REQUIRED READING: THE UNEXPECTED ALBUM RENAISSANCE

following years of decline. Now, The Verge has posted a well-thought-out analysis of the phenomenon titled “The internet took the album away, and now it's giving it back,” and subtitled How the surprise release led to an album renaissance.

“In the last year there’s been a noticeable wave of top-tier artists producing great, cohesive album-length projects, rather than just chasing singles,” Micah Singleton writes. “Artists like St. Vincent, Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift all put out albums in 2014 that were all conceptual in their own way. The entirety of the album was the focus, not just a song here or there. It’s a noticeable shift from the 2006–2012 era, with its Soulja Boy-esque novelty rappers, one-hit-megawonders like Carly Rae Jepsen and pop stars following the two singles/10 fillers formula. Once believed to be the harbinger of death for the music industry, the internet has paved the way for the return of the album. A few years ago this wouldn’t have been possible, but thanks to Beyoncé, the power of social media, and, surprisingly, iTunes, the music industry’s favorite format is returning to the forefront.

“Beyoncé’s surprise release changed the music industry more than any other album in the last 10 years, but not in the way you may think. When she released her eponymous album at the end of 2013, the reaction was unparalleled. There had been surprise releases before, but none of this magnitude. There were no leaks. No physical copies. No marketing budget. No singles. No streaming. If you wanted to hear one song you had to buy them all. And yet BEYONCÉ still sold over 800,000 units in 72 hours on iTunes. It was a ***Flawless rollout and an unprecedented risk for a superstar artist in the prime of her career to take.”

After pointing to recent variations on this blueprint from Drake and Kendrick Lamar, and iTunes current quest to snag more exclusive windows on high-profile albums, Singleton concludes: “If artists continue to approach their albums as cohesive projects and leverage their fan base to create moments around their release, it may blunt the blow that streaming services are delivering to the revenue of digital music sales. Moreover, we have proof that people will pay for full albums in those moments. The method isn’t foolproof, and it’s possible only artists who have substantial social media followings will be able to execute the surprise album perfectly. But good music is good music. Now we just need more of it.”