currently being done, but perhaps not as effectively as they could be.
The average price that respondents think is fair to pay for a CD album is just GBP6.58 (approx.$9.50) For a download album the average drops to GBP3.91(approx$5.50) and for a download single the average is 39p(approx 55 cents). On average 43% of the music owned and enjoyed by the age group has not been paid for. This increases to 49% for 15-19 year olds. TMV wonders what artists would think of these price points when they found out how much in terms of royalties they would end up with…
If they were a big celebrity 42% of the age group would value respect for their music and creative freedom above all other factors. Money scores second at 20% and performing in front of massive audiences third at 14%. So what are the ramifications of this for potential new artists wanting to become big-time artists and branding tie-ups? Strange they state no thrill in playing in front of massive audiences… perhaps this is once again a thing which will be only remembered in the history of popular music?
