Author: Bretos Margetis

1. Kenneth Edmonds was nicknamed Babyface by funk bassist and singer Bootsy Collins.
2. At the first Grammy Awards, held on 4 May 1959, Domenico Modugno beat out Frank Sinatra and Peggy Lee for the Record of the Year, with “Volare.”
3. Bob Dylan’s first professional performance was as opening act for John Lee Hooker at Gerde’s Folk City in New York, 1961.
4. U2 was originally known as Feedback. To date, U2 have sold more than 70 million records.
5. The Dave Matthews Band is the only group to have 6 consecutive studio albums debut at the top of the Billboard chart.
6. In 2005, S. vinyl record sales generated $35 million U.S. dollars; in 2015, it had increased to $416 million.
7. During the 2010s, 40 billion songs were downloaded illegally every year, that was approximately 90% of all music streaming.
8. Top-selling albums used to reach sales of 20 million copies before the advent of online piracy – by 2009 it had dropped to about 5 million.
9. During the 1990s, the number of recorded CDs and blank CDs sold were about equal.
10. About one-third of recorded CDs ever sold were pirated.
11. DVD discs are the same diameter (120mm) and thickness (1.2mm) as a Compact Disc (CD) but a DVD can store 13 times or more data.

Have you ever stopped to think about how much music impacts on, influences, enhances, alters…. our lives?

Over the coming months, we will bring you ten+ fast facts each week, starting with these gems. Enjoy!

1. YouTube is the world’s largest on-demand music service.
2. The harmonica is the world’s best-selling music instrument.
3. The U.S. music industry generates more than $16 billion, 50% of which is in online music. Globally, the music industry generates more than $40 billion.
4. To win a gold disc, an album needs to sell 100,000 copies in Britain, and 500,000 in the United States.
5. Music was sent down a telephone line for the first time in 1876, the year the phone was invented.
6. It was at a concert in Minneapolis in 1954 that Al Dvorin first closed Elvis’s concerts with: “Ladies and Gentleman, Elvis has left the building. Thank you and good night.”
7. Ariana Grande (b. 1993) was the first person in history to have the lead single from each of her first three albums debut in the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100.
8. During 2015, Taylor Swift earned more than $1 million per day. (Taylor Swift Day is held annually on December 13.)
9. The longest song to reach number one on the Billboard charts on LP was “I’d Do Anything For Love (But I Won’t Do That)” by Meatloaf, the shortest: “Stay” by Maurice Williams and the Zodiacs.
10. The term “disc jockey” was first used in 1937.
11. In May 1997, Paul McCartney broke his own world record by obtaining his 81st gold disc.