Nielsen’s Mid-Year Music Report Confirms Streaming Has Become A Gusher

Kendrick Lamar: The Los Angeles rapper has the most-consumed album thus far in 2017. (Photo by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images )

Last month, The Weeknd graced the cover of FORBES under an apt headline: Streaming Grows Up. He had amassed 5.5 billion streams in the past two years, second only to Drake, en route to a $92 million payday over the past 12 months–exemplifying the model of making one’s music widely and cheaply available, then cashing in on the road.

“I really wanted people who had no...