A West Midlands YouTube Top 50, as of August 2014

The 50 must viewed West Midlands acts; Laura Mvula is out on top. And look at all the death metal....

Every six months, I research the most-viewed numbers for local acts on YouTube. It's a weird kind of chart: at the bottom, people who have pulled in, seduced and nagged enough views to get past the cut-off point; at the top, BIG acts like The Editors and Laura Mvula. I've done this for long enough for some trends to emerge, although I would never lay claim to this being a comprehensive index of popularity. There's just too many wildcards. Scroll on down to the bottom of the post for caveats and analysis

But first, congratulations to the new leader....

Now, the basic rules...

• West Midlands acts, who are still involved locally, only. Tax exiles excluded.
• Proper videos only: smartphone and fan clips are out, official vids are in.
• The two most-viewed videos uploaded within the past three years are counted.
• Minimum total is 10,000. 
• No live videos unless specifically commissioned.
• Only one version of the song - no remixes.
• No videos of full albums ripped to YouTube with just one image to try to score ad revenue.

Now, here's the chart. 

More analysis afterwards, if you're interested...

Act	Video 1	Video 2	views
Laura Mvula	Green Garden	That's Alright	3,430,303
Oceans Ate Alaska	Clocks	To Catch A Flame	3,382,885
Editors	A Ton Of Love	Formaldehyde	2,718,723
George Barnett	Swimming Pools	Where The Devil Sleeps	1,692,727
Peace	Wraith	Bloodshake	1,453,203
Swim Deep	Honey	King City	1,415,754
Lady Leshurr	Look At Me Now	F64	1,036,487
The Enemy	Like A Dancer	Saturday	682,505
Napalm Death	The Wolf I Feed	Breed To Breathe	554,960
UB40	Blue Eyes Cryin' In the Rain	-	506,326
Robert Plant	Rainbow	Promo for Lullaby and the Ceaseless Roar album	490,817
Electric Swing Circus	Penniless Optimist	Everybody Wants To Be A Cat	425,283
The Twang	We're A Crowd	Mainline	210,817
Anaal Nakraath	Forging Towards The Sunset	Todos Sono Humanos	201,473
Dexys	Incapable Of Love	Nowhere Is Home	158,533
Templeton Pek	Wake Me Up	What Are You Waiting For	144,720
Jaws	Toucan Surf	Surround You	129,905
Mahalia	Let The World See The Light	Goldrush (with Ed Sheeran)	98,134
No Americana	Washed Out Summer	Wax Poetic	95,834
Troumaca	Lady Colour	Layou	93,191
Scott Matthews	Myself Again	Virginia (Guild Lounge)	75,282
Soweto Kinch	Help	A People With No Past	71,739
Superfood	Superfood	Bubbles	68,880
Claire Maguire	Paper Thin	Whenever You Want It	52,607
The Wonderstuff	Planet Earth	Oh No!	45,047
Musgraves	Last Of Me	So Sophia	43,651
Midnight Bonfires	Lights Out	Exhale	43,243
The Traps	Calypso	The Honeydrip	39,560
Destroyers	Hole In The Universe	-	37,042
God Damn	Heavy Money	I'm a Lazer, You're a Radar	29,402
Hanging Doll	Carnival Of Sin	Sacred and Profane	26,774
Rebecca Downes	Basement Of My Heart	When I'm Bad	26,449
Mistys Big Adventure	Aggression	-	25,001
Goodnight Lenin	Wenceslas Square	Record Store Day '14 promo	22,858
Malik MD7	I Bear My Soul	Skooled By	21,326
ADO	Power	Waterfall	19,339
1 Eye	Mr Bailiff	-	18,830
Stone Foundation	That's The Way I Want To Live My Life	To Find The Spirit	18,290
Broken Witt Rebels	Call Out The Sun	All Worn out	18,189
Ali Campbell and Radio Riddler	Purple Rain	-	18,176
Dumb	Dive	Retina	17,495
Erica Nockalls	Cut Them Out	Manikin	17,056
Boat To Row	Tightrope	Grassmarket	16,116
DC Fontana	Abbesses	Pentagram Man	16,067
Old Dance School	Swifts and Martins	Chasing The Light album promo	14,874
Bluebeat Arkestra	The Chillr	Ghosts	13,663
Victories At Sea	Future Gold	Stay Positive	13,112
Xova	9 Lives	Just Want To Be Famous	12,810
Brothers Groove	Treat 'em Mean	My Guitar	12,279
Friendly Fire Band	One Drop it Like It's Hot (Sam Redmore mix)	Welcome to Holland	11,340
Don't take this too seriously... Now, I realise that, chart rankings aside, this is major geek territory. But it's also very interesting. The chart itself should be taken with an industrial-grade pinch of salt. Why? Well, because YouTube counts aren't precise; I've seen figures go DOWN in a six month period. And the mechanism is generous to those with the tools and the chops and the money to make snappy videos. Don't let the 'accessible to all' vibe fool you: YouTube works best when you've got a slick package to push.  So people who don't play that game lose out by this metric. Soweto Kinch has two 'straight' videos in the chart, but he's also all over YouTube doing some fine rap battles, cut live and raw. But there's so many of them that the impact is diluted. YouTube can be hyped. Dig around, and you'll find outfits who will give you views for cash. I don't think that applies too much at this level, but it just might be present here or there. Look at the top, and there's evidence aplenty of big record company support.  Except that George Barnett doesn't have that support, and he's up there, and with a rotating repertoire at that. Everybody else mainly leans on their same two biggest videos. So don't let them tell you it can't be done.  Trends and patterns Putting the four series of rankings together over the two years (February 2013, August 2013, and February 2014) you can start to spot some rough trends. A lot of bands - not all - seem to surge forward, and then... run out of steam. That's sad, but inevitable. Others sit on the chart until their videos get past the three-year cut off point, and they have nothing to replace it with.  It's also fascinating to see how some underground genres have big followings: Look at the string of death metal and black metal bands. Equally fascinating is how loyalty can apply - or not apply - to older acts with fresh videos. There's UB40 and Robert Plant doing very nicely, thank you. Dig around and you'll spot others who aren't doing so well.  Progress? Finally, two more geeky charts, looking at how acts have prospered, both in terms of increased numbers and increases by percentage, Here's the top 15 winners for each:
Percentage increase Number of views increase UB40 95.42% Laura Mvula 613,046 Mahalia 60.73% Editors 596,451 Dumb 41.20% Oceans Ate Alaska 455,242 Superfood 41.15% George Barnett 374,687 God Damn 38.03% UB40 247,233 Jaws 34.85% Swim Deep 238,246 Brothers Groove 29.28% Peace 142,765 George Barnett 28.43% Lady Leshurr 69,264 Editors 28.10% Electric Swing Circus 56,334 Laura Mvula 21.76% Mahalia 37,079 Broken Witt Rebels 20.99% The Enemy 34,947 Swim Deep 20.23% Jaws 33,570 Troumaca 17.59% Superfood 20,082 ADO 15.69% Dexys 18,910 Oceans Ate Alaska 15.55% Troumaca 13,937
And if for some reason I'm missed anyone out.... yikes! My bad. Drop me a note through the blog contact page, and I will fix things.  You want more? See more music business posts
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