The IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) have today revealed the results of their analysis of sales for 2014, and Pink Floyd have made the number seven spot.

The chart aims to accurately capture the popularity of artists across streaming channels, alongside digital and physical album and singles sales.

Taylor Swift was named as the Global Recording Artist of 2014, receiving the annual award honouring the most popular recording artist across music downloads, streaming and physical format sales worldwide. Swift was followed by One Direction and Ed Sheeran.

The top 10 global recording artists 2014 were:

1. Taylor Swift
2. One Direction
3. Ed Sheeran
4. Coldplay
5. AC/DC
6. Michael Jackson
7. Pink Floyd
8. Sam Smith
9. Katy Perry
10. Beyoncé

The independently verified chart includes sales of albums – across digital, CD and vinyl formats; singles, both downloaded and physical; on-demand audio streams and music videos. The chart includes all the music of each artist featured, not just one track or album. It uses track and album equivalents to combine measurements of downloads, physical sales and streams.

Some news from Switzerland, courtesy of Thomas Griesser, reinforces the return to popularity of vinyl, along with the strength of Pink Floyd's enduring classic, The Dark Side Of The Moon, and their recent release, The Endless River.

Swiss Sunday newspaper NZZ am Sonntag asked Musik Hug, a Swiss retailer which sells musical instruments as well as back catalogue and latest release albums, which were the top five selling vinyl albums in 2014?

Here are the results:

1. Pink Floyd - Dark Side Of The Moon (1973)
2. Pink Floyd - The Endless River (2014)
3. Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication (1999)
4. Nas - Illmatic (1994)
5. Parov Stelar - The Art Of Sampling (2013)

The strong sales of The Dark Side Of The Moon, some 42 years after release, point to a new generation of fans buying it on vinyl for the first time - along with, of course, those replacing worn out copies!

As the Official Pink Floyd Facebook page noted yesterday, this month marks the 50th anniversary of the proper beginning of The Pink Floyd, with the band using that name for the first time in 1965. Of course, they weren't quite settled on it at the time, and at various points during the year they reverted to The Tea Set, before finally deciding on the name the world came to know the band under.

Unusually for a band that has been around for such a long time, the line-up barely changed over the years. This picture shows the band in 1965, around the time Syd conjured up the name, and shows Rado "Bob" Klose, guitarist, who left them before they signed to EMI and turned professional.

We'd be interested to hear what you think on the band's golden anniversary. What have been your Pink Floyd highlights - either the moments in their career you consider most significant, or the moments you remember best on a personal level? Did you see them live? Any special memories of that, or of hearing any of the albums for the first time? Any amusing stories? And, have you ever met any of the band? If so, please share the experience for those who haven't!

We'd love for you to share your thoughts on the above, as part of our commemoration of the band this year. We'll collate a number of the responses and add them to this story - so, time for you to get thinking and commenting! You can either email us at the normal address ( This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ), or join the conversation over at the Brain Damage Facebook page or our Twitter page. We're looking forward to seeing your responses!

UPDATE: Thanks to all of you who have already shared your thoughts, memories and pictures with us. What follows below are a selection of the responses; more will follow soon!

Tutte le canzoni dei Pink Floyd: Il fiume infinito is a recently published (November 2014) Italian book from our friends The Lunatics. As with their previous publication, Pink Floyd: Storie e Segreti, the book has been put together as a collaborative effort by a number of long-time collectors of Floyd records and memorabilia, known collectively as The Lunatics, and together owners of one of the largest collection of rare Floyd records and assorted memorabilia.

Il fiume infinito takes a detailed, chronological look - in Italian - at the band's entire catalogue, right up to The Endless River (although due to publishing deadlines this is not covered in the same detail as the rest of the Floyd's official releases). It also covers some of the side projects and officially unreleased material the band have created. Track after track, album after album, year after year: a guide spanning over three hundred pages, analyzing the genesis, content and background of each song from 1965 to 2014.

For the non-Italian readers amongst us, there is a sixteen page, full colour section with numerous items of memorabilia, some of which I've not seen before, and all of which well reproduced. So, we would suggest the main audience for this will be those who can read Italian well, with a separate smaller bunch of people, who will want the book for the illustrations at the back. From my sketchy grasp of Italian though, the material clearly covers each track well, with some impressive detail and research at the heart of every page.

You can buy the book in Italian bookstores, or for fans either in Italy, or indeed worldwide, you can order it direct from Amazon Italy through this direct link. They'll ship the book wherever you live, and by using our direct link to buy it (or anything else there) we get a small but vital contribution to our ongoing running costs.