New List Of Most Played 2017 Artists Confirms Rock’s Death: Most Rockers Featured Are Dead

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Nielsen have released their list of most played artists and albums of 2017, and no rock act is featured in the overall top 10 artists. The rock genre features Imagine Dragons and Twenty One Pilots, who are pop groups and not really rock bands. Metallica is the only band in the top played rock genre who are currently active and don’t have deceased singers, with Linkin Park and The Beatles also featured. The top played rock albums features Metallica and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

Nielsen.com posted:

The surge in music streaming continued throughout 2017. Overall consumption of albums, songs and audio on-demand streaming grew 12.5% year over year. A 59% increase in on-demand audio streams offset track and album sales declines.

For the first time ever, R&B/Hip-Hop became the most dominant genre, with seven of the top 10 most-consumed albums coming from that genre. The popularity of R&B/Hip-Hop was powered by a 72% increase in on-demand audio streaming.

Highlights from the 2017 U.S. Music Year-End Report include:

Ed Sheeran’s Divide was the leader in total volume (albums + track equivalent albums + on-demand audio streaming equivalent albums), followed by Kendrick Lamar’s DAMN. and Taylor Swift’s Reputation.
Latin music history was made when Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee’s Spanish-language
smash “Despacito” and its crossover remix featuring Justin Bieber topped the Hot 100 chart. “Despacito” was the biggest song of the year in terms of total activity (sales + on-demand audio streaming equivalents), followed by Ed Sheeran’s “Shape of You” and “Humble.” by Kendrick Lamar.

“Despacito” and “Shape of You” also led the Digital Song Sales chart, followed by Sam Hunt’s “Body Like a Back Road” at No. 3.

Vinyl had a renaissance at retail by experiencing sales growth for the 12th consecutive year, comprising 14% of all physical album sales. The top-selling vinyl LP of the year was the re-release of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.