Total streams increased 90.6% in the first quarter. Streams accounted for 33% of equivalent albums, up from 19.7% in the first quarter of 2015. Track sales fell 10.9% and digital album sales rose 2.8% — digital album equivalents fell 4.4% and accounted for 42.8% total of equivalent albums, down from 60% last year. Physical albums fell only a modest 5.6% and accounted for 24.2% of equivalent albums. Pure album sales have fell just 1.8% this year. This quarters 14% album equivalent increase is much larger than the 3.7% tracked by Nielsen in the first quarter of 2014. At this rate there could be 527.9 million equivalent albums for 2015, much larger than last years total of 326 million.
However, equivalent albums (which is the digital tracks profit in an album equivalent, and streaming profit in an album equivalent) is about to reach it's highest since 2007. Meaning albums are making a return.