MIDYEAR MARKETSHARE
MERRY-GO-ROUND

Lucian Grainge’s UMG, having completed its absorption of EMI, takes a 37.7-30.4 marketshare lead over Doug Morris’ Sony Music at the six-month mark. It’s a significant reversal from this point last year, when SME led narrowly, 30.5-29.8. (Of course, factoring EMI into UMG’s mid-2012 marketshare would’ve put it at 39%, but at that point approval of the merger was still pending.) In TEA (track-equivalent-albums), Universal’s share drops 0.2, but its lead widens.

On the new-release front, Monte Lipman’s Republic (9.1, up 0.3 from this point last year) beat out the resurgent RCA of Peter Edge and Tom Corson (8.3, up a hefty 3.9) for the top spot.

Republic’s holdings in country (Big Machine’s Taylor Swift, #9 on the YTD album chart, as well as #11 Florida Georgia Line, Tim McGraw and The Band Perry), hip-hop (Cash Money’s Lil Wayne), rock (a reunited Black Sabbath) and STs (notably Pitch Perfect and Les Miserables) helped fuel its lead.

But RCA’s turnaround, fired by album-chart champ Justin Timberlake (now over 2 million), pop mainstay P!nk (#6) and hip-hop arrival A$AP Rocky, is truly impressive.

Rob Stringer’s Columbia, which dominated last year with Adele and One Direction, slips to #3 with 6.6 (down 6.6), despite having one of 2013’s true zeitgeist records (and a serious Grammy contender) in Daft Punk (#10 on the YTD album chart). Of course, the label still has Adele and One Direction, who sit at #21 and #30, respectively.

Team Iovine-Janick at IGA edged up 0.4 with 6.1 for the #4 spot, thanks in large part to PoMo fire-breathers Imagine Dragons (#5 on the album chart) the Jay-Z-supervised Great Gatsby soundtrack, pop-rockers Maroon 5, Idol Season 11 winner Phillip Phillips and rapper Kendrick Lamar.

Atlantic, which slipped 0.6 from this time last year to 5.3, is followed by Steve Barnett’s Capitol Music Group, which rose two full percentage points to 5.4. Next comes Mike Dungan’s UMG Nashville (on the strength of hits from Luke Bryan, Darius Rucker and Lady Antebellum, among others), up 2.5 to 4.9. Steve Bartels’ IDJ, with Justin Bieber, Kanye West, Rihanna and Fall Out Boy, was up 1.5 over last year with 4.5.

Cameron Strang’s Warner Bros. also edged up over mid-’12, moving 0.8 to 3.8 (and has the #4 album, thanks to Blake Shelton, as well as Mother’s Day mainstay Michael Buble) but is parked in ninth place. Gary O’s Sony Nashville rounds out the top 10, nearly flat at 2.7.