UK artists shine overseas

Good news everybody - UK music is still doing rather damn well out their in foreign-land. New stats from those BPI types show that UK acts sold around 27 million albums in France and Germany alone last year, they being the world's fourth and fifth largest music markets. To put that in perspective, that's one album for every five sold in Germany, and one in ten in France. Which is pretty damn impressive. Of course, the Beatles 'Love' album helped, and long players from James Blunt and Katie Melua made up a sizable portion of the 27 million units, but that's no reason for all you record label types to not go "hey, aren't we good". Actually, BPI chief Geoff Taylor has sort of said it for you here: "Music is one of the UK's great cultural and economic exports. The fact that UK labels are gaining an increasing share of these major international markets demonstrates the diversity and quality of new British artists".