Idol Sales News – Week Ending 02/07/10

Congratulations on having the first Gold selling album of Season 8, Adam!

Indeed!!

Does anyone remember when Kellys and Daughtrys album were released?

Congrats Adam! The first of many milestones!!

Carrie’s Some Hearts is closing in on 7 million sold. That 4 year old album by an Idol winner is selling on par with the current winner’s. Yikes.

Daughtry’s album came out in July. I’m not sure about Kelly.

Congrats Adam!!!

Kelly’s album came out in March, I think.

Congratulations Adam baby!!!

Congratulations Adam…..:)

Kelly’s album came out in March, I think.

Then she has not really sold well (or as she used to)… she prob won’t make platinum within a year.

Congrats Adam! (champaign toast)

Lol with question 3 – so true. Really, get rid of ‘em and bring on NPH and Shania to join Ellen next year.

And HOORAAY Adam! That is fantabulous

Congrats on your Gold Album, Adam!

Congrats Adam! GOLD! Only the first of many IMO.

Congrats on going gold, Adam!

Go Adam…go Adam….go Adam!!!!!! So happy!!!!!!

I believe Daughtrys cd came out in the summer sometime.

Congrats to Adam for having a GOLD album. I have a question about Kris’s numbers. If he sold 5,000 last week and 5, 000 this week, how is that a 11% increase?

I think most pop singers are not selling like they used to.

If he sold 5,000 last week and 5, 000 this week, how is that a 11% increase?

Rounded numbers – could have been a change from 5001 to 5200 or something (just making up numbers, but you get the idea).

ETA: Better example would be going from below 5000 to above 5000 – that would get him at 11% growth. (Say 4590 to 5499 – both would round to 5000).

I think Gold is a nice milestone but going gold in February is more “just okay dawg” than fantabulous.

Adam is lucky because WWFM is rising and not peaking on the charts. That should keep the sales going. But pop hits don’t always generate album sales. Sometimes they sell the song but not the album. So it’s too early to predict future sales.If he’s lucky WWFM and hopefully more singles could generate more sales.

If Kris’s stats last week (2/3) were “Kris Allen 5K -7 percent”, how is Kris Allen “5K” for this week +11% ??

Rounded numbers is weird because that’s an 18% discrepancy, and 18% of 5K is 900. That’s some generous rounding, and someone should be required to keep the percentages in line with the numbers, otherwise it is misleading.
I think

lorismile
02/10/2010 at 9:44 am
I think most pop singers are not selling like they used to.

With a few exceptions, I think the general trend is for there to be way more singles sales with pop artists – I know I for one very rarely even buy albums, and usually just hand pick a bunch of random singles from different people that I like. But then, you have to sell a ton more singles to equal the album sales. And of course, strong single sales hopefully boost the album sales.

The numbers are rounded, that’s not the actual figure. Brian isn’t allowed to post the actual numbers.

Adam is lucky because WWFM is rising and not peaking on the charts. That should keep the sales going. But pop hits don’t always generate album sales. Sometimes they sell the song but not the album. So it’s too early to predict future sales.If he’s lucky WWFM and hopefully more singles could generate lots more sales.

Adam’s cd sold reasonably well even before WWFM came out. So I expect to see it go platinum sometime this year.

Congrats to Adam on getting his first GOLD album.

I am quite surprised he sold over 10K, way to go!!

Congrats Adam

Nice milestone for Adam, hope the numbers keep steady for a long time, a little like Jordin.

The strange thing with Kelly is that she sold a lot of singles out of that album, I think MLWSWY was double platinium, IDHU sold something like 600k and Already Gone went platinium too. Those singles did not push album sales as they should have.
It’s not the same situation as her last album that didn’t have that many hit singles.

Congrats to Adam on his first gold album, awesome news! Here is to many more (raising my morning coffee)!

David Cook’s sales went up noticeably on itunes overnight after that guy sang Come Back to Me on Idol last night. Pretty cool.

The strange thing with Kelly is that she sold a lot of singles out of that album, I think MLWSWY was double platinium, IDHU sold something like 600k and Already Gone went platinium too. Those singles did not push album sales as they should have.
It’s not the same situation as her last album that didn’t have that many hit singles.

I heard she is releasing one more single. Hope it does well!

Carrie’s Some Hearts is closing in on 7 million sold. That 4 year old album by an Idol winner is selling on par with the current winner’s. Yikes.

To be honest I think it’s more a testament to Some Hearts’s MASS appeal than a reason to yikes about anybody’s sales. Half country, half pop (and with some GREAT country singles, one of which became a huge pop hit too) – Some Hearts hit its spot in the market perfectly. It’s full of songs about leaving home for the first time and finding your place in the world so it really appealed to people going away to college or starting out in the real world, and their parents, and anybody for whom that was a recent memory. And it was really well sung.

It looks like Carrie’s sales really benefited from the i-Tunes sale and the release of the Temporary Home video. Good timing by the label on that one. It’d be great to see TH continuing to connect with people. The video does everything it’s supposed to as far as bringing the song to life and adding another layer to it.

Congrats to Adam!

I’d be curious to see what would happen with Kelly’s sales if All I Ever Wanted became a single. It’s different from anything out their on the radio and it’s so Kelly, I feel like it could put some fuel in sales.

This week should be pretty good for sales because sales usually go up for Valentine’s Day. But Carrie and others with the biggest increases last week might not increase.

I sort of figured with Kris singing the NA on national tv, having the itunes banner with the discount, and having a big single, there would be a bigger increase. Still dumbfounded on why he can’t sell CD’s at least to the Idol audience. LLWD is doing great but the song is not connecting people with the artist.

Rounded numbers – could have been a change from 5001 to 5200 or something (just making up numbers, but you get the idea).

Kris sold 4943 last week, so if it increases 11%, that should take his sales to 5487 give or take a few. It’s the magic of rounding that Kris only needed to sell a few more for him to show up as 6K in Idol Chatter numbers.

Good point about Some Hearts. Not a country fan but I bought the album and love the first 5 songs.

Kris saw an 11% increases in sales. So all that promo did help. LLWD is doing great selling as a single though. But the poor album sales may turn Kris into a nonperson on Idol S9.

Yay for gold :]

That’s some generous rounding, and someone should be required to keep the percentages in line with the numbers, otherwise it is misleading.

Rounding is rounding. There is nothing misleading about it. It’s just rounding. Brian is not allowed by SoundScan to publish the actual numbers. They permit him to publish rounded numbers.

Here are the actual numbers for Kris from last week (shh! Don’t tell SoundScan)

115 ALLEN*KRIS KRIS ALLEN 4,943 -7 5,297 249,768

I don’t think that anybody would argue that 4,943 does not correctly round to 5K. Unless one is doing a “floor”, but Brian is not, he is rounding.

11% more than that is about 5,487 (although, since 11 only has 2 significant digits and is rounded itself, the number could be anywhere from around 5,462 to 5,511…although, not the last number since that would be rounded to 6K. The top percentage that it could be is 11.248%). Again, following the standard rules of rounding, it makes perfect sense that it’s rounded to 5K.

Thanks Kristen.
It’s confusing.

congrats to Adam for gold!

i’m bummed with Kris’s album sales but I’m happy nevertheless to see a 11% increase. It’s the right direction! It might be a slow burner or not. I guess with a 2nd single and a U.S tour, we’ll see more sales

Kris saw an 11% increases in sales. So all that promo did help

I guess I didn’t look at it that way. 500 more albums is definitely an increase no matter how you slice it.

Kris’ album sales will not result in him being a “s9 nonentity”. His face has been front and center during auditions, his ford commercial plays evey episode, he has a hit single that everyone hears on the radio, and he will be performing on the show at least once (maybe even twice). And he is a 19 client. I get no sense whatsover that tptb are trying to distance themselves from kris. To the contrary, they are warmly embracing and promoting him

I thought that cover of David Cook’s Come Back to Me was awful, and yet it still managed to nudge people to go buy the real thing. Amazing. If I read things right at DCO this morning, the bump is still bumping, and right now it looks like this:

CBTM: 121, from 822 before the show
DCTR: 225, from 529

Edited because DCTR gained two while I was typing, lol.

Congratulations again to Adam for his gold album.

Good to see the increase for Kris, even if the actual jump in albums sold isn’t huge. Any increase is still a positive!

No sales figures fir the singles downloads yet? That’s odd – those are usually out earlier than the albums sales numbers. I’m predicting 55+ K for LLWD and 45+ K for WWFM…

Congs to Adam!!! Hope FYE keeps selling well and WWfM continues climbing up the charts.

Well,this is it.

I’m officially 13

True, you could see Kris’ picture. No plant to block it. And no outright insults. Like I said, Kris is very, very lucky that LLWD is a decent hit.

I’m predicting 65K for LLWD. And I think it could go platinum in 3 weeks.

Welcome to the world of the teenager.

luvadamlambert
02/10/2010 at 10:33 am
Well,this is it.

I’m officially 13

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LUVADAMLAMBERT!!!!! Just think (and I know you have) that you will get to enjoy Adam and all that he is for a very long time. Good for you!!! Have a great day. Doing anything special today?

Top Concert Events
Week Ending 02/07/2010

1 Michael Buble Tickets
2 Black Eyed Peas Tickets
3 James Taylor & Carole King Tickets
4 Bon Jovi Tickets
5 The Eagles Tickets
6 Taylor Swift Tickets
7 Jay-Z Tickets
8 John Mayer Tickets
9 George Strait & Reba McEntire Tickets
10 Daughtry Tickets

http://www.ticketnews.com/Super-Bowl-XLIV-dominates-the-rankings-and-Michael-Buble-gains-ground2109753

Does anyone feel Breakeven (the scripts new song) sounds awefully like LLWD. I know they are both written by the scripts but the voices are similar too. If I don’t know better bc I follow. AI, I’ll be confused. Wonder how having two similar songs on the radios affect the artists.

Eta I thought According to You was a Taylor Swift song. But ATU is not a strong song.

Happy Bday LUV!!!

Congratulations on the gold album Adam! (I started celebrating yesterday by playing the album non stop last night – my neighbors must think I’ve gone insane… heh – or maybe they like the music and decided to buy it themselves).

Katharine’s Terrified also got a significant bump on itunes after Didi B. sang the song. #32 on Pop and #70 overall! The regular version is #72 on Pop.

Unbroken, the album, is up to #82 on Pop, and the regular version is #89 on Pop.

Does anyone feel Breakeven (the scripts new song) sounds awefully like LLWD.

yes, I do a double take every time either one is playing. Same as the problem with Already Gone/Halo, but they at least had very different voices. So it could be an issue, or maybe not.

anything out their

Man I hate not catching typos before it’s too late to edit. Anything out THERE was more like it.

According to You

That’s Orianthi. But it has that generic pop rock sound so I see why it wouldn’t be obvious which pop rock starlet sings it.

No sales figures fir the singles downloads yet? That’s odd – those are usually out earlier than the albums sales numbers.

We usually get download sales from somebody @ Pulse early but he’s the source who’s traveling this week. We’ll have to wait for Brian @ Idol Chatter for rounded numbers for the downloads too.

Happy 13th Birthday Luv

Orianthi’s guitar playing makes that song, and her whole album really. That girl can shred.

Happy Birthday luv!

Congrats to Adam on Gold, I hope you see many more from the different countries you are visiting!

Yeah Adam, so proud of you going gold. Do anyone know how many albums he sold in Canada last week?

Happy Birtday Luv. You will always be intertwined with Adam now!! The day you became a teenage, he sold gold!!

(sorry was trying to stay on topic and wishing you HB at the same time)

Congrats Adam on hitting GOLD, way to go Baby!!!

Let’s celebrate with this Baby Adam sporting Emo hair?!! I find this pic absolutely irresistible from another fan site LOL.

CONGRATULATIONS, ADAM !!! ON YOUR FIRST GOLD ALBUM.

Happy 13th Birthday, LUV.
Enjoy your youth. (I feel so old now.)

Hugs and kisses XOXO

Happy birthday, Luv!

LLWD and Breakeven should sound similar, since they were both written by The Script…

I don’t think Breakeven and LLWD sound similiar at all. I certainly think of one when I hear the other. Can’t wait to see Kris’s single #’s. Hopefully within the next month he will have a platinum single on his hand.

Congrats Adam for your gold album!!

Oops/correction to my post.. I certainly DON’t think of one… (not certainly think..)

oops.. forgot.. congrats adam on your gold record.

I thought that cover of David Cook’s Come Back to Me was awful, and yet it still managed to nudge people to go buy the real thing.

OK, that’s funny that it got a bump – I thought the cover wasn’t all that, but then again the song really is awfully boring so unless you turn it into something way different… I’m probably not going to like it if you’re not singing it with David’s voice

And HAPPY BIRTHDAY, luvadamlambert! Hope you’re staying warm, it looks like a blizzard outside here in Fairfax. Grumble, grumble.

Oh, and I don’t hear any similarity with LLWD and Break Even, really. and congrats to Adam on the gold album. It’s fun to see your Idol on the list with **NOW GOLD** (or whatever) listed beside the numbers, isn’t it?

I think that Adam’s album sales have slowed because so many people are downloading the individual songs instead.

Still shocked that Rabbit Hole wasn’t released on the regular album. IMHO, the BEST song he has. Would have been a MUCH MUCH MUCH better first single that FYE (especially with the new Depp movie coming out).

girlygirl

LLWD and Breakeven should sound similar, since they were both written by The Script…

Actually I think Breakeven sounds like the Red Guitar. Soul is slowly creeping into rock.

I actually thought the guy Tim sounded pretty good singing CBTM. Not nearly as good as David Cook, of course, but okay. It made me happy to hear the song. Even though it wasn’t my favorite song on the cd, it still warms my heart to hear it.

Congrats to Adam on going gold!

Umm….. I really hope Kris gets more album sales. It’s a great album. I’m surprised they haven’t released single #2 yet. Could they be waiting until LLWD hits platinum? I think single #2 will give more exposure to Kris’s album.

Umm….. I really hope Kris gets more album sales. It’s a great album. I’m surprised they haven’t released single #2 yet. Could they be waiting until LLWD hits platinum? I think single #2 will give more exposure to Kris’s album.

LLWD is still growing, so releasing a second single so soon could canabilize sales of it. Once the timing is right, I’m sure single #2 will be ready.

LLWD and Breakeven should sound similar, since they were both written by The Script…

I don’t think LLWD sounds like Breakeven so much as it has a definite “Script” sound. If you listen to the Scripts album it has a definite sound to it. Their songs are very wordy, with catchy hooks, and the lead singer sings “yeah yeah” a lot in the EXACT same way as Kris does. It would not shock me if european fans of the script heard Kris’ llwd and thought it was the script . But the script is just getting well known in the us and i doubt anyone thinks that here. both songs are doing well. obviously there is a market for that type of music

17 17 KRIS ALLEN Live Like We’re Dying 4098 3749 349 25.528
+34 Spins
+9 Bullet
+0.594 AI

HAC:
8 8 KRIS ALLEN Live Like We’re Dying 2987 2851 136 14.809
+29 Spins
+6 Bullet
+0.079 AI

POP:
22 19 ADAM LAMBERT Whataya Want From Me 3261 2740 521 22.544
+59 Spins
-15 Bullet
+0.284 AI

HAC:
30 26 ADAM LAMBERT Whataya Want From Me 720 579 141 2.995
+25 Spins
+3 Bullet
+0.310 AI

I hope radio doesn’t stop playing LLWD as Breakeven is charting higher because they think is the same “genre” and LLWD has had its time.

Why would radio stop playing LLWD because Breakeven is charting? The Script didn’t sing LLWD.
It doesn’t make sense.
Since when did two songs in the same genre sang by two different artists have effect on each other? LLWD is still getting adds and the only thing that will let radio stop playng it is Kris releasing a new single to radio. Even in that case, it will just fall of the mediabase charts but lots of stations will just reduce it’s play.
LLWD doesn’t look like a song that will die .

Congratulations Adam!!! Kris will be next with the gold, just you wait and see and HAPPY BIRTHDAY LITTLE LUV!!!

saga

No reason why they would do that. Especially with LLWD moving up the charts still. It’s not like radio doesn’t play a lot of similar songs!

Katharine’s Terrified also got a significant bump on itunes after Didi B. sang the song. #32 on Pop and #70 overall! The regular version is #72 on Pop.

Unbroken, the album, is up to #82 on Pop, and the regular version is #89 on Pop.

very nice! i love that song!

saga

I brought this over from IDF where Kworb has been nice enough to show us on a daily basis how LLWD is doing in spins relative to the 7 HAC songs which are still charting higher than it. Long story short LLWD is positioned to move a lot higher on the HAC chart!

Only Daughtry had a better day today. Kris will pass Owl City tomorrow.

1283 spins away from #1 TRAIN (+42)
896 spins away from #2 ROB THOMAS (+56)
524 spins away from #3 LIFEHOUSE (+5)
325 spins away from #4 KELLY CLARKSON (+47)
214 spins away from #5 NICKELBACK (+56)
53 spins away from #6 OWL CITY (+94)
34 spins away from #7 DAUGHTRY (-10)

(#)is LLWD’s increase/decrease in spins relative to that particular song

I hope radio doesn’t stop playing LLWD as Breakeven is charting higher because they think is the same “genre” and LLWD has had its time.

Ke$ha has Tik Tok & Blah Blah Blah both charting high and it’s the same artist, same genre. Same thing with Lady Gaga, Jay Sean and others. If Kris goes for adds on another single and it does well, both could chart, so different singles from different artists are most definitely able to chart.

Actually hearing CBTM made me think of buying Cook’s album. I didn’t care for LO or CBTM initially, but those two songs are growing on me and I love Cook’s voice.

Surprising but super about that sale bump for David Cook!
if anyone’s interested here’s a vid that has Cookie doing Come Back to Me acoustic – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS83IsggGPA

Adam is officially GOLD – expected but wonderful!!

Does anyone feel Breakeven (the scripts new song) sounds awefully like LLWD.

Actually, I think they sound nothing alike. They have a different chorus, bridge, lyrics and vocals. I do like both songs, but do not think of them as similar at all. On the other hand, every time I hear Ke$ha I hear only “Blah, Blah, Blah” – pun intended!

If Kris goes for adds on another single and it does well, both could chart, so different singles from different artists are most definitely able to chart.

Although true, I don’t expect Kris to have that ability with LLWD. TikTok is a HUGE hit and the other artists are established. LLWD isn’t a HUGE hit, hit yes but not a monster hit, so I think you will see his chart position fall once a new single is sent for adds.

Does anyone feel Breakeven (the scripts new song) sounds awefully like LLWD.

No, LLWD sounds like The Macarena.

CONGRATULATIONS ADAM!!!

So happy for him!

Surprising but super about that sale bump for David Cook!
if anyone’s interested here’s a vid that has Cookie doing Come Back to Me acoustic – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS83IsggGPA

Yeah, I mean, I expect a bump any time *he* performs but nice surprise that we can get a bump when someone else does his song . And thanks for link to AcousticDave. I could listen to AcousticDave all.day.long. Nice listening for a snowy day!

Umm….. I really hope Kris gets more album sales. It’s a great album. I’m surprised they haven’t released single #2 yet. Could they be waiting until LLWD hits platinum? I think single #2 will give more exposure to Kris’s album.

Kris’ second single release will probably tie in with his performance on AI in April. The timing would be very similar to CBTM release last year.

Somewhere there was an article that a song sung on Idol gives the original artist a bump also. So expect it for most songs sung on Idol.

I agree that Kris second single will come after LLWD goes platium.

Somewhere there was an article that a song sung on Idol gives the original artist a bump also. So expect it for most songs sung on Idol.

Same thing was happening with Glee all season too – the original songs kept getting nice (even if it was just temporary) bumps on itunes.

There is almost always a nice bump for the original artist when a song is sung well on idol one of the reasons why I am surprised at this point why some artists refuse to clear their songs for the show.

Congratulations Adam on going gold in two countries and I’m hearing a third is on the way or already there!!

Congratulations Adam on going gold in two countries and I’m hearing a third is on the way or already there!!

Really? That’s great! Which country?

Surprising but super about that sale bump for David Cook!
if anyone’s interested here’s a vid that has Cookie doing Come Back to Me acoustic – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vS83IsggGPA

I’m not surprised. David Cook is probably one of the most popular idol winners to date. With more women watching Idol then men, I think he is probably is at least as popular with idol audiences as Carrie and Kelly are. I would say Carrie and Kelly are more popular outisde the AI bubble than Cook.

Kris just doesn’t seem to get a significant bump from those Ford commericials. To be fair, however, those Ford commericals are not nearly as pimpilicous as Cook’s solo AI commercial was last year.

It will be interesting to see what happens when Kris performs in a couple of months. I suspect he will get a bump, but I don’t think it will be anywhere like Cook’s. I also don’t expect Adam to get the sales bump that Cook did either when he performs.

This is off topic, but there are many pictures of Adam in Mexico in facebook. This is a video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ruajyomvdac

cheers, and sorry if this was already posted.

Kris’ second single release will probably tie in with his performance on AI in April.

LLWD should peak soon. I think we’ll get a new single in March. I think they waited too long to release Cook’s second single (Jive certainly waited too long to release Archie’s second single). The trick is to release the next single when the other one is just starting to fall. Do it too soon and you undercut the song. Do it just at the right time and you can replace your own spins. Do it too late and you have to start from scratch all over again.

Watch the airplay charts for non-Idol singles for a while and you will see that is the pattern they typically follow. A smart label will already have their ducks in a row and have the program directors familiar and on board with the next single.

Plus, it looks like Kris’s April appearance on Idol will be for Idol Gives Back and it’s a bit squiffy to use a telethon to premier your new single. Kelly a few years ago refused to do it. They usually flog a charity single (some cover). Maybe he’ll get a performance slot before that.

Congratulations to Adam on Gold!

KA is a great album! If something falls into place somehow the floodgates could open for him yet. I think this will take more than a sale on itunes, as they are not big sellers of albums. I would be interested to know how many of his sales from last week were from itunes though.

Thanks for the bday wishes ( the early ones too )
I posted a long squee in theheadlimes yesterdy about fye going gold:)

I wonder if RCA really though Blah blah blah would chart as fast as it has done? It has been like a speed rocket! A new Rihanna single is coming (next tuesday) soon as well.

Plus, it looks like Kris’s April appearance on Idol will be for Idol Gives Back and it’s a bit squiffy to use a telethon to premier your new single. Kelly a few years ago refused to do it. They usually flog a charity single (some cover). Maybe he’ll get a performance slot before that.

I too think it’s a bit icky to debut your single on an episode that is essentially a charity telethon. Also, if as suspected LLWD will go platinum and possibly peak on radio in the next few weeks, then I think April is too late. Based on what you said about the single release strategies (that totally makes sense to me), it would seem that Kris’s label should be prepared to release single #2 in March.

Oh, and nice to see Adam get to Gold.

Was just reading over on the Pulse boards about the lack of the Cumulus add for WWFM. Apparently they banned the Dixie Chicks from their playlists and are very conservative. There is only one song higher than him that hasn’t been added. I’m still hoping they will add the song, but they may not. It’s not like they have to, but it would be a nice add, they have some decent sized stations.

ok, why is it taking so long for the singles download sales numbers to show up. I’m not real good at being patient (personality fail, I know – LOL)

LLWD should peak soon. I think we’ll get a new single in March. I think they waited too long to release Cook’s second single (Jive certainly waited too long to release Archie’s second single). The trick is to release the next single when the other one is just starting to fall. Do it too soon and you undercut the song. Do it just at the right time and you can replace your own spins. Do it too late and you have to start from scratch all over again

Excellent analysis, thanks, and sounds about right to this lay person. So that being said, for me the question becomes what should be his next single? Despite saying otherwise, could the Ford commercials on AI be a clue and AWM be the next one? Would work out well to play it on the show on March, after having it played for weeks earlier on the show. Could be a good tie in. Plus lots of people seem to dig the song, so maybe? Because I think that BWCU is also a front-runner. I wasn’t so sure about BWCU, but the AOL session made me like it more. Just selfishly, I would like to have a Kris song that I not only root for, but actually like to listen to, unlike LLWD which I just root for. And speaking of which, whenever we get the numbers, I expect another really good week, even after Grammy slippage –which he’s bounced back from beautifully.

Oh and happy birthday Luv!

Congrats to Adam on gold….took ya long enough. HA! Oh and he won’t have as good a week as last in single sales, but probably pretty good, so there’s that.

Sometime I have the feeling that the labels don’t treat idol artists seriously. For example, if you listening z100 online, you’ll find LLWD is tagged with a strange album cover (i guess it’s the album of LLYD that country song) and Adam’s is still his idol smoky panda picture, while Breakeven a relatively new song to LLWD and WWFM is tagged with the Script’s album cover, both online and in iheartradio.

3) Why do Kara and Randy get paid so much and do so little? If they were replaced by a Chia pet, would anybody notice?

i think this just made my day

YEAH! On FYE selling gold — and whether we expected it or not — some Idol alums albums have just died and stopped selling — and selling 13K this week with no promo event is great!

I hope radio doesn’t stop playing LLWD as Breakeven is charting higher because they think is the same “genre” and LLWD has had its time.

Actually LLWD is ahead of Breakeven on airplay — here is today’s Pop update:

Top 40
Published (U.S.) — Rolling Chart — Currents Only
lw: Jan 27 – Feb 2 TW: Feb 3 – Feb 9
lw TW Artist Title TW lw Move Aud

17 17 KRIS ALLEN Live Like We’re Dyin… 4098 3749 349 25.258

23 21 THE SCRIPT Breakeven 3216 2723 493 16.516

LLWD is way ahead on spins 4,098 vs 3,216 and ever further ahead on Audience Impressions 25.3 million vs. 16.5 million.

And on HAC LLWD is #8 and Breakeven is at #11.

On the Billboard charts LLWD is ahead too:

LLWD Hot 100 #23 Radio Songs [airplay] #33 Digital Songs [sales] #22

Breakeven Hot 100 #53 Radio Songs [airplay] #67 Digital Songs [sales] #46

But Breakeven has the momentum and will move up the chart rapidly. So it could cause problems for LLWD in a couple of weeks.

I think that they will release Kris second single after LLWD peaks on the radio — and it is not there yet. The moment they start to focus on another single, LLWD will drop. And LLWD may well peak on radio after it sells 1 million copies.

Does anyone feel Breakeven (the scripts new song) sounds awefully like LLWD.

Kris’ LLWD sounds like Breakeven [since Breakeven was released first], but not a surprise since LLWD is a The Script song — they wrote, arranged and recorded the track. But Kris’ vocal on LLWD is different than Danny O’Donoghue’s on The Script version of LLWD. I would not confuse the two versions. However, I agree that there is not space on Top 40 radio for both of these songs for very long. But LLWD will get replaced by a new Kris single soon.

RCA got a win-win out of LLWD — Kris got a hit and The Script now are getting US airplay after about a year of effort and two UK/Europe hits that were not successful in the US.

Congratulations Adam on going gold in two countries and I’m hearing a third is on the way or already there!!

Really – which country would be the third?

Patiently waiting for singles sales numbers lol

and selling 13K this week with no promo event is great!

Adam was on Ellen late in the week, so I’m sure some of the sales went over to last week as a result of that. Also, he was at the Awards so which was promotion.

Congratulations to Adam! Your album rocks! Never had to skip any songs while listening to your album.

Here is an excellent article from Rock Star Weekly – Beyond Talent: The Courage of Adam Lambert

http://www.rockstarweekly.com/content/view/1445/206/

Question – Would RCA or Jive like to see their artists sell more singles or more albums? I thought selling more albums will bring them more benifits. Am i wrong? IDK. Can someone tell me?

girlygirl
02/10/2010 at 1:57 pm
ok, why is it taking so long for the singles download sales numbers to show up. I’m not real good at being patient (personality fail, I know – LOL)

I have that same darn personality trait – LOL! Kworb from IDF said they will be available later today, and the person who normally leaks the data early is traveling and unavailable which is the reason for the “delay.”

Kris’s song,’Llive Like We’re Dyin’ is a cover of an old song-his next single better be an original or his credibility is totally gone.

When does the top 12 start on Idol? If mid-March, I think this would be when Kris could debut the second single. I think we’ll see Danny and Allison during the top 24 results shows.

Question – Would RCA or Jive like to see their artists sell more singles or more albums? I thought selling more albums will bring them more benifits. Am i wrong? IDK. Can someone tell me?

You’d probably need to see their financial statements to know the true answer. But, I would guess selling albums is more profitable. Although, selling a lot of singles is nothing to sneeze at. It helps keep an artist’s profile high, and contributes to other revenue streams (like ringtones, etc.).

Is it me or does it seem like the same questions / comments get said every sales or mediabase thread???

Question – Would RCA or Jive like to see their artists sell more singles or more albums? I thought selling more albums will bring them more benifits. Am i wrong? IDK. Can someone tell me?

I keep hearing how selling singles will result in album sales but I don’t see that happening with Kris. The single is doing well but album sales are in the tank. I guess we will see if this theory pans out when he releases another single. I would think album sales would be what they are looking for. That makes much more sense. I for one am not writing off any of the Idols and their success until their albums have been out a year or so. I think Kris and Adam both want longevity in the business, not necessarily instant stardom. I do worry about Allison. Her sales are so bad and I keep hearing about a tour. Why would a record company put out money for an artist who is not selling albums? Maybe she will come back with a better single and more sales. Who knows.

Congratulations Adam on going gold in two countries and I’m hearing a third is on the way or already there!!

Looks like there are now 4 countries where FYE album is Gold:

US – Gold = 500,000
Canada – Gold = 40,000
Finland – Gold = 15,000
New Zealand – Gold = 7,500

Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore could also be close based on the FYE chart positions. [All small markets with proportionally low Gold record thresholds.]

The big test for FYE is coming soon in Japan, UK and Germany/Austria. These are three big markets where American Idol is not that well known and where RCA is supporting FYE album releases. March and April will be very interesting.

LOL Martha.. I am pretty sure the original LLWD did not go gold or was on its way to heading platinum. So LLWD does not appear to have hurt his credibility in anyway. So I think Kris’s credibility is totally fine no matter what song he puts out next.

I do worry about Allison. Her sales are so bad and I keep hearing about a tour. Why would a record company put out money for an artist who is not selling albums? Maybe she will come back with a better single and more sales. Who knows.

I love Allison, but there’s no way she’s getting any kind of tour. Her best hope is to be asked to open for an established act. Her sales are terrible, so she probably can’t fill even the smallest venues. I’m hoping for better for her as well, I just don’t see any light at the end of the tunnel right now.

What’s really bugging me, is why is the label wasting her time by having her do all these radio spots for a single that is going absolutely nowhere. Maybe I just don’t know enough about the business, but if the stations were going to play that single, wouldn’t they have done it by now?

I fear she’s wasting valuable radio exposure on a song that’s dead in the water.

Her best hope is to be asked to open for an established act

Not sure who would be the best fit, but I hope this happens for her – it could be a really valuable means to introduce her to a new audience (which is so important for her right now).

Kris’s song,’Llive Like We’re Dyin’ is a cover of an old song-his next single better be an original or his credibility is totally gone.

Every other song on KATA is original [except Heartless, bonus track and that already is a single] so this is not an issue. The big and fun question is, “What will be the second single?”

Sometime I have the feeling that the labels don’t treat idol artists seriously. For example, if you listening z100 online, you’ll find LLWD is tagged with a strange album cover (i guess it’s the album of LLYD that country song) and Adam’s is still his idol smoky panda picture, while Breakeven a relatively new song to LLWD and WWFM is tagged with the Script’s album cover, both online and in iheartradio.

Breakeven was released in 2008 — it was released to US radio on August 31, 2009 — about a month before LLWD — it was just ignored by US PDs like the past The Script songs.

And the bad images on Z100 site are just proof of how careless 19M really is. The just managed to approve putting the Fantasy Springs concert on AO.com yesterday – after over 3,000 tickets have been sold!

Q3

Do you have the total sales on those countries?
Canada
Finland
New Zealand

Breakeven was released in 2008 — it was released to US radio on August 31, 2009 — about a month before LLWD — it was just ignored by US PDs like the past The Script songs.

Why it is picked up now? It’s shocking how heavily PDs are controlling the airplay of the songs.

Her best hope is to be asked to open for an established act.

Paramore is doing a spring tour. That would probably be good for her, especially if they put out a more rock-oriented single than FIBOU.

Looks like there are now 4 countries where FYE album is Gold:

US – Gold = 500,000
Canada – Gold = 40,000
Finland – Gold = 15,000
New Zealand – Gold = 7,500

Seriously??? WOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Q3
02/10/2010 at 2:25 pm
Congratulations Adam on going gold in two countries and I’m hearing a third is on the way or already there!!

Looks like there are now 4 countries where FYE album is Gold:

US – Gold = 500,000
Canada – Gold = 40,000
Finland – Gold = 15,000
New Zealand – Gold = 7,500

I think you might be able to add China to that list because if I heard correctly,he has sold over 15,000 albums, which qualify international artist as having a gold album. I don’t have any proof that this is true, just something I heard on the internet.

This tweet from Fantasy Springs this morning:

Close to 300 tix left for @adamlambert concert. 100 left for party. And going fast

Definitely will be a sellout. Selling over 3,000 tickets in less than 2 wks is pretty good to me.

and selling 13K this week with no promo event is great!

Adam was on Ellen late in the week, so I’m sure some of the sales went over to last week as a result of that. Also, he was at the Awards so which was promotion.

I thought the conscensus by many was that non-musical events like the Awards thing did not help his musical career-so based on that argument- I wouldn’t count that as promotion to help sell the album and Adam was on Ellen the week before. However, I totally disagree then and now that non-musical appearance do not help his musical career. But we can’t have it both ways when it suits us. Just glad he went gold and will go gold shortly with his single too. Great to see him reaching milestones in so many countries.

Looks like there are now 4 countries where FYE album is Gold:

US – Gold = 500,000
Canada – Gold = 40,000
Finland – Gold = 15,000
New Zealand – Gold = 7,500

awesome!! He’s dominating the gold market, hopefully he’ll reach platinum!

I have to say, AWM is one of my least favorite songs on the album, I hope it’s not the next single. I know it’s being used in the Ford commercials though so I’m sure it will be. It’s kinda fast folksy/country to me and grates on me as much as the Train ‘Soul Sista’ song. But maybe that’s the market it’s going for, so what do I know!

I really like The Truth, which was written by the guy from Train, so very confusing, lol. Let it Rain is great, I wouldn’t mind seeing that as a single. Can’t Stay Away might be another good one.

Looks like Vh-1 is taping an acoustic concert for Adam Saturday.
http://bit.ly/aeVeL9

Congrats to Adam on selling GOLD!!!! (And in 4 countries, no less!) Awesome.

Too bad Mansfield couldn’t bring himself to say the G-word. What a douche.

There are some people who insist that FYE is already released in the UK. For my understanding I thought FYE imports were released and the album does chart on iTunes. Does anyone know what the story is with this? Is it import or not?

ooh, I hope he does Broken Open with Tommy and Monte play acoustic, that would be awesome.

I thought the US version of FYE was on UK Amazon as an import, but the UK version isn’t released yet.

I’m taking the stuff about the VH1 concert to the headline thread, this is the sales thread, but thanks for the info.

While it’s nice that Adam may have gold in other countries, looking at the numbers that get you there? yeah, okay then. He still neeeds to be selling a lot more there and here. Hopefully he’ll keep going steady and gets some increases. I did note that he had like the only decrease last week, all other idols got increase. Hopefully he can turn that around. Though without any promotions coming up…hmmm. Yeah, I’m such a Debbie Downer, and all while I’m stoked he’s doing that VH1 acoustic thing. Just how I roll.

Too bad Mansfield couldn’t bring himself to say the G-word. What a douche.

lol. I was expecting some disclaimer beside the Gold destinction like-Adam Lambert goes Gold but it took 11 weeks or Adam Lambert goes Gold on Cd but is not the first S8 idol to see gold or ….. well you get the picture. lol

I thought the US version of FYE was on UK Amazon as an import, but the UK version isn’t released yet.

Thanks that’s what I thought but I hear its on iTunes too?

While it’s nice that Adam may have gold in other countries, looking at the numbers that get you there? yeah, okay then. He still neeeds to be selling a lot more there and here. Hopefully he’ll keep going steady and gets some increases. I did note that he had like the only decrease last week, all other idols got increase. Hopefully he can turn that around. Though without any promotions coming up…hmmm. Yeah, I’m such a Debbie Downer, and all while I’m stoked he’s doing that VH1 acoustic thing. Just how I roll.

I have a different opinion. I think selling 13K cds while he is on vacation in Mexico is amazing. As for the numbers to get gold in other countries…..US has approximately 350 million people and one needs to sell 500K to get gold. Canada has 35 million people and it takes 40K. I think that is reasonable and remember even with our numbers there are alot of performers that don’t reach gold in this country. So kudos to Adam. We Canadians do love him.

Brian Mansfield posted the sales numbers:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/02/idol-track-sales-kris-allen-tops-fantasia-debuts/1

Kris topped the IDOL sales list with 57,000 digital sales, bringing LLWD to 806,000!

Kris Allen, Live Like We’re Dying (57,000, -10 percent, 806,000)
Adam Lambert, Whataya Want From Me (49,000, -17 percent, 373,000)
Carrie Underwood, Cowboy Casanova (34,000, 0 change, 1.117 million)
Daughtry, Life After You (30,000, -14 percent, 370,000)
Carrie Underwood, Temporary Home (25,000, +46 percent, 170,000)
Kelly Clarkson, Already Gone (20,000, -13 percent, 1.208 million)
Fantasia, Even Angels (10,000, debut, 10,000)
Jordin Sparks, Battlefield [Main Version] (9,000, -19 percent, 1.37 million)

My life sucks. I’m flying from L.A. back east this weekend. But not only did I not get Kradison concert tickets, I can’t even apply for tix for this acoustic concert taping as I already made plans for Saturday with my family…

I did note that he had like the only decrease last week, all other idols got increase. Hopefully he can turn that around. Though without any
promotions coming up…hmmm. Yeah, I’m such a Debbie Downer, and all

^^^^ Last week sales Adam was the only one of two that had increase in sales everyone else had a decrease!!

^^^^Went back to check figures that increase was 2wks ago

What VH1 gig?

Kris Allen, Live Like We’re Dying (57,000, -10 percent, 806,000)
Adam Lambert, Whataya Want From Me (49,000, -17 percent, 373,000)

It seems like Kris’s and Adam’s singles will hit platinum and gold respectively around the same time.

. I did note that he had like the only decrease last week, all other idols got increase

Personally, I’d rather have a decrease and sell 13,000 albums than an increase and sell 5,000 albums.

He still neeeds to be selling a lot more there and here.

Poor Kris and Allison are in a very scary situation then.

Speaking of that, how are they doing in other countries with album sales? Does anyone know what countries KA has accomplished gold in?

My thoughts are gold is gold.It doesn’t matter if the standard is lower. The standard is still there for ALL albums so it is an accomplishment if you reach it.
BTW, the population of the US is 309 million vs 34 million in Canada. It would make sense that their standard for gold would be considerably less.
Does China have different standards for international vs domestic album sales? Or do they steal all their music? LOL

Idol Chatter also posted some numbers for songs getting a Grammy boost. Some pretty impressive weekly numbers:

Black Eyed Peas, Imma Be (+33 percent, 236,000 for the week, #1)
Lady Antebellum, Need You Now (+90 percent, 196,000, #2)
Black Eyed Peas, I Gotta Feeling (+22 percent, 118,000, #7)
P!nk, Glitter in the Air (+1034 percent, 104,000, #10)

Obviously (as seen by the Grammy boost), promo helps tremendously but at a certain point music has to sell itself. Doubt Susan Boyle got some promo but she’s still doing fine. Ditto for Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Getting promo on TV is a bonus most artists can’t rely on.

Too bad Mansfield couldn’t bring himself to say the G-word. What a douche.

lol. I was expecting some disclaimer beside the Gold destinction like-Adam Lambert goes Gold but it took 11 weeks or Adam Lambert goes Gold on Cd but is not the first S8 idol to see gold or ….. well you get the picture. lol

Eh, it is what it is. Of the Season 8 contestants, it seems as if Brian likes Adam the least and he will usually downplay or dismiss any accomplishment/milestone Adam makes and instead play up every mistep or failure. C’est le vie.

But to be fair, did he give Kris Allen a nice write up when LLWD went gold? If he didn’t then perhaps we are reading too much into this.

Congrats to Adam going gold!!! Happy Birthday Luv.

Sorry girlygirl
btw if anyone cares “terrified ” what didi(I think) sang written by Kara got a big boot on iTunes

thanks again 4 all the bday wishes( you guys are making my day !!!)

Personally, I feel Adam is doing extremely well considering the fact that he hasn’t been performing to promote himself. Also, if Kris’s sales weren’t increasing I would be nervous when you realize all the gigs he’s been doing since the new year. So, let’s try and keep it in perspective here. They’re both doing well in their own way….anyhow, it’s longevity that will show the final results.

Good for Adam for hitting gold. I think this is as far as he’ll go plaque wise with this album but I think he could go on to selll around all I ever wanted by summer.

I think selling 13K cds while he is on vacation in Mexico is amazing.

eh I don’t really see the difference between him being here and on mexico for one week, I don’t think the world would entirely forget about him in one week!.

Canada has 35 million people and it takes 40K. I think that is reasonable and remember even with our numbers there are alot of performers that don’t reach gold in this country. So kudos to Adam. We Canadians do love him.

really? I thought we had more artist go gold/platinum in Canada. As for us loving him, I would say that we like him more then the usa but I think he aoput as big here as he is in the usa. Sorry to be a Debbie downer or diminish Adam’s success(I think he’s selling a good amount) but I’m just trying to be realistic.

He still neeeds to be selling a lot more there and here.

^^^ Wow, some of Adam “fans” sure have high expectations of him!!

But to be fair, did he give Kris Allen a nice write up when LLWD went gold? If he didn’t then perhaps we are reading too much into this.

Well okay if he didn’t, but I want something when Kris’s single goes platinum, because seriously, he should. That’s a good thing and it’s a big deal. Blah blah it’s not his album, blah, it’s still a good accomplishement for a singer, and Kris deserves, and should get some kudos for it. Especially considering the Little Engine That Could path it took to get to platinum.

Okay, maybe I’m just working myself up in advance, but yeah, I’ll be peeved if it doesn’t get some blurb, even a small one.

Personally, I’d rather have a decrease and sell 13,000 albums than an increase and sell 5,000 albums.

lol. Yeah, me too. That’s the way I roll.

How about the Philippines?It does have a population of around 90 million. Is Kris or Adam selling well over there? You would think Kris would be!
Did the two Davids sell well in the Phillipines? I’m sure they did. How many units do you have to sell to go gold?

But to be fair, did he give Kris Allen a nice write up when LLWD went gold? If he didn’t then perhaps we are reading too much into this

.

yes, brian gave kris a headline when he passed 500K in downloads (“Kris Allen passes 500K mark” or something like that)…am not surprised that adam passing 500K cd sales was buried underneath other news

LaurelG
02/10/2010 at 3:42 pm

Personally, I’d rather have a decrease and sell 13,000 albums than an increase and sell 5,000 albums.

lol. Yeah, me too. That’s the way I roll.

LOL!!!!

So according to Brian’s rounding numbers on singles, the difference between #16 and #28 is less than 8,000 sales (just using last itune updates I saw for the two). Interesting to know. It might help projections in the future.

Let’s not forget what is gold – THE ALBUM – not the song. Personally, I would rather my album be gold and not the song itself. There’s a big difference between the two. ?!@?

I think selling 13K cds while he is on vacation in Mexico is amazing.

Did he take the week off from selling the album out of the trunk of his car? Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Why does Brian Mansfield have to call Adam’s album gold if isn’t gold because it isn’t certified yet? He did say it had passed the half million mark. It’s not the headline of the sales article because the story in every article about album sales this week is the post Grammy bounce not Adam’s sales. Carrie got a 65% increase for her current album and her other 2 albums increased their sales by more than 30% each so that’s his headline.

When Kris’s Live Like We’re Dying topped 500k he didn’t call it gold either. Here’s the writeup on that:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/01/kris-allen-tops-500000-downloads-for-llwd/1

That’s the headline because Kris’s song is also the week’s top selling AI related song.

Unless there’s a major storyline going on the headline usually goes to the top seller who this week happens to be Carrie (and she also got the biggest percent increase). I don’t see big douchiness going on here but maybe it’s just me.

Oh Truthi

I am sure you do not have to get yourself in angst over what headline Brain will have when LLWD goes platinum. It will be written in lights with fireworks, etc. without a disclaimer. I agree, Kris deserves it. It is a huge milestone compared to his anemic album sales. But, going gold on a CD is also a milestone.

Yes, Kris got a headline when he sold more than 500,000, but Brian didn’t use the “gold” word. Perhaps these days gold is ignored and the big news is when something goes platinum.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/01/kris-allen-tops-500000-downloads-for-llwd/1

I do think having an album hit gold is a bigger milestone then a single hitting gold, but they are both pretty nice accomplishments.

ETA-windmills beat me to it.

tiger92
“My thoughts are gold is gold.It doesn’t matter if the standard is lower. The standard is still there for ALL albums so it is an accomplishment if you reach it.”

That’s what I was thinking , gold is gold. I think RCA has to be glad he’s selling in other countries besides the U.S. They have to be thinking if he’s going gold in these countries, there’s no reason why he can’t go platinum. He’s selling both singles and albums and all of these small numbers add up to make a profit. Album sells could lead to endorsements, photo shoots and commercials. Adam has a distinctive look and singing style, plus he’s well spoken. He has an advantage of not looking like the average All-American boy next door.

How about the Philippines?It does have a population of around 90 million. Is Kris or Adam selling well over there? You would think Kris would be!

Piracy is rife in the Far East, Philippines is not an exception, it is in fact an exporter of pirated CD and DVD. Legitimate CD sales is probably quite low.

singles sales numbers are in. LLWD at 57K, WWFM at 49K

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/02/idol-track-sales-kris-allen-tops-fantasia-debuts/1

But to be fair, did he give Kris Allen a nice write up when LLWD went gold? If he didn’t then perhaps we are reading too much into this.

Good question! Here’s the answer:

January 13, 2010 headline of his singles sales thread…”Kris Allen tops 500k in downloads”.

Let’s not forget what is gold – THE ALBUM – not the song. Personally, I would rather my album be gold and not the song itself. There’s a big difference between the two.

ITA!!!
I’m sure musical artists and record companies would agree with this!

congrats to Kris for LLWD …. still has a lot of life in it!!!

It’s at #16 now. And since a few days it moved between #15 and #18 so it’s possible that it might have even better sales next week

I don’t think labels are into the either/or. They want albums and singles both to do well. Since Kris’ album sales are meh, those excellent single sales are helping him keep his job at Jive.

And I’m sure RCA will be happy if and when WWFM goes platinum. Some current singles are selling 3-4 million copies at $1 plus a pop. I don’t think labels are into putting down any revenue source in this tough market.

I thought LLWD would be platinum in three weeks and I’m sticking with that prediction even though four is probably a better guess.

Why does Brian Mansfield have to call Adam’s album gold if isn’t gold because it isn’t certified yet?

Do you think Brian will make a nice headline about it when it is “certified”? We’ll see.

Kris Allen, Live Like We’re Dying (57,000, -10 percent, 806,000)
Adam Lambert, Whataya Want From Me (49,000, -17 percent, 373,000)

LOL, Kris sold 57,000 copies of LLWD as single, plus 5k as part of the album: 62 K total
Adam sold 49000 copies of WWFM as single, plus 13k as part of the album: 62 K total

Seriously guys: Brian Mansfield’s headline usually goes to the week’s top seller. LLWD was the top AI related download seller the week it got past 500k so it got the headline. Carrie’s album is the top AI related album seller this week plus it has the biggest increase by far, that’s why it got the headline. But for the record Adam was part of his headline LAST week for approaching the half million mark even though he was outsold:

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/02/album-sales-carrie-underwoods-back-on-top-adam-lambert-approaches-a-half-mil/1

By the way Brian added a lot more numbers to his album post including AIers like Kellie Pickler and Mandisa. He also gave the breakout of digital album sales.

It turns out 14k of Carrie’s PO sales of 30k were digital so the i-Tunes REALLY helped. It was an increase of 358% digitally. I definitely think PO sales will decrease this week despite Valentine’s Day because the i-Tunes deal is gone.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2010/02/carrie-underwood-others-see-post-grammy-album-sales-bump/1#uslPageReturn

Do you think Brian will make a nice headline about it when it is “certified”? We’ll see.

tiger92 I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a headline when Carrie’s Play On was certified platinum, so no I don’t think that unless there’s some other Adam news it goes with. I don’t even think Brian’s acknowledged PO officially being certified. So does that mean I have to assume he hates Carrie?

Personally I think any musician would be thrilled if anything of theirs went gold, whether itbe a single or an album. What do you think is the percentage of musicians even signed to mid-sized or big label deals who see anything of theirs go gold? I would venture that that % is pretty low.

And I’m not going to get hung up on what Brian writes or doesn’t write. I remember he did mention it when Carrie went platinum a few weeks back — maybe that’s what he does, wiats for stuff to go platinum rather than gold before he mentions it in that manner?

Kris got a 66% jump in his digital album sales this week. Both he and Adam are listed at 2K for digital album sales this week. Overall, Adam has sold approx. 21K more digital albums than Kris, which isn’t a huge gap. I wonder why there’s such a huge gap in totals for the non-digital album sales? There are likely several reasons of course, but it’s interesting that the digital sales are relatively close while the overall sales are not.

Seriously guys: Brian Mansfield’s headline usually goes to the week’s top seller. LLWD was the top AI related download seller the week it got past 500k so it got the headline.

All I know is he takes every opportunity to diss Adam and his sales (remember his comments after Adam’s second week sales?) so I don’t even venture to his site anymore. I wait until someone posts them here.

If and when Adam goes platinum, I expect Brian to say something like “took him long enough”.

I wonder why there’s such a huge gap in totals for the non-digital album sales? There are likely several reasons of course, but it’s interesting that the digital sales are relatively close while the overall sales are not.

Peeps buy the hard copy cause they want to see Adam’s cover! lol j/k

People want Adam’s pretty album cover?

Unless there’s a major storyline going on the headline usually goes to the top seller

Well, I think the major storyline is that it is the FIRST ALBUM from a SEASON 8 FINALIST to SELL 500,000+. And fine if he wants to stand on a technicality and not declare it gold until it’s certified, but at least give it a prominent mention as opposed to burying it at the end of the story.

And, yes, I think an idol hitting a major milestone for his first album is a bigger story than “grammy sales bump.” By the way, it’s not just this article. There’s a pattern here in Mansfield’s (non)reporting and a lot of people have noticed.

So LLWD is at (approx) 806K now. Which means it’ll likely go platinum when — 4 to 5 weeks?

Meanwhile, WWFM is now at (approx) 373K. Which means it’ll likely go gold when — 3 to 4 weeks?

Does that seems reasonable?

So LLWD is at (approx) 806K now. Which means it’ll likely go platinum when — 4 to 5 weeks?

Meanwhile, WWFM is now at (approx) 373K. Which means it’ll likely go gold when — 3 to 4 weeks?

Does that seems reasonable?

Yup.

I still don’t get why ADam and Kris sell the same amount of digital CD’s when Kris is always head of Adam on the itunes chart for albums. Anyone have an explanation? Of course, it could be Brian’s rounding stuff again.

So LLWD is at (approx) 806K now. Which means it’ll likely go platinum when — 4 to 5 weeks?

Meanwhile, WWFM is now at (approx) 373K. Which means it’ll likely go gold when — 3 to 4 weeks?

Good for both of them.

LOL, Kris sold 57,000 copies of LLWD as single, plus 5k as part of the album: 62 K total
Adam sold 49000 copies of WWFM as single, plus 13k as part of the album: 62 K total

^^^^^What?

And I’m not going to get hung up on what Brian writes or doesn’t write. I remember he did mention it when Carrie went platinum a few weeks back — maybe that’s what he does, wiats for stuff to go platinum rather than gold before he mentions it in that manner?

ITA-it’s no point in getting that caught up on what Brian writes. For me, when he basically wrote Adam off back in December, I kind of stopped paying attention to his opinion. Seriously, Kris won AI, so if Adam’s was popular on the show, Kris should be even more so.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2009/12/albums-sales-adam-lambert-plummets-carrie-underwood-stays-top-10/1

But back to the boys. The fact that they are still chugging along is a good sign. Both Kris and Adam seem to be selling like Jordin. No big sale numbers up front, but they will get there in the long run.

I think if no one from S8 has a platinum album by November, 2010 Brian should write a column about that historic event. He can put both Kris and Adam’s names in the headlines so all the fans will be happy.

Seriously, I agree the Jordin Sparks model is in effect here. Although it took a monster hit like No Air to do it for her.

While I’m glad LLWD is doing fine, I’m very disappointed Kris’ album sales aren’t better. I hope Jive doesn’t give up on him.

I still don’t get why ADam and Kris sell the same amount of digital CD’s when Kris is always head of Adam on the itunes chart for albums. Anyone have an explanation? Of course, it could be Brian’s rounding stuff again.

It’s because Adam has two albums, the regular and the deluxe version, selling on ITUNES and they both usually rank in the 100s, (although I believe the deluxe version has dropped to the low 200s now) so you have to combine those sales. So Kris’s regular version album may be higher then both of Adam’s albums, but he only really has one album selling. Kris’s funky ITUNES PASS/Deluxe album was kind of a marketing nightmare. It’s always sits in the 700s or so on the ITUNES chart.

Re the itunes cd sales, adam has been outselling or selling the same as kris even when kris has been ahead on the itunes chart because 1) adam has generally had both his regular and his deluxe cd in the top 200 and those sales are added together and 2) there is relatively little difference in the sales of itunes cds below the top 30 or so. So while it may. Look nice to be #80 instead of #105, in reality there is only a few sales units difference. But the big reason is 2 versions of the cd for adam v 1 for kris

I hope Jive doesn’t give up on him.

A platinum single will help here. Plus, LLWD seems to have some juice in it. It may sell more than platinum in the end. A second hit single will seal the deal though. Hope there’s one on the album.

All these comparisons are useless, IMO. Labels would be happy with anything that’s selling be it singles or albums. Why should we downplay any of them.
At the end of the day, it’s the profit they make in total that matters to them and their investment into each artist financially is different.
I never compare Adam and Kris’ sales because they are on different labels and none of us know how much their labels have invested in them. Therefore, comparisons don’t and will never make sense.
People always wonder why Jordin is still there, and my answer lies in what I just wrote in the above paragraph, level of investments and profits.
It’s not like Kris is selling 0(zero) copies each week. Selling 5,000 copies each week with only one single out for a new artist is not bad in my books. Just check those with more than one big hit on the itunes apart from the established artists and very popular ones, and check how their albums are doing. You’ll be suprised that some of them are not even in the top 500.

I realize Kris’s album sales are disappointing, but the totals have remained pretty steady over the past few weeks. The % drops have been pretty small from week to week (except the 1st to 2nd week). Of course the increases have been pretty small, too. But steady sales at 5K or so are still better than dropping entirely off the map.

Kris got a 66% jump in his digital album sales this week. Both he and Adam are listed at 2K for digital album sales this week. Overall, Adam has sold approx. 21K more digital albums than Kris, which isn’t a huge gap. I wonder why there’s such a huge gap in totals for the non-digital album sales? There are likely several reasons of course, but it’s interesting that the digital sales are relatively close while the overall sales are not.

Girlygirl, I’ve always wondered that myself. NGL, I’ve wondered, and even mentioned about multiple buying by AL fans, but I’d honestly like to know the facts if anyone can tell me. Can one person buy multiple copies of a song/album on i-tunes without gifting those extra copies? I think it would be beneficial for everyone to know, from all fan bases. I’ve seen it questioned on a number of sites, including this one, and it would be worth knowing.

I remember he did mention it when Carrie went platinum a few weeks back

For the record this did NOT happen. I actually went back and checked because I’m stubborn like that. Play On got the little platinum symbol next to it on the Billboard charts released on 1/21. None of the fans knew it had been certified before then and it wasn’t mentioned in the media. I checked every post at Idol Chatter that mentioned Carrie since then and he did NOT mention platinum certs for Play On or Cowboy Casanova.

He noted when Carrie and Daughtry had singles sell past the million mark here. The word “platinum” did not come up.

The only way I see Brian mentioning a certification is if the label sends out a press release with certification information and he posts that on his blog. But he usually paraphrases those too so he might leave the certification info out.

There’s a pattern here in Mansfield’s (non)reporting and a lot of people have noticed.

OK but do you mean “(non)reporting” like when he posted two separate headlines about Adam’s sales from Oprah? link 1 link 2

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t think Brian is an Adam fan. I know he didn’t like Adam’s AMA performance. I thought his take on Adam’s 2nd week sales was really short sighted. But I don’t think he selectively chooses his sales headlines and coverage to slight Adam, I think that was a case of him having the wrongs instead of him hating. Seems to me he treats everybody about the same and tries to balance things out as far as who he spotlights. There’s always something more he could say about every idol.

In regards to all of this *concern* over whether Kris is in jeopardy of getting dropped by Jive due to his *anemic* album sales… Kris is #3 in cumulative sales amongst Jive artists in the Billboard 200 right now.

Three Days Grace – Life Starts Now (294k)
Chris Brown – Graffiti (258k)
Kris Allen – Kris Allen (255k)
R. Kelly – Untitled (241k)
Britney Spears – The Singles Collection (119k)

I would guess that Jive is probably OK with how he’s doing, especially with LLWD well on it’s way to platinum.

album sales are just crappy and horrible in general in this climate. piracy, recession, everything. so good adam on going gold. i mean kesha has tik tok and blah blah blah going to be another #1 hit and her album sales are pretty bad considering whats happening for her….i mean if kelly clarkson has only sold 800K+ in almost a year, hopefully adam can hit that!

Dang! How does Jive stay afloat??

WWFM could be a Top 10 hit if Cumulus and CBS would get with it and add him. I get so frustrated with people whom I’ve heard say Adam can’t sell singles. It’s kinda hard to sell singles to people if they don’t hear it on the radio or watch VH1 at 4 AM. Having said that, he’s doing amazingly well considering the obstacles he has faced with radio

Thanks for the Jive info. I don’t think Kris is in any danger of losing his label based on those stats.

“Dang! How does Jive stay afloat??”

Justin Timberlake and Britney Spears are signed to Jive… they do a pretty good business when they release albums. Also isn’t Jive known as the “cheap” label? They probably have a lower threshold for profitability.

I’m not holding my breath for Cumulus and I hope I’m proven wrong next week.

Also, LLWD’s audience impression is around 41mil and WWFM is around 26mil. Daughtry and John Mayer are getting roughly the same Ai but they’re selling much less. Daughtry last week sold about 30k.

Actually album sales in 2010 are pretty decent. Lady A has sold close to 600K in two weeks. That’s incredible for an album released in January.

700k actually

481k 1st week plus 209k 2nd week means 690k in 2 weeks.

More evidence that sales aren’t so bad? Sade is projected by HDD to sell 400-425k 1st week. Billboard’s saying 375-400k. Amazing.

HDD
Billboard

I’ve wondered, and even mentioned about multiple buying by AL fans, but I’d honestly like to know the facts if anyone can tell me. Can one person buy multiple copies of a song/album on i-tunes without gifting those extra copies?

Did they both sell about 2,000 digitally this week? Sorry if I am off on that number, I will look back to see. But I did want to address the gifting comment. I think if you go down the ITUNE gifting path theory, I think it would apply more to Kris than Adam if you base it on ITUNE sales of about 2,000 each. That would mean about 40 percent of Kris’s album sales this week come from ITUNES, where only 16 percent of Adam’s album sales come from ITUNES.

I find that interesting in itself. Either way, I think both these guys are now selling outside the bubble. I think the gifting days are over.

Oops, edited that out. Wow, Sade’s numbers are impressive. SuBo and Taylor Swift have also lifted the boats for overall album sales. Good for the music biz.

I am guilty, I bought Sades CD!

I bought the single Soldier of Love. And I’m listening to Hope for Haiti and I absolutely love Taylor Swift’s song Breathless. Just had to get that out there.

So basically LLWD is being heard by almost double the people that WWFM is yet the sales gap is small in comparison. And WWFM is being heard as much as Mayer and Daughtry, yet WWFM is still selling more.

By the way, it’s not just this article. There’s a pattern here in Mansfield’s (non)reporting and a lot of people have noticed.

Yep! It’s kind of comical. It’s fun to watch the new ways Brian tries to discount certain numbers. I am rather amused by it all.

saga: I’m guilty of buying SuBo’s cd and contributing to her huge sales numbers. I finally gave in and bought it for my mom for Valentine’s Day. She loooved her on Oprah! (sigh)

Yep! It’s kind of comical. It’s fun to watch the new ways Brian tries to discount certain numbers. I am rather amused by it all.

I’m rather amused as well but probably not at the same thing.

Kris got a 66% jump in his digital album sales this week. Both he and Adam are listed at 2K for digital album sales this week. Overall, Adam has sold approx. 21K more digital albums than Kris, which isn’t a huge gap. I wonder why there’s such a huge gap in totals for the non-digital album sales? There are likely several reasons of course, but it’s interesting that the digital sales are relatively close while the overall sales are not.

Set aside the rounded digital sales numbers because 2K can be anything from 1,501 to 2,499 and Brian has to report it as 2K. So at there low numbers things that look the same are not the same.

The difference is not that great — Adam’s album sales are 12.9% digital and Kris’ are 17.3% digital.

I think there are five reasons for Adam’s higher CD sales penetration –

1. Demographics — Adam has a diverse fan base that includes a lot of fans over 40. People over 40 are more likely to buy CDs and more likely to purchase Amazon MP3 vs. iTunes. [Adam has consistently charted above Kris on Amazon MP3.]

2. Adam fans want the photos that come with the CD.

3. Whenever an artist sells a lot of digital tracks, they pick up digital album sales. Kris hit the 500,000 mark about a month ago — and is now at 806K. That is a lot of people who have already purchased part of a Kris Album on iTunes. Adam only has 373K units of WWFM out there so a much smaller universe to convert to album completion.

4. Kris has the album sales units from the iPass and they are all digital. A large portion of Adam’s presale was from Amazon CD’s — week 1 which includes the presale, Adam was only 19% digital. Kris week 1 album sales were 30% digital.

5. Kris’ won Idol and a lot of his sales were to American Idol viewers who are used to purchasing music on iTunes. Adam probably had fewer core American Idol fans than Kris [at least based on the voting results].

There effect of multi-buying on total sales numbers is vastly overrated. And with sales of 505,000 CDs, I do not think that it is rational to think that there are a few thousand people buying them. That is over $6 million in FYE album sales. Also, there is a lot of external evidence that Adam has a large fanbase.

Just wanted to drop in and say HAPPY BIRTHDAY to LUV you can remember this as the day Adam’s album went GOLD. Hope your bithday is golden,too!

I bought Sade’s CD yesterday. Loving it so fat..those numbers prove that despite the crappy economy some people can still sell a lot of CD’s.

I don’t get comparing WWFM to Daughtry’s current single, which his his followup single to his 1st. Unless 2nd singles go on to be a moster hit they generally don’t sell as much as the 1st, and over 928,000 people own the album already.

The difference is not that great — Adam’s album sales are 12.9% digital and Kris’ are 17.3% digital.

Overall, that is correct. But this week, based on the rounded numbers, Kris sold a higher percentage of albums digitally this week than Adam did. I wonder if that was due to the ITUNES sale this week?

I think the word for how all this makes me feel is… bemused? It’s just not worth all the worrying over every teeny detail, it really isn’t. You can spend all day thinking so and so slighted your guy/girl and it’s really quite exhausting.

ITA!!! If you laugh about it, it makes it seem even more insignificant. I’d rather have the attention and praise from mainstream media than idol bloggers. It works for me!

Adam fans want the photos that come with the CD.

I’m going with this! And they want the cover!

Adam fans want the photos that come with the CD.

Yeah!! hehehe

Adam fans want the photos that come with the CD.

ditto – it is soooo true, especially us old folks, the over 45 crowd… LOL

Q3, some interesting points, but a couple of them apply equally to Kris. He is a little hottie, and I certainly wanted a hard copy of his cd with the very pretty pictures!

Also, given the fact that Idol demographics as a whole are older, and since Kris won the show, I think it’s fair to say that he has quite a few older fans as well.

What concrete evidence do you have that the “effect of multi-buying on total sales numbers is vastly overrated”? That is your opinion, and you are certainly entitled to it, as am I to mine. What I am really looking for, though, is an answer to my question. Is there a limit as to how many copies of a song/album can be purchased on i-tunes? That would also reasonably explain why there is such a difference in the percentage of their digital sales.

By the way, it’s not just this article. There’s a pattern here in Mansfield’s (non)reporting and a lot of people have noticed.

Okay, I’m not knocking what other people feel. I was personally done with Brian after his editorial comment as part of the smelly fan whatever, but I don’t think it matters. He provides pretty, shiny numbers, and that’s all I care about. Plus I do think that he puts as his lede the biggest story, and that was the Grammy boost, and Carrie was an Idol who really saw one. Wow, +65%, nice! and on top of already impressive sales by her.

But hey, that’s my mileage.

I don’t care what Brian writes or who he likes. I just wanna know the numbers.

Is there a limit as to how many copies of a song/album can be purchased on i-tunes? That would also reasonably explain why there is such a difference in the percentage of their digital sales.

I want to say 10? But I could be remembering wrong. I know there was a discussion awhile back about it. I recall it has something to do with the Claymates. Those who have been here longer however, would probably know.

Also, perhaps Kris has many fans in the cold part of the country and they are snowed in, so they have to download his album?

Unless 2nd singles go on to be a moster hit they generally don’t sell as much as the 1st,

Well, WWFM has already outsold FYE.

Actually, I have to thank Brian Mansfield for adding some humor to my life — if it was the first time, I would just brush it aside as I have in the past but this is one of several similar occurrences.

And I will give Brian the benefit of the doubt one last time — but if on March 3rd when WWFM hits 500K, I sure hope the headline isn’t: LLWD approaches the 1 million mark; should be there next week. Because the events are going to be so close together, I am predicting a Kris-Adam headline from Brian that week!

Just to compare….

1/13/10 – Event – Soundscan numbers show LLWD passes 500,000 mark

Headline: Kris Allen tops 500,000 downloads for ‘LLWD’

Photo: Kris

Mention is lead: Kris Allen passes the half-million mark this week with Live Like We’re Dying. People downloaded 65,000 copies of Kris’ single last week, pushing it to nearly 551,000 total.

2/10/10 – Event – Soundscan numbers show FYE album passes 500 mark

Headline: Carrie Underwood, others see post-Grammy album sales bump

Photo: Carrie

Mention in the third paragraph: Also seeing increases last week, according to Nielsen SoundScan: Albums by Daughtry, Kelly Clarkson and Kris Allen. And Adam Lambert’s For Your Entertainment passed the half-million sales mark.

Now, I can accept that Carrie’s Grammy sales bump in the lead — I would have done the same thing. And Brian did mention that Adam was approaching the 500K mark in last weeks headline — after Carrie, of course.

I also could see putting Daughtry’s sales increase as the #2 item [although Adam did outsell him this week and I think that the first AI8 Gold album is bigger news than Daughtry selling 12K.]

But I have to wonder when FYE crossing the 500K line is ranked as less important news than — Kris having a sales increase of about 550 units, and Kelly having a sales increase of about 200 units. [No knock on Kris or Kelly intended by me -- but that is the increase in units.]

Bottom line, I’m happy for Adam going gold. It’s been a tough “welcome to the real world” for this season 8 kids, and to be honest, I have no problem supporting any of them. They gave us all a lot of great entertainment last year, and the price of an album for each of them releasing one, is a pretty reasonable price to pay for that.

Yep! It’s kind of comical. It’s fun to watch the new ways Brian tries to discount certain numbers. I am rather amused by it all.

I’m rather amused as well but probably not at the same thing.

Heh. I know what you mean, jpfan. Thanks windmills for setting the record straight on those ever-important Brian “mentions” and “non-mentions.” We are rather good are working ourselves up to high dudgeon, aren’t we? *looks around and checks own glass house* Hee.

Seems to me he treats everybody about the same and tries to balance things out as far as who he spotlights.

Sorry, windmills. I just don’t see it that way. At all.

Consider the following two articles, both written by Mansfield, both discussing the Adam’s and Kris’s second week of sales. The difference in tone is unmistakable.

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2009/12/album-sales-adam-lambert-gets-soooo-close-to-200k/1

http://content.usatoday.com/communities/idolchatter/post/2009/12/albums-sales-adam-lambert-plummets-carrie-underwood-stays-top-10/1

With respect to Kris, he goes out of his way to paint the rosiest picture, focusing on who had percentage drops larger than his and noting that although his drop wasn’t great, it wasn’t out of the ordinary either (percentage-wise). Adam gets a headline, yes, (it’s his first week of sales after all) but Mansfield focuses on the negative. Not what Adam accomplished (greatly outselling the winner), but what he didn’t accomplish (breaking the 200,000 mark).

And in the second article, well, he basically writes that Adam’s career is in jeopardy of being over before it ever started. This despite the fact that by week 2 Adam is halfway to gold and sold more in his first week than Kris sold in his first three weeks. Forget percentages, there’s a HUGE difference in the raw numbers and Mansfield completely ignores it.

I won’t belabor the point. Today’s article is just more of the same to me.

I agree with what someone is the past said-Media loves Adam, AI bloggers not so much. I find Brian’s spin amusing. It reminds me of politics. Spin it in the best light to highlight one and in the worst light to diminish the other. He is actually getting so good at it, I think he should go into Politics. Sarah Palin is looking for some staffers!

LaurelG, I remember those articles and two mainstream newspapers called out Brian bias reporting of Adam and wrote up a proper one for Adam. If your own peers are picking up on your bias reporting you have a credibility problem. I heard there was someone else before Brian took over was it the same thing?

I’d rather have the attention and praise from mainstream media than idol bloggers.

That’s definitely a sensible way to go but Brian Mansfield is one of USA Today’s senior music writers so he is definitely mainstream media. That having been said his focus is the music coming out of Nashville so he doesn’t do a lot of the pop music reviews for USA Today. That’s not to say he doesn’t listen to pop music, just that he doesn’t write about it so he’s not likely to be writing any USA Today articles about Adam except in direct relation to American Idol.

LaurelG: like I said I thought Brian’s opinion about the state of Adam’s career based on his 2nd week drop was short sighted but a case of him having the wrongs not anything more dastardly than that. I see my unnecessarily exhaustive research on Brian’s lack of cert mentions for other AIers who’ve hit sales milestones, the way he usually assigns sales headlines, and my crazy non-Adamcentric belief that the Grammys were indeed music’s biggest story this past sales week as more than enough to demonstrate that bias wasn’t a driving factor in Brian’s sales talk this week. Agree to disagree You’re welcome to have the last word.

I agree with what someone is the past said-Media loves Adam, AI bloggers not so much.

I suspect the mainstream media doesn’t follow AI until the top 12/13. I think they just judge the show on what they watch and are not caught up in who is pimped or not pimped. That’s just my theory.

Well, WWFM has already outsold FYE.

But FYE was never officially the first single, nudge, nudge.

I think RCA/19 isn’t losing any sleep over Brian!

Congrats Lambert.

Thanks ljsmack and others or the bday wishes

Oh and Brian Mansfield is a do**hebag

Is there a limit as to how many copies of a song/album can be purchased on i-tunes? That would also reasonably explain why there is such a difference in the percentage of their digital sales.

You can buys as much as you want (as many copies) on itunes…it is unclear whether itunes counts more than 8 or something like that when doing their chart rankings. I have no idea whether they all get reported to soundscan or not. but if you want to buy 100 downloads of llwd or wwfm or lay or cc or any other idol tune, you can certainly do it

Top 20 in album sales from Pulse. The only idol there is Carrie so hopefully the rest of the AI numbers will come in from the usual other sources.

1 LADY ANTEBELLUM NEED YOU NOW 208828 689796
2 LIL WAYNE REBIRTH 175620 175960
3 NICK JONAS & THE ADMINISTRATION WHO I AM 81537 81636
4 LADY GAGA FAME 79417 2726359
5 VARIOUS 2010 GRAMMY NOMINEES 70601 164826
6 BLACK EYED PEAS E.N.D. (ENERGY NEVER DIES) 69662 1999018
7 TAYLOR SWIFT FEARLESS 52968 5519014
8 ROB ZOMBIE HELLBILLY DELUXE 2 48564 48668
9 SUSAN BOYLE I DREAMED A DREAM 46388 3461364
10 ZAC BROWN BAND FOUNDATION 40006 1568890
11 MICHAEL JACKSON MICHAEL JACKSON’S THIS IS IT 34947 1439421
12 LADY GAGA FAME MONSTER (8TRK) 33719 733388
13 ALICIA KEYS ELEMENT OF FREEDOM 33703 998937
14 BEYONCE’ I AM…SASHA FIERCE 32192 2741929
15 PINK FUNHOUSE 31468 1544442
16 MARY J. BLIGE STRONGER 31022 563538
17 KE$HA ANIMAL 30222 314732
18 CARRIE UNDERWOOD PLAY ON 29849 1292850
19 VARIOUS HOPE FOR HAITI 29186 343102
20 JUSTIN BEIBER MY WORLD 28734 877153

Okay, I think that we’ve bashed Brian enough here. MJ generally prefers that we do not have board-on-board discussions. If you are unhappy with Brian’s reporting, may I suggest posting something on his blog or e-mailing him? Me? I’m thankful he posts numbers and I can relate how hard it is to write a blog post about numbers each week, trying to keep it interesting and trying to keep all the diverse fan bases from burning me in effigy.

Further mentions of Brian on this thread will be deleted. Thank you.

But FYE was never officially the first single, nudge, nudge

wink wink. Know what I mean? Know what I mean? A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind bat, eh? Yeah anyhew. Adam says WWFM is his second single, pretty much nuff said for me there. Nevermind the rest…

Hope07
02/10/2010 at 5:22 pm

Q3, some interesting points, but a couple of them apply equally to Kris. He is a little hottie, and I certainly wanted a hard copy of his cd with the very pretty pictures!

Also, given the fact that Idol demographics as a whole are older, and since Kris won the show, I think it’s fair to say that he has quite a few older fans as well.

What concrete evidence do you have that the “effect of multi-buying on total sales numbers is vastly overrated”? That is your opinion, and you are certainly entitled to it, as am I to mine. What I am really looking for, though, is an answer to my question. Is there a limit as to how many copies of a song/album can be purchased on i-tunes? That would also reasonably explain why there is such a difference in the percentage of their digital sales.

Sure the majority of Kris fans bought the CD, so I am sure people wanted his pictures too. But since there are literally thousands of posts on Adam fansites about people wanting the FYE CD for the pictures I included it on the list about Adam fans.

You can purchase up to 9 albums on iTunes without gifting and they count in Nielsen Soundscan. You can easily trick the system to get hundreds counted on iTunes. So not counting multiple digital albums purchased by one person is not part of the difference.

I have read that the effect of multi-buying is vastly overrated many times on this site — written by many long time Idol fan posters and quite eloquently explained by Kristen. I am not an expert on Idol fan behavior but defer to the experts who post on this site.

My opinion is also based on the evidence — or lack there of. There is NO evidence of any organized fan buying program among Adam fans — now or during the pre-order. There is, however, a lot of evidence that there are a lot of Adam fans — from Adam’s 339,663 Twitter followers, to TV ratings, to magazine sales, to vote once polls, and so on.

In addition, the math argues against it. If you invest $300,000 in bulk buying Adam Lambert albums, you can only buy about 25,000 albums.

Adam has sold 505K albums for total sales of about $6.1 million, Kris has sold 255K albums for total sales of $3.1 million. $3 million is too much to explain with bulk buying or the reverse that some of Kris’ digital sales didn’t count. Note: The only substantial number of digital sales that I am aware of that are NOT in the totals are the FYE Amazon MP3 $3.99 special.

Finally, Adam’s album sales are in line with past Idol #2 finishers when you adjust for the decline in album sales. David Archuleta sold 700K last year. Total album sales are down about 13% this year vs. last year, so if Adam matched Archie’s sales that puts him at 609K. The difference this year is not sales by the #2 Idol finisher, it is Kris’ sales which are substantially lower than any past Idol winner.

cakeygirl
02/10/2010 at 4:59 pm
So basically LLWD is being heard by almost double the people that WWFM is yet the sales gap is small in comparison. And WWFM is being heard as much as Mayer and Daughtry, yet WWFM is still selling more.

So glad someone said this! it’s fantastic the single is doing so well – my thoughts on spins to sales exactly.

I am tired of hearing/reading that Adam doesn’t have great sales…if someone said “would you like to achieve a gold record in 12 weeks” or “would you like to have $5,000,000 or more in sales in 12 weeks”, who would say no or that isn’t good enough?

THIS IS GREAT news and can only lead to wonderful, better things.

Congrats Adam!

oh q3 btw, archie has sold 750k… might wanna put that in your statistics notes for future reference.

also, holiday sales in 2009 was up like 3% from holiday sales in 2008.

Billboard – Hot 100

LW-TW-Title-Artist
23-24 Live Like We’re Dying – Kris Allen
30-34 Already Gone – Kelly Clarkson
35-35 Whataya Want From Me – Adam Lambert
51-52 Life After You – Daughtry
70-61 Temporary Home – Carrie Underwood

I have read that the effect of multi-buying is vastly overrated many times on this site — written by many long time Idol fan posters and quite eloquently explained by Kristen. I am not an expert on Idol fan behavior but defer to the experts who post on this site.

It is over-rated.

A prime example of this is that there was a campaign from some Adam fans on his birthday to buy a bunch of copies of WWFM. I think the aim was to get him in the top 10 as some kind of gift. There efforts had no discernable effect. Why? Quite simply because most people are sane and aren’t interested in spending a bunch of money buying multiple digital copies of something to impress some dude that made more money last year than they may make in their lifetime.

I’m sure many people are tempted to post “I never heard about this campaign” and to them I say, “Good! Nobody thinks you are BSC enough to participate in this ludicrous scheme”. It’s out there. It failed. It fails like every other bulk-buying campaign. Every Idol has BSC fans who try bulk-buying campagins. Every BSC fan who participates in them is wasting their money and may one day sober up and wonder what the hell they were thinking.

There is no sense in bulk-buying at all. BSC fans might manage to increase the numbers by 100-1000 units, but that’s a statistical drop in the bucket of a successful artist. The number of true BSC fans is small. The number of failed bulk-buying campaigns is huge. Sales only increase when the general public is interested.

Disclaimer: I only use the Adam story because it is recent (in the past few weeks). The history of Idol is littered with other failed campaigns which I have used in previous posts extolling the ineffectiveness of bulk-buying campaigns. All Idols have a small sub-set of BSC fans. Most people are sane.

also, holiday sales in 2009 was up like 3% from holiday sales in 2008.

Is that for music sales or sales in general? I recall reading articles showing the boostage in overall holiday shopping in 2009 versus 2008, but didn’t know that there a statistic that isolated music sales during the holiday shopping season.

That said, it’s probably good to go with the overall 2008 vs. 2009 percentage loss because we are not in the holiday season anymore and haven’t been for over a month. But the new question to me is whether that 13% is still a valid number. That percentage decrease was thrown around in late October/early November 2009 but if the holiday season actually bucked the trend of declining year over year music sales, AND because a buttload of records are typically moved during the holiday season, then I wouldn’t be surprised if percentage decrease of 2008 versus 2009 has decreased.

ETA: Because would be surprised and wouldn’t be surprised mean two different things. Oops.

Billboard – Hot 100

LW-TW-Title-Artist
23-24 Live Like We’re Dying – Kris Allen
30-34 Already Gone – Kelly Clarkson
35-35 Whataya Want From Me – Adam Lambert
51-52 Life After You – Daughtry
70-61 Temporary Home – Carrie Underwood

I totally do not get this. Kris has increased airplay and sales, yet he moves down a spot. Adam has increase spins but decreased sales and stays the same. What is the formula for this?

Ada

m has increase spins but decreased sales

Adam had decrease vs himself prior week but better sales than kris in the same week.

no matter how you look at it selling 13,000 vs 5,000 puts you in a better position on a chert than comparing a % inc/dec to your own sales the week prior.

“I keep hearing how selling singles will result in album sales but I don’t see that happening with Kris. The single is doing well but album sales are in the tank. I guess we will see if this theory pans out when he releases another single.”

I remembered it happened to Jordan Sparks too. She can sell millions of singles but her album sells sucked too. Hopefully Kris’ second single would help bringing album buyers.

ooops- I wasn’t reading starting from the last page. Quoted and commented on BM. Then I saw Kirsten’s message.

Sorry cariA, I quoted yours but don’t know how to do quote here. I don’t post here often.

I totally do not get this. Kris has increased airplay and sales, yet he moves down a spot. Adam has increase spins but decreased sales and stays the same. What is the formula for this?

The formula for this is that each song gets 1 Hot 100 point for every 10k audience impressions it gets through airplay, 1 Hot 100 point for every 10 downloads it sells, and 1 Hot 100 point for every 50k streams it gets on Billboard tracked outlets. Add each song’s points up, rank them, and you get your Billboard Hot 100.

There might’ve been a song going recurrent between #24 and #35 that helped WWFM not to fall but didn’t help LLWD (but maybe not – this is really something I should’ve checked but I’m too lazy to do it right now). But also because of the way the formula works there’s a little less volatility based on sales.

Has anyone seen a number for FYE – the single. Some are interested in how many it sold.

I totally do not get this. Kris has increased airplay and sales, yet he moves down a spot. Adam has increase spins but decreased sales and stays the same. What is the formula for this?

First, a minor correction: Kris Allen had an increase in airplay and a decrease in sales.

The Hot 100 is a ranking chart, not a ratings chart. One’s ranking is depends not only on how well one’s song does, but also how well other songs perform. The number 2 song one week could have a 100% sales and radio increase in the next week and still be number 2 if number 1 is still earning more points for the chart.

It happens.

A song gets so many points for each 100K in audience impressions, 10K in sales and something for streaming. BB aims for a mix of 55% for audience impressions, 40% for sales and 5% for streaming on average.

505,000!!!!

A thrilling number. And today, seeing Adam’s name here in the weekly sales chart with “Now Gold”, I got a little misty-eyed. Thinking of all those tour night vigils, waiting for vids, or suffering through gurgled mermish cellcasts. (And how it was crazy but delicious fun.)

Not very long ago.

Also not very long ago, just this time last year, Adam was one of those total unknowns whose whole future was riding on what happened week after week. And now he’s got a gold record!!

There are many splendid things about this achievement. Including, next month as he tours the UK, every interview introduction can include it.

But best of, IMHO, is that having one Gold Record – not even 3 months after its release – has to mean they’ll give him a chance to make another one. Which means Adam Lambert Album II will happen. Which makes 505,000 a golden number indeed.

There might’ve been a song going recurrent between #24 and #35 that helped WWFM not to fall but didn’t help LLWD (but maybe not – this is really something I should’ve checked but I’m too lazy to do it right now).

The recurrnecy rule for the Hot 100 is on the chart more than 20 weeks and below 50. Something couldn’t go recurrent between 24 and 35. Although, sometimes there is a 2 year old rule. If there is one on the Hot 100, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t come into play very often.

Sorry to have to ask but what is a “BSC fan?” I’ve also seen it mentioned here and there in other threads. My best guess is “Bat-Shi* Crazy.” Is that it?

Kirsten,

A couple of quick questions if you don’t mind. Why do you think there is such a disparity in percentage of digital sales between Kris and Adam? I really am curious and would love to hear your thoughts.

Do you know about the i-tunes sales limits? I’d be more than happy to lay this subject to rest, but am amazed that I haven’t been able to get an answer to that question.

Oh, and please forgive a newbie for raising questions that have been addressed in the past. S8 was the first that I’ve ever followed Idol on-line, either before or after, and I’m finding the scope of the fans’ involvement to be quite fascinating. Not to break the rules by commenting on other sites/blogs, but there are many, many theories/conspiracies? floating around out there, so it’s an honest question.

Thanks.

To Kirstan, the difference in digital sales for Kris and Adam is because Adam’s CD comes standard and also ‘delu’-with bonus tracks you ccan download free. The digital sales did not combine Adam’s album total, it is split into two different numbers – so the position on the chart is actually far lower than reality in number of sales would indicate. Example: is FYE downloaded 120 and
———FYE delux downloaded 290 it would show up as less than the 410 actual sales. And someone with 300 sales would be listed as higher since it is higer than the 290 without considering the 120 as well.

Martha, no offense, but can you try not to bold everything? It kinda hurts my eyes

jpfan
But FYE was never officially the first single, nudge, nudge.

No, it was the “first single.”*

*Note: for reasons unknown to the general public, however, said single was not given the customary promotional opportunities normally accorded other Idol debut singles and another single was immediately substituted in its stead.

You just have to remember to include all the facts.

Evolution of expectations. He’s another Elvis, another Madonna, bigger than Carrie, as big as Gaga, should sell as well as Archie in about 10 weeks (if sales are adjusted because of overall sales decline).

I don’t want to snark too much because going gold is an accomplishment and Adam’s fans should feel happy. And who knows how much the album will sell in another six months.

Edit: Reasons unknown – Top 40 radio wasn’t into the song. Of course, maybe there’s more to the story (spooky music, puts on tin hat).

ALLEN*KRIS LIVE LIKE WE’RE DYING
Week 1: 15,755 (three days of sales)
Week 2: 23,552 (+49%, 39,307 total)
Week 3: 13,476 (-43%, 52,783 total)
Week 4: 9,980 (-23%, 62,763 total)
Week 5: 10,190 (+2%, 72,953 total)
Week 6: 10,444 (+3%, 83,397 total)
Week 7: 14,754 (+41%, 98,151 total)
Week 8: 21,402 (+45%, 119,553 total)
Week 9: 35,787 (+67%, 155,340 total)
Week 10: 31,327 (-12%, 186,667 total)
Week 11: 27,641 (-12%, 214,308 total)
Week 12: 35,553 (+29%, 249,861 total)
Week 13: 40,355 (+14%, 290,216 total)
Week 14: 109,200 (+171%, 399,416 total)
Week 15: 86,824 (-20%, 486,240 total)
Week 16: 64,667 (-26%, 550,907 total)
Week 17: 69,155 (+7%, 620,062 total)
Week 18: 65,325 (685,377 total)
Week 19: 63,329 (748,716)
Week 20: 57,000 (805,716)

LAMBERT*ADAM WWFM
Week 1: 11,197 (11,871 total)
Week 2: 9,372 (-16%, 21,243 total)
Week 3: 10,178 (+9%, 31,421 total)
Week 4: 20,207 (+99%, 51,628 total)
Week 5: 45,843 (+127%, 94,471 total)
Week 6: 38,422 (-16%, 135,893 total)
Week 7: 32,801 (-15%, 168,694 total)
Week 8: 37,430 (+14%, 206,124 total)
Week 9: 59,421 (+59%, 265,545 total)
Week 10: 58,433 (-2%, 323,978 total)
Week 11: 49,000 (372,478)

FYE:
Week 1: 18,397
Week 2: 26,065 (44,462 total)
Week 3: 19,465 (63,927)
Week 4: 38,509 (102,436)
Week 5: 14,000 (116,436)
Week 5: 13,000 (129,436)
Week 6: 15,169 (144,605)
Week 7: 29,605 (174,210)
Week 8: 20,000 (194,210)
Week 9: 13,000 (207,210)
Week 10: 12,000 (219,210)
Week 11: ??

Wish we had numbers for FYE (single)

Evolution of expectations. He’s another Elvis, another Madonna, bigger than Carrie, as big as Gaga, should sell as well as Archie in about 10 weeks (if sales are adjusted because of overall sales decline). But the the evolution of expectations for post Idol success for all of them does seem to follow a patten.

Going gold in single sales is a bigger accomplishment than going gold in album sales. (because…I forgot all the reasons) Selling 700K singles must mean my idol is selling outside the bubble but it didn’t mean that for past idols. The other idol should be selling more, they got more attention. Just as long as my idol can make a living doing music, I’ll be happy.
The excuses made for them seem to follow a pattern also. I want a country gal to win for season 9. It would stir things up a bit!

Edit: Reasons unknown – Top 40 radio wasn’t into the song. Of course, maybe there’s more to the story (spooky music, puts on tin hat).

Is the Truth Out There, Mulder?

tierbee – LOL!

holy crap. just looked at Orianthi’s album numbers…..about 50K

and she has a hit single! YIKES!!

Evolution of expectations. He’s another Elvis, another Madonna, bigger than Carrie, as big as Gaga, should sell as well as Archie in about 10 weeks

Hahaha, that’s funny. You forgot to add the last one which is he beats Kris.

Cakeygirl

I heard Kesha’s album sales are not good either. Can you see a total for them?

He can be the next Elvis or Madonna. We will only know that later in his career not at the beginning. My overall expectations haven’t changed just the timeline on getting there.

Yeah Kesha sold less than Adam and tik tik is huge plus her cd was $7.99 on iTunes!

Orianthi’s album is really pretty good, it’s too bad it’s not selling better. The instrumental with Steve Vai is amazing.

I’d like to see the single sales for FYE as well if anyone finds them!

lorismile
02/10/2010 at 9:32 pm
Yeah Kesha sold less than Adam and tik tik is huge plus her cd was $7.99 on iTunes!

um they were released a month and a half away and Kesha released in January and that’s the worst month for album sales and Adam was released during the holiday’s which is the best so IMO it’s not fair too compare them.

my point is that is that orianthi has a top 20 hit, soon to be top 10 most likely and shes only sold around 55 K…kesha has sold almost 300K

Kesha sold less than 200k and she had a #1 monster hit out. Adam did not have a hit and actually a flop with FYE single. I think that kinda equals out the nov – Jan debate. Jmo of course. I think it makes more sense to compare current singers CDs than previous contestant CDs since the music landscape is changing so much.

Honestly I had no idea how bad record sales were until i started following Adam around.

Eta – I’m talking debut weeks

ur lucky to sale albums these days, just bc u have hits on the radio doesnt correlate unforunately..so im glad adam has gotten 500K with wwfm just now getting top 20 airplay

o and another example of someone who is an example of poor sales?? SHAKIRA!! 300K…and she was promoting EVERYWHERE!!

um they were released a month and a half away and Kesha released in January and that’s the worst month for album sales and Adam was released during the holiday’s which is the best so IMO it’s not fair too compare them.

I’m not comparing Kesha to Adam. But, she has two huge hits and singles are supposed to drive album sales. She is barely selling more than Kris. I think the peeps that buy her singles like her songs. Most people don’t like her.

i compare to orianthi to cascada-no one knows who they are (cascada is known outside US though)-hence the “branding” is important

o ya another

#1 song-Jay Sean-only 150K in album sales
Timberland-120 K
chris brown-250K
orianthi-60K
shakira-300K

(compiled)

didnt like only 7 people go platinum last year??

Isn’t this from the Phillipines and Sony?

http://sonymusicphil.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/on-the-charts-this-week-feb-8/

Cakeygirl

Where do you see those numbers for the other artists?

Kesha sold less than 200k and she had a #1 monster hit out. Adam did not have a hit and actually a flop with FYE single. I think that kinda equals out the nov – Jan debate. Jmo of course. I think it makes more sense to compare current singers CDs than previous contestant CDs since the music landscape is changing so much.

I don’t see how you can compare the sales of someone who released an album during the month that’s the worse in terms of album sales, to someone who released it during what’s known to be the best month in terms of sales. I’m pretty sure that Adam’s Idol exposure as well as all of the media attention that he’s been given equals Kes$ha having a hit single.

The recurrnecy rule for the Hot 100 is on the chart more than 20 weeks and below 50. Something couldn’t go recurrent between 24 and 35. Although, sometimes there is a 2 year old rule. If there is one on the Hot 100, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t come into play very often.

*facepalm* I’d totally forgotten. Thanks Kirsten.

alaadam Ke$ha’s album has sold 315k to date. I think this is her album’s 5th week on the chart. On last week’s chart (I don’t know her download #s this week), her song TikTok had sold over 3.36 million and her song Blah Blah Blah had sold almost 527k.

frogcooke
02/10/2010 at 6:41 pm
oh q3 btw, archie has sold 750k… might wanna put that in your statistics notes for future reference.

also, holiday sales in 2009 was up like 3% from holiday sales in 2008.

Archie’s sales noted! Sorry, wrote that from memory but that just make my point more valid — Adam’s sales are not inflated by mass fan buying and one of several facts that supports that is that Adam’s are lower that Archie’s even adjusted for the 2009 album sales drop. So 750K adjusted down -13% is 652,500 and Adam is not even close to that number. So why raise a question of fans padding sales — looks like he is underperforming the last #2 finisher to me.

Regarding 2009 sales, the year was ugly and 4th quarter was not much better than the rest of the year. From the Wall Street Journal…

“U.S. album sales in 2009 declined for the eighth time in nine years, according to Nielsen SoundScan, while online song downloads grew too slowly to close the gap.

…. in 2000, the year the CD-sales boom peaked. That year, Americans bought 785.1 million albums, the most on record.”

Link: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703882804574642764293968586.html

Evolution of expectations. He’s another Elvis, another Madonna, bigger than Carrie, as big as Gaga, should sell as well as Archie in about 10 weeks (if sales are adjusted because of overall sales decline).

I don’t want to snark too much because going gold is an accomplishment and Adam’s fans should feel happy. And who knows how much the album will sell in another six months.

Don’t know how much FYE will sell in the next 6 months but I predicted that it would be Gold 1st week of Feb [one down] and that it would be Platinum by the end of 2010. Still believe that FYE will be US Platinum by the end of 2010.

Got a laugh from the first part of the comment but one to respond to the Elvis comparisons — there is only one Elvis and Adam is not Elvis BUT Elvis’ first hit was Heartbreak Hotel — his 17th single. [3 Country hits before that but in 1955 a Country hit was a regional seller and not important like it is now.] Contrary to popular myths, Elvis was not an overnight success.

And when most Adam fans compare Adam to Elvis it is usually because the have physical similarities, have similar stage and photographic presence, and are both entertainers — can sign, dance, act, etc. They are/were also described in similar ways as people — extremely nice, unassuming and polite. That said — they do not have similar life stories, musical influences, or issues.

I have met both of them and seem both of them perform. The similarities are there BUT there is and always will be only one Elvis.

alaadam, thanks for putting up those numbers for the guys’ three singles. I had NO idea FYE was doing so well! I think it will actually reach gold eventually!
And, wow, those numbers for Kris the two weeks after Christmas were just monster huge, weren’t they?!
Interesting to compare the numbers for all three.

http://sonymusicphil.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/on-the-charts-this-week-feb-8/
Isn’t it time to rethink this “FYE single was a flop” stance? It is obviously doing quite well in other countries (also Canada), is charting on the Dance charts (#19 I think?) and is still selling with absolutely no promotion AND no airplay. Looks like this song is only getting started IMO.

Adam’s sales are not inflated by mass fan buying

Unless you were there to see each of these purchases, there’s no way that you can say that this is a fact. AI fans are notorious for their mass purchases, it’s one of the reasons why Adam’s FYE and TFM sold as much as they did.

It sure would be interesting to see numbers for Kris/Adam/Ke$ha if their album release dates were flipped around. Something tells me if Adam released in January he wouldn’t have sold 500,000 by now especially in a matter of 5 weeks. Has Ke$ha performed on the AMA’s and Oprah?
Expectations are definitely changing. And to think last year selling gold in 4 weeks was considered underwhelming!

And I guess it works the other way also. No-one was there for all the sales so they don’t know if they were actually mass purchases by Adam’s fans. I do believe that Adam would be platinum by now if his fans were just mass buying.

AI fans are notorious for their mass purchases, it’s one of the reasons why Adam’s FYE and TFM sold as much as they did.

And maybe that explains why there are so many downloads of LLWD.

aa618892
02/10/2010 at 10:47 pm
http://sonymusicphil.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/on-the-charts-this-week-feb-8/
Isn’t it time to rethink this “FYE single was a flop” stance? It is obviously doing quite well in other countries (also Canada), is charting on the Dance charts (#19 I think?) and is still selling with absolutely no promotion. Looks like this song is only getting started IMO.

I don’t think that everyone was ever onboard with the “FYE was a flop” concept. I still believe that it will sell in the US. FYE is/will be the lead single in the UK, Japan, Brazil, NZ, and most of Europe and Asia. WWFM is/will be the lead single only in the US, Canada [RCA is promoting WWFM vs. FYE there], Germany and Australia. The FYE remix EP gets released in March — and with the success FYE in now having in Clubs, I expect to see that promoted in the US to RHM/dance stations.

That said, I believe that WWFM is the best intro single for Adam in the US. Germany and Australia — so I think RCA is on the right track with that focus single choice.

I’m no fan of Ke$ha’s music. She’s a flash in the pan Pop artist to me but her album is doing fine. From HDD this week: .

16 18 KE$HA KEMOSABE/RCA/RMG 29,787 -1%

It’s not uncommon for Top 40 artists to sell millions of singles and move not alot of albums.

AI fans are notorious for their mass purchases, it’s one of the reasons why Adam’s FYE and TFM sold as much as they did.

If that is true, then ditto with Kris Allen’s LLWD.

ETA-I actually don’t think mass buying is fueling Adam or Kris’s sales, but you can’t say it is true for one and not the other.

Even the fan who spent $8,500 for Adam’s underwear isn’t spending 50K a week downloading WWFM. Ditto for Kris. I don’t think mass buying adds up to much in the end.

It’s not uncommon for Top 40 artists to sell millions of singles and move not alot of albums.

I think this is why RCA is pushing the single sales for her. They are trying to push her album sales. But, isn’t she the one that broke records by selling 600K single downloads in a week? Anyways, RCA only pushed three artists on radio ads this week: Martina Mcbride, Kesha and Adam. So, they know what they want.

i was just refering that most likely alot of artists would like a gold album right now…..jay sean, orianthi, shakira, kris (they all came out with an album around the same time as adam)…adam will get his hit like them too!

undercooked
02/10/2010 at 10:59 pm
AI fans are notorious for their mass purchases, it’s one of the reasons why Adam’s FYE and TFM sold as much as they did.

If that is true, then ditto with Kris Allen’s LLWD.

ETA-I actually don’t think mass buying is fueling Adam or Kris’s sales, but you can’t say it is true for one and not the other.

Well, yeah, I kind of can. See, if you can only download a set number of singles or albums on i-tunes, then it would be pretty difficult to inflate single sales. You obviously can, however, buy as many hard copies as you want. From various things I’ve seen on the internet, I believe it’s happening. Do I think one or even one thousand fans are buying 500 copies each? Of course not. Do I think that an organized fan base such as Adam has would buy three each, yeah, think it’s quite plausible.

It’s only my opinion, though I’ve seen it suggested in enough places to make one think.

Do I think that an organized fan base such as Adam has would buy three each, yeah, think it’s quite plausible.

It’s only my opinion, though I’ve seen it suggested in enough places to make one think.

Ok, now I understand what you were going with in regards to your download question. You are saying Adam’s sales aren’t by music consumers but rather his sales are a product of the the same large organized fan group purchasing 3 or 4 albums per week?

My question to you is if you truly believe fan multiple purchasing is driving Adam’s sales, why wouldn’t you believe the same for Kris?

Neither Kris or Adam are setting the world on fire with their sales. There may be a few BSC fans in each camp that are buying enough CDs to use as coasters for large parties, but I don’t think they are purchasing enough to radically change the sales numbers. I think Kris and Adam have respectable sales, they just don’t have the sales of previous winners and runner ups. I don’t know why that is, but it is what it is.

Even the fan who spent $8,500 for Adam’s underwear isn’t spending 50K a week downloading WWFM. Ditto for Kris. I don’t think mass buying adds up to much in the end.

MTE–and hasn’t Kirsten cleared this point up numerous times? I’m sure everyone off AI has some fans attempting mass buying, but it’s not enough to make a real difference.

Unless you were there to see each of these purchases, there’s no way that you can say that this is a fact. AI fans are notorious for their mass purchases, it’s one of the reasons why Adam’s FYE and TFM sold as much as they did.

It’s one of the reasons LLWD is selling so much then.

Kirsten
02/10/2010 at 6:49 pm
I have read that the effect of multi-buying is vastly overrated many times on this site — written by many long time Idol fan posters and quite eloquently explained by Kristen. I am not an expert on Idol fan behavior but defer to the experts who post on this site.

It is over-rated.

A prime example of this is that there was a campaign from some Adam fans on his birthday to buy a bunch of copies of WWFM. I think the aim was to get him in the top 10 as some kind of gift. There efforts had no discernable effect. Why? Quite simply because most people are sane and aren’t interested in spending a bunch of money buying multiple digital copies of something to impress some dude that made more money last year than they may make in their lifetime.

I’m sure many people are tempted to post “I never heard about this campaign” and to them I say, “Good! Nobody thinks you are BSC enough to participate in this ludicrous scheme”. It’s out there. It failed. It fails like every other bulk-buying campaign. Every Idol has BSC fans who try bulk-buying campagins. Every BSC fan who participates in them is wasting their money and may one day sober up and wonder what the hell they were thinking.

There is no sense in bulk-buying at all. BSC fans might manage to increase the numbers by 100-1000 units, but that’s a statistical drop in the bucket of a successful artist. The number of true BSC fans is small. The number of failed bulk-buying campaigns is huge. Sales only increase when the general public is interested.

Disclaimer: I only use the Adam story because it is recent (in the past few weeks). The history of Idol is littered with other failed campaigns which I have used in previous posts extolling the ineffectiveness of bulk-buying campaigns. All Idols have a small sub-set of BSC fans. Most people are sane.

Well, yeah, I kind of can. See, if you can only download a set number of singles or albums on i-tunes, then it would be pretty difficult to inflate single sales. You obviously can, however, buy as many hard copies as you want. From various things I’ve seen on the internet, I believe it’s happening. Do I think one or even one thousand fans are buying 500 copies each? Of course not. Do I think that an organized fan base such as Adam has would buy three each, yeah, think it’s quite plausible.

It’s only my opinion, though I’ve seen it suggested in enough places to make one think.

I do not think there is any organized Adam fanbase, but assuming there is an organized group — let’s say of 12,000 fans and all 12,000 bought 3 discs each it is still only 36,000 CDs — not enough to matter.

Adam fans can’t even agree on a fan name — they are not likely to agree on a bulk buying strategy.

Are there 100 fans here and there buying a bunch of CDs — maybe. But even if there are it can’t amount to anything that matters.

My guess is there are probably 20 BSC Adam fans who post about buying multiple CDs and helping Adam.

A prime example of this is that there was a campaign from some Adam fans on his birthday to buy a bunch of copies of WWFM. I think the aim was to get him in the top 10 as some kind of gift. There efforts had no discernable effect. Why? Quite simply because most people are sane and aren’t interested in spending a bunch of money buying multiple digital copies of something to impress some dude that made more money last year than they may make in their lifetime.

It also failed because Adam fans decided to celebrate Adam’s Birthday by giving money to DonorsChoose [$42K or more] and to Haiti Relief [at least 3 $1,500+ Red Cross gift cards to Adam] instead. My experience with Adam fans is that there is no interest in wasting money to make a song chart. It just wouldn’t be consistent with Adam’s values to do that. And that matters to many fans — in fact, it is an important reason why many fans are so passionate about him.

I think Kris and Adam have respectable sales, they just don’t have the sales of previous winners and runner ups. I don’t know why that is, but it is what it is.

Well, noone can deny that airplay creates sales, and radio presence is something that Adam had very little of arriving into the Christmas period, as WWFM life span is about 7 weeks behind most other idol singles.

On December 10th, WWFM total spin count was under 950, compared to LLWD, around 3500 spins, and Light On that had a similar airplay presence as with, in addition for DC, TMOL that was still widely span on AC and HAC.

Archie’s Crush and Jordin’s Tattoo also had very good radio presence at the same period.

It will be interesting to see how sales evolve, for both Adam and Kris relatively to the airplay of both their actual single and the next one.

I was stating FYE was a flop for the week his CD came out when talking about Kesha and Adam debut CDs. I don’t consider it a flop now but you can’t deny it was toxic back then, especially after the AMAs. I understand people disagreeing with the compariosin Iade, but when the highest album debut charts are published, Adam will be higher than Kesha and Nick Jonas, who didn’t break 100k and he’s a Jonas!

Also I don’t expect Adam to be the next Elvis, etc, even though how my post ended up sounding. To quote his friend, I expect him to be the next Adam Lambett! Hehehe

Still no single sales numbers for FYE? Wondering if the dance chart placement is helping sales.

Just stopped in my local walmart and no Kris, Adam or Allison.

hmm I dont know much about the ins and outs of music biz and the whole album sales thingy. But i wanted to mention something about Ke$ha — even though Ke$ha only released her album in Jan, the company had been promoting tik tok video since early Nov. I am not sure about the single release though but still I feel Kesha’s music had been circulating for long. Don’t think Adam got that much time between single and album release.

I remember it cos that was when I first started using Itunes store and I saw ke$ha’s video on itunes for free. I downloaded it and was wondering who the trashy woman was. I am still not a kesha fan.. but starting to tolerate her just cos of Adam’s admiration. LOL

PS: i know Justin beiber isn’t mentioned anywhere here.. but i came across this fan page called ” Can this onion ring get more fans than Justin Beiber”. Just wanted to pass on this message!!Please join!!

I am not sure about the single release though but still I feel Kesha’s music had been circulating for long. Don’t think Adam got that much time between single and album release.

I believe it was released digitally to radios stations back in August. I think there was quite a bit of build up before it went officially for adds.

hmm I dont know much about the ins and outs of music biz and the whole album sales thingy. But i wanted to mention something about Ke$ha — even though Ke$ha only released her album in Jan, the company had been promoting tik tok video since early Nov. I am not sure about the single release though but still I feel Kesha’s music had been circulating for long. Don’t think Adam got that much time between single and album release.

Some of Keshas music has been used in tv series so it’s not only Tik Tok that the audience has been exposed to. I just think it’s hard to establish a new artist and it is probably mostly done through single sales. Idols are different in that respect because they already have an inbuilt fanbase, though that fanbase alone will not make the idols relevant in the current music scene.

Just stopped in my local walmart and no Kris, Adam or Allison.

What??? You mean the music wasn’t playing, or the CD’s weren’t available? If not available for sale, that’s awful!

None available.

alaadam: Thank you for posting those weekly sales numbers. They present such a great opportunity to follow the percolation of an individual artist’s sales path. Can I ask where you got these numbers – I’d love to be able to look up this kind of info for other artists? Thanks in advance.

Just stopped in my local walmart and no Kris, Adam or Allison.

I don’t want to ruffle any feathers, but I was at my local Target and under popular music, I saw both Adam and Kris, but no Allison. What is amusing is they have Adam under “Rock” and Kris under “Pop.”

cakeygirl: Wow. I’ve seen a lot of numbers/statistics posted about the music industry (the amount and variety of which mostly leaves me baffled) but that last line of your post about how many artists went platinum last year is probably the clearest, most illuminating number I’ve ever seen about the state of music sales. Had no idea the number of platinum sellers could be that low. Really puts the music landscape into perspective for me. Thank you for your post.

Actually, there were 19 platinum albums in the chart year 2009, if I recall right. David Cook was #13 on that list, which was a huge achievement to be one of 19. The decline year to year is amazing, but I can’t recall the figures.