Nov 16, 2014 5 min read

Taylor Swift is this decade’s Beatles.

No need to blink. You read that sentence correctly.

Just as the Beatles’ cemented interest in long-playing albums with their thematic “Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” and “White” LPs, Taylor Swift has confirmed the future of the compact disc with her new “1989” CD.

As you may have heard, “1989” is far and away the best-selling album of 2014. As of late last week, it was nearing 2 million pieces – more than half of them sold on compact disc.

That’s noteworthy for a multitude of reasons, not the least of which is that it contradicts the music industry’s incessant moaning about the impending death of the CD. Record label executives insist that the industry is once again being driven by singles (45s then, digital downloads now) as opposed to albums.

They’re right. And it’s entirely their fault.

Pop music in recent years has been as disposable as its counterpart output in the early 1960s. In that long-ago era, record labels were interested in a hit – any hit. They issued singles as fast as they could manufacture them and they were recorded by anyone they could pull into the studio at any given moment. Even secretaries. (Martha Reeves, as a prime example). Producers would even change names of singers and groups in hopes of doubling the odds of getting another song in the Top 40 (as with the Four Seasons recording as the Wonder Who). It became the era of one-hit wonders.

Flash ahead 50 years and it’s much the same. Today’s top 40 is top heavy with likely flash-in-the-pan artists such as Meghan Trainor, Jeremih, Mr. Probz, Echosmith and Alesso, among others. The No. 1 song is by someone named Tove Lo. Their songs are undeniably catchy – “All About the Bass” especially – but as one DJ pointed out last week, that song could have been recorded by Leslie Gore or just about any female artist since. It’s all about the song, not the artist. That’s fine, but the result is that consumers are reluctant to invest in CDs when they have little knowledge about the singer. And it completely explains why the best-selling CDs over the past several years have been the “Now” compilations of mostly one-hit wonders.

Taylor Swift, though, is the exception – and she’s a brilliant young lady. Much like the Beatles, her albums are thematic. The singles are, in essence, merely teasers for the LPs. Like John, Paul, George and Ringo, she puts a face to her music. In the weeks before the release of “1989,” she was on virtually every TV talk show and behind the microphone on syndicated radio shows. Tove Lo, not so much. When the Beatles switched musical gears toward FM listeners in 1967, they nonetheless tucked at least one commercial single in the album for AM stations. Likewise, there always was a song or two that appealed to an older generation, whether it was “‘Til There Was You” in 1964, or “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” and “When I’m 64” on later albums. The fan base was ever expanding.

Taylor Swift has famously bounced between pop and country, and she’s done it successfully because none of our songs are outlandish or offensive to either musical camp. Incredibly, and to her credit, Taylor was very open to her country fans (and country radio) that she would be issuing a pop album this time, but she still professed a love for country music. And her fans – all of them – bought into it.

So, of course, when “1989” was released on the heels of her “Shake It Off” single, fans bought the album because they bought into the concept. Simply put, they bought into the “Taylor Swift” brand.

Branding, in fact, perfectly explains the recent domination of older artists on the album charts – especially with sales of compact discs as opposed to digital downloads. Not surprisingly, then, Neil Diamond, Tony Bennett, Barbra Streisand, Bob Seger and Barry Manilow have been riding high on album sales charts in the past few weeks, and re-issues of albums by Led Zeppelin, Whitney Houston and Sir Paul McCartney are also doing well. Bette Midler’s new album is No. 3 this week, and new releases by Queen, Bob Dylan, the Doobie Brothers, Elvis Costello and Jackson Browne are off to a good start, too. Well-timed compact disc retrospectives of Jerry Vale, Perry Como and T. Tex are expected to do well during the holiday season.

If Taylor Swift’s CD album sales are going to be surpassed by any artist this year, it will most certainly be by Sir Paul when his “The Art of McCartney” is released. It’s the perfect CD combo – McCartney’s incredible songbook interpreted by a who’s who of classic artists, from Steve Miller to Cheap Trick.

Hollywood’s declaration of the death of the CD is perpetrated by laziness on the part of the music industry. The quick money may be “All About the Bass,” but the legacy – and CD purchase -is still reserved for those who truly care about their music.

Even in this age of disposable everything, a discerning public knows the difference.

Terrry Hazlett can be reached at snowballrizzo@aol.com.