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OKP's 14 Essential Record Store Day Selections For 2014
OKP's 14 Essential Record Store Day Selections For 2014

Music Industry Releases Will Soon Take Place On Fridays

OKP's Top Record Store Day Releases

New major music industry releases will not be going up on a Tuesday. Yesterday Music Week reported that release dates in the record industry--at least those that take place on a relatively large scale--will take place on Friday, as opposed to the current mid-week schedule. The change is, according to the magazine, scheduled to take place this summer.

Making the transition from Tuesday to Friday releases is a decision that only the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry can make (IFPI), and in a statement yesterday the body did just that. "The compelling logic of Friday is that it is the day that best suits consumers...the highest footfall in physical retail stores and the highest levels of purchasing traffic online."

"It's also the time of greatest activity on social media, helping amplify the buzz around new releases everywhere. And the weekend is a time for greater spontaneous purchasing," the statement continued.

Besides benefitting from weekend Twitter buzz and paycheck-cashing, the new Friday date will set a global standard, meaning that split UK/US/International release dates, even those merely a day apart, will soon become a thing of the past. A new worldwide Friday drop date will cut down on piracy in the music industry and make it more difficult for leaks to spread across time zones and national borders. Other motivations, apart from weekend buzz and paycheck-cashing, include a conviction from the board that Friday drops will help cut down on piracy of new music.

Even as artists like Drake and Beyonce move away from the tried-and-true "long lead up to Tuesday" model, the change to Friday releases will have an undoubted impact on the pace of album sales, music criticism and perhaps even concert schedules (weekend album release shows, we see you).

Some retailers are already objecting to the change, including Target, which has a history of balking at release date shakeups.