Top 100 Best-Selling Music Artists

[Andrenekoi]

^Michael sold either 750, 350 or 300 million,
Madonna sold 200 million
BEP sold +- 35million and they are not on the list at all =)

[tetsuo69]

Originally Posted by Andrenekoi

^Michael sold either 750, 350 or 300 million,
Madonna sold 200 million
BEP sold +- 35million and they are not on the list at all =)

thats why i have my doubts with western artist, one day its 300 the next 400 the next 700 XD whats next a billion its as if they get their info from wikipedia where just anyone can edit the numbers

Originally Posted by LiveInBlue

Did Gaga surpass the million sales in Japan? O_o

dont think so, i think it was more of an example ,seeing as how japan the second biggest music market in the world, most of her asian sales would have to come from japan.

[Nackar_91]

Originally Posted by tetsuo69

dont think so, it think it was more of an example ,seeing as how japan the second biggest music market in the world, most of her asian sales would have to come from japan.

Yeah, that was the point. ^^

According to Oricon all of her albums combined (The Fame, The Fame Monster, Remixes) sold approximately 600.000 copies, but that's just Oricon.

[hpg23]

Originally Posted by Nackar_91

Yeah, that was the point. ^^

According to Oricon all of her albums combined (The Fame, The Fame Monster, Remixes) sold approximately 600.000 copies, but that's just Oricon.

And that is an excellent number for a western artist.

South Korea is also a economic powerhouse in terms of CD sales, so nowadays Asian sales are mostly equal to Japan and Korea + China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. The rest of Asia makes a smaller percentage.
The Asian market is difficult to conquer from outside (not so hard if you are a Japanese/Korean/Chinese artist) but when you do it, the revenue is huge.

[Yumsushi]

Originally Posted by hpg23

South Korea is also a economic powerhouse in terms of CD sales, so nowadays

I was always under the impression that piracy was very high in S. Korea since the best selling album of the year sells about 300K copies.

[rakeru]

Originally Posted by tetsuo69

dont think so, i think it was more of an example ,seeing as how japan the second biggest music market in the world, most of her asian sales would have to come from japan.

I recently read in Billboard that Japan has surpassed the US in physical sales, though the US is naturally ahead of Japan in digital sales. That's hard to measure though, since actual sales aren't as readily available in the US as they are in Japan, and may be skewed because the release patterns are very different.

[Nackar_91]

Originally Posted by rakeru

I recently read in Billboard that Japan has surpassed the US in physical sales, though the US is naturally ahead of Japan in digital sales. That's hard to measure though, since actual sales aren't as readily available in the US as they are in Japan, and may be skewed because the release patterns are very different.

The numbers I saw are from 2008, and I read them in the RIAJ yearbook document, although the info themselves comes from a neutral party, but they said the following :

The US sold 2 million physical singles, Japan 50 million. (This number isn't all that surprising since physical singles are pretty much dead in the US.)

Japan sold 165 million albums, the US 385 million. (This number isn't all that surprising either, since Japan only has half the amount of inhabitants. I'm not sure whether the US one counts digital sales or not ...)

Also interesting is that in Japan, MORE dvds are sold than in the US. And not just by comparison of country size, in total, which I think is pretty amazing.

Also of note :

The retail value of everything sold in the US is 5.9 billion. In Japan, it's 5.1 billion. Now that is, I think, a tiny gap for a country with just half the amount of inhabitans o.O.

Anyway, that's my ramblings XD

[tetsuo69]

Originally Posted by Nackar_91

The numbers I saw are from 2008, and I read them in the RIAJ yearbook document, although the info themselves comes from a neutral party, but they said the following :

The US sold 2 million physical singles, Japan 50 million. (This number isn't all that surprising since physical singles are pretty much dead in the US.)

Japan sold 165 million albums, the US 385 million. (This number isn't all that surprising either, since Japan only has half the amount of inhabitants. I'm not sure whether the US one counts digital sales or not ...)

Also interesting is that in Japan, MORE dvds are sold than in the US. And not just by comparison of country size, in total, which I think is pretty amazing.

Also of note :

The retail value of everything sold in the US is 5.9 billion. In Japan, it's 5.1 billion. Now that is, I think, a tiny gap for a country with just half the amount of inhabitans o.O.

Anyway, that's my ramblings XD

Thankz for the info and yes the u.s counts the digital sales and im guessing as well cd/digital sales outside the u.s

[*Petit*]

Originally Posted by Nackar_91

Also interesting is that in Japan, MORE dvds are sold than in the US. And not just by comparison of country size, in total, which I think is pretty amazing.

Also of note :

The retail value of everything sold in the US is 5.9 billion. In Japan, it's 5.1 billion. Now that is, I think, a tiny gap for a country with just half the amount of inhabitans o.O.

Anyway, that's my ramblings XD

I remember looking at a chart listing the 20 biggest markets for music and dvds on which countries like Sweden (9mill approx) and Norway (4.7 million inhabitants) figured, both of these markets were considered bigger than China, Vietnam, india etc, most other asian and south american countries which is surprising to say the least. =P So if japan becomes the biggest music market for physical sales I'm not surprised.

There's a huge difference between the strategies in the US and japan though, In the us the companies seem to have been more than happy to abandon the physical format whereas in japan they try to make it more attractive by adding DVDs, extras (gifts, posters etc) and releasing limited editions.

[..:Hot:Like:Wow:..]

I highly doubt the accuracy of this list especially when not all of them are worldwide sales and I believe some of them are just total album sales not both album and singles.

[auss246]

I haven't seen this before.. it's nice to see that she's internationally recognised for her great work.

[Mirrorcle Monster]

Oricon is corrupted jaja!!!

[erika_ayu]

WOW OMEDETTO!!~
what does that 174 means anyway??

[teamMessAge]

This is just a list of artists who have sold 50-74 million albums and singles.

There are different lists on the same website, and the more globally-known artists everyone else has mentioned are in different (higher-up) sections.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._music_artists

[ayumi_Queen]

AWESOME

[jimex289]

Should post the 75 million and beyond list so as to not forget B'z.

[gothicayu]

thanks for this explaination i was looking for madonna too . ayu and hikki number are impressive

[Andali]

yay!!

[mcluva420]

hmmm..no problem.. its only the artists between 50-74 mil ^_^ the artists with MORE arent on the list ^O^.

[Crystal_Ageha]

^ That's interesting. Thanks for sharing the specifics.

I'm personally not surprised about the DVDs, since more types of videos are a lot bigger over there. And I'm definitely~ not surprised about the retail value, considering everything in Japan is twice as expensive. XD I didn't think there'd be such a difference in physical sales, though. :O