After years of warning of threat to grassroots and artist’s viability, UK acts have dropped out of global best-sellers chart

UK acts failed to make it into the worldwide annual charts of the year’s top 10 bestselling singles or albums in 2024.

According to figures from the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) via BBC News, no homegrown artist featured on either list last year after Benson Boone claimed the Number One song with ‘Beautiful Things’ and Taylor Swift‘s ‘The Tortured Poets Department‘ was the world’s bestselling album.

Albums by Coldplay, Charli XCX and Dua Lipa did not make either list. The highest ranked artist was Artemas who came in 15th with ‘I Like The Way You Kiss Me’ on the global best selling singles list.

Both lists were mainly dominated by US acts including Billie Eilish, Sabrina Carpenter and Kendrick Lamar.

Billie Eilish. CREDIT: Kevin Mazur/Getty Images for Live Nation Entertainment

Previously, UK acts appeared in one or both of the top 10 lists every year since 2003.

It comes after David Martin of the Featured Artists Coalition recently pointed to Spotify’s most globally streamed artists of 2024, saying that the increasing lack of UK names was a sign of the talent pipeline already suffering – and not for a lack of talent.

“I’m not saying this is doomsday, it’s fixable but this should be the canary down the mine to the UK music industry,” he told NME. “What is the whole ecosystem able to do together to stimulate activity? Large arenas and promoters need to have that foresight. You’d expect them to.

“We should all be very concerned. The UK’s share of the global music market has reduced from 17 per cent to 10 per cent in the last seven years. How many UK artists topped the overall Official Charts last year? These should be red flags for the industry. If you want venues to do well, make sure you’ve got performances in them and that you’re stimulating new audiences. Do you want promoters to do well? Make sure there’s a demand by allowing artists to build new fanbases.”

Martin added that the UK needed to urgently tackle issues around money made from streaming, the grassroots levy, the impact of Brexit on touring and the regulation of AI.

“Right now, we need growth and easy wins,” he added. “I think the UK is enormously underachieving against its potential. I know the demand that’s out there and the quality of artists we have. Anybody that says ‘There’s no good music out there anymore’ is frankly full of shit. There is so much good music out there, it’s just very difficult for it to cut through and it’s not very well supported in the UK.”

It comes after the government recently backed a call for a levy on tickets to gigs at arena level and above – adopting a ‘Premier League model’ with the top tiers of the live industry paying back into the ecosystem to keep the talent pipeline flowing, as they do in football.

It is hoped that the major companies of the live industry will take it upon themselves to act on a voluntary levy, with a deadline for meaningful decisions set for March before the government steps back in to consider making it mandatory by law.

As for gig spaces, the Music Venue Trust – who recently reported the “complete collapse of touring” across the UK – have already been gifted ticket levy donations from the likes of Coldplay, Sam Fender and Katy Perry from their upcoming arena and stadium tours. This also comes at a time when MVT’s annual report for 2024 showed that one venue was lost every two weeks last year, with nearly 44 per cent of their venues running at a loss and a near 20 per cent spike in venues in need of emergency help on the brink of closure.

Chris Martin of Coldplay. CREDIT: John Nacion/FilmMagic

With the government’s imposed business rates and the VAT on tickets creating “crippling obstacles”, and the time taken for the levy to kick into action, Music Venue Trust CEO Mark Davyd said that UK venues “won’t be out of the woods in 2025”.

“For 2026, I’d go as far to say that we can see a brighter future for venues, artists and the touring circuit,” he stated. “This year will still be hard, but thanks to the generosity of Coldplay, Sam Fender, Katy Perry, Enter Shikari, Frank Turner, Mr Scruff, Alien Ant Farm, there will be some financial support available and we’re going to try and deploy that in a way that means that as many venues as possible can make it through 2025 into the period when we expect this levy to start to make a real difference to venues, artists and promoters.”

Davyd added: “2025 is going to be a difficult year and there’s no point in pretending otherwise, but it is taking place in an atmosphere where everybody understands the problems and are trying their best to resolve them.”

The global best selling albums of 2024 were: