January 13, 2009

By By Howell Llewellyn, Madrid

Spain will from this week unify physical and digital tracks sales lists into a single chart, in line with the practice in many other countries, labels body Promusicae announced January 12.

In addition, gold and platinum disc awards will now be the same for all sales charts - a gold disc for 20,000 sales and a platinum disc for 40,000 sales.

Previously, gold and platinum targets for physical single sales were 10,000 and 25,000 units respectively, and for legal downloads and original ringtones they were 20,000 for gold and 40,000 for platinum.

The new unified physical and digital albums sales chart will still require gold sales of 40,000 units and platinum sales of 80,000 units.

"Our business model changed a long time ago," says Promusicae president Antonio Guisasola. "But now we want to promote the growing legal digital market in Spain, to make it more popular, accessible and easy. Unfortunately, this market is still far from the reality of other countries of our economic and cultural level".

During a trip to Madrid last November to participate in a convention on digital content, John Kennedy, chairman and CEO of the IFPI, said "The variety and excellence of Spanish artists is undeniable, but the index of penetration of the digital market is way below that of the European average. And that is bad news for everybody - the industry, artists, and the international diffusion of Spanish culture".

IFPI affiliate Promusicae says digital sales in Spain represent just 13% of the total.

Under the new unified sales charts, the top selling single, combining physical and digital sales, is "Colgando En Tus Manos" (Warner Music Spain), a duet by Venezuela's Carlos Baute and Spain's Marta S?nchez. The top selling album is "50 A?os Despu?s" (Sony Music Entertainment) by veteran Spanish singer Raphael.

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