Will the album become extinct as a format?

August 4

	During the course of recent years, sales of albums have been going down, dominated by streamed tracks and playlists. What the stats are showing is that in 2013 in UK there were 30 million fewer albums sold than in 2009, while UK fans streamed an estimated 7.4 billion songs. There are 1.5 billion playlists just on Spotify, against compared to only 1.4 million albums. More and more bands and musicians are stating that they will not make new albums, because the format is dead. What is happening with the dominator of the music industry during the last few decades? The answer is simple – the online digital streaming services provides customers more flexibility. Flexibility to listen carefully selected their favorite hits and create customized playlists. Having the complete albums is not always what listeners want anymore. Musicians must come to terms with this trend and offer individual tracks for download and streaming or risk a severe drop in listener base. On the other hand, there will be always fans who want to own the full album. There are still those who appreciate just sitting back to listen to a whole album, and letting one artist take them on a journey. So, what is the future of the album? Will it die? What do you think? More on the topic can be found here: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/jul/29/album-music-format-streaming-playlists-extinction