Blast from the past boosts record company's profits

EMI is expecting new albums from a host of big-name artists, including the Beatles, to give it a bumper second half of the year.

The record company and music publisher expects the new releases to compensate for a decline in first-half sales.

Popular artists including Robbie Williams, Joss Stone and Nora Jones have new records on the way, and EMI expects them to sell well over the Christmas period.

Other new albums are coming from Depeche Mode, Moby and Keith Urban.

Perhaps the highest-profile release will be a new collection of songs by the Beatles - who split in 1970.

Sir George Martin, who produced almost all of the band's albums in the 1960s, has reworked a selection of famous songs that will be used to accompany a new Cirque du Soleil show. The soundtrack will be released next month.

Analysts had expected EMI to turn in a more subdued performance in the first half than in the previous year when albums from British acts Coldplay, Gorillaz and the perennially popular Rolling Stones dominated the charts.

EMI said that first-half revenue would decline 5 per cent, and profit before tax had declined 34 per cent to £27 million ($76.2 million).

International Federation of the Phonographic Industry figures show that in the first half of this year, CD sales fell 10 per cent.

The fall was partly offset by the explosion in digital music downloading, which accounts for about 11 per cent of all music sales.

During the first half, EMI's digital sales accounted for about 9 per cent of its music sales.

- INDEPENDENT