World music cross-cultural hybrids are also growing as a market share in the retail world. Broad mainstream success by the Buena Vista Social Club, B-Tribe, and The Gipsy Kings has made it all more visible and easier for the average listener to relate to. The African continent also continues to show great strength as a source for pleasing, salable world music. The area that I see with the greatest potential for adding titles is Space Music, now more commonly called Ambient. I believe that sales would be stronger if both distributors and retailers would set aside some of those biases.
Listening stations address the concerns about in-store play.
Even without headphones, simply offering the main artists and bestsellers in this important area would probably result in more new sales than you'd expect. Some of the most innovative and influential artists in our niche are purveyors of Space Music. Collectively, their body of work comprises some of the most enduring, timeless, moving, and deep music produced. At Backroads, Space Music remains one of our core offerings, and consistently ranks as one of our top three genres in sales. Closely related musically is the fast-growing realm of massage and healing music.