Charge of the Light Ballad Brigade

UK artists claimed over 12% of US album sales last year, with a familiar roll call of Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith, Coldplay and One Direction leading the polite charge Stateside. With debut ‘In the Lonely Hour’, Smith achieved the best selling British album in the US and overall third best selling LP in that territory.

The proportion of British albums across all LPs in North America was 12.2% in 2014, up from 10.4% in 2013. In truth, this slice of the pie has expanded steadily since 2009 when it was 9.6% according to Nielsen Music and as reported by Music Week.

This certainly sounds like something that BPI and BRIT Awards boss man Geoff Taylor would comment on and so it proved, with Taylor saying: “British artists well and truly flew the flag in the world’s biggest and most competitive music market last year. The sensational achievements of Sam Smith, Ed Sheeran, One Direction and the entire Class of 2014 demonstrate once again that the UK’s music industry is a world beater”.

Artists such as Arctic Monkeys, Bastille, Little Mix, Alt-J, Pink Floyd and that Adele album (still hanging in there), also helped boost the share.

As previously reported, the 10 best-selling albums released in the UK in 2014 were all by British artists, the first time this has occurred since records began.

Find out more and see the complete breakdown here.