There are a lot to struggling artists out there just needing exposure. I remember Carly Smithson, everyone was bashing her at the beginning as being a “professional” having had a contract with some record company, yada, yada. she was dubbed a “plant.” I think there were a couple of others people attacked also as being “professionals” or having put out singles, indies, etc. Carly sold like 1,000 albums and that’s it and her contract expired before she auditioned. Sure these people just don’t wake up one morning and decide they are going to audition for A.I. They’ve been working on their craft and all are struggling artists and broke.

What is A.I. going to do with Adam, he’s put them in a terrible position.

Being openly gay does, in fact, often make it more difficult for artists to sell in the US. The Scissor Sisters are enormous stars in Europe–not here. Mika is a huge international star, but there are tons of people here who have no idea who he is. It’s not a hard and fast rule, and there are probably major labels willing to sign openly gay people, but if you take the general difficulty of getting signed at all, no matter how talented you are, and add this on top of that, it’s difficult.

We could take each of those kids and point out some area that did not meet some “Middle America” criteria. This “middle America” label is pretty condescending to alot of people out there. The word “christain ” has been flung around on here with such vehemence, bordering on hate. No matter what side of the fence, it still sounds and feels the same.

What about the unwed mother?
What about the Puerto Rican kid?
What about the Indian kid from NC?
What about the young African-American woman with three small kids?
What about the divorced mother with a small child?
What about the bi-racial kid?
What about the sight-impaired kid?
What about the conservative christian guy?

In the long run, the contest came down to the two talented pretty boys. There were alot of factors that got them there. For me it was talent, personality, joy of music, kindness and class showed toward everyone…all those tangibles and intangibles.

My world is no different than your world, I just try not to raise up one while putting down another. Kris said it quite succinctly, “Why can’t everyone just get along?”

And as far as the numbers, I did make an assumption, which could not be proven with the data I had available. I apologize.

To bring this back on topic, Wilshire didn’t jump on the Adam bandwagon, now they have — it’s business.

Oh, yeah, and the media did play a huge role in this no matter how you look at it.

YMMV

Because of this I believe these totals are close to an accurate assessment of singles sold during and post Idol.

The figures are reliable for post-idol sales. You may believe my assumption is flawed concerning the complete the album, that’s your perogative. But the post-idol figures are accurate based on numbers available, whether it is to your liking or not.

In your original statement, you were making claims about sales during and post Idol. Since to me your basic premise is flawed (Rickey is a nice guy, but he runs an AI blog and doesn’t have any more access to in-season sales numbers than anyone else), projecting from post sales numbers and making conclusions about overall season totals is inherently unreliable in my view. As for whether your post Idol numbers have been calculated corrected, I have no idea. And, truthfully, I don’t care because I’ve moved on and am more excited about what both these guys, Adam and Kris – and Allison too – will do in November.

As far as your other posts go, the sense I get is that you don’t believe homophobia really exists in this country or, to the extent that it does, it’s been artificially manufactured by the media. That’s cool. To each his own, mileage varying and all that. I don’t want to get into a dog-chasing-tail kind of argument. I kinda wish I lived in your world though.

As far as Wilshire was concerned, there was more to it than Adam being openly gay and not wanting to invest money in him. The record industry has promoted and stood behind far more “outrageous” people, than a nice, well-mannered glam-goth kid who happens to be gay. JMO

‘The new release from the talented 2009 American Idol runner-up!’ 

http://www.allaccess.com/

IMO Adam’s early works album won’t affect his RCA album sales. If anything fans will have the opportunity to purchase both albums. And you never know, Adam’s pre-idol album might be better than his RCA album. With the exception of “Want” which is a badly written song with a with a repetitive chorus, there might be some good music on Adam’s summer release album. Personally I am going to listen to snippets from both albums and purchase the songs I like the best.

And if Adam Lambert does have a contract with another label, it would be in 19E’s best interest not to manage him after the tour. 19E 19M does not need this headache and all the accusations that will follow when this blows up in the press. The management of American Idol is indeed in a very precarious position if Adam has a contract with another record company. If Adam has been honest then there won’t be a problem. But if Adam lied or forgot about this alleged contract, then I see no reason for 19E to extend their relationship with someone that was not truthful, because it will hurt their reputation.

Also, Adam already has a recording contract with RCA and I’m sure RCA and another management firm will be able to manage him properly.

Rickey from Rickey.org stated that Adam fans are “completists” when he saw Adam’s album sales were higher than Kris’s, but the single sales were lower. I ‘ve read many negative reactions concerning both Kris and Adam’s sales as not being all that impressive, especially when compared to David Cook. I think they’re both doing well.

The album compilation was a complete the album deal, meaning any singles that had been purchased during Idol would not be repurchased when buying the Album compilation. In other words when buying the Album compilation, you pay for only the singles you did not have already. Because of this I believe these totals are close to an accurate assessment of singles sold during and post Idol.

So you’re assuming that everyone who bought singles also bought albums? Sorry, I think that’s a flawed assumption and therefore your figures are not reliable. I agree with anna in vegas, though, I would love to see the true numbers.

As of week ending 6/21/09, Kris has sold singles/albums — $1,058,279.70
As of week ending 6/21/09, Adam has sold singles/albums — $901,641.00

The album compilation was a complete the album deal, meaning any singles that had been purchased during Idol would not be repurchased when buying the Album compilation. In other words when buying the Album compilation, you pay for only the singles you did not have already. Because of this I believe these totals are close to an accurate assessment of singles sold during and post Idol. These figures do not reflect Ringtones (Kris was #1 for several days), videos (Adam did well here, Kris also made a strong showing), I-tune pass and singles/albums that fell off the Top 200 digital chart.

Of course, not engraved in stone.

The American public will vote with it’s pocket book come November and not one person on this board can predict what will happen with Kris or Adam’s albums. We can look at how they have done so far after Idol and say they have done okay and that is all not fantastic or earth shattering or record breaking. Just Okay. That is all we have to go on for now.

Please enlighten us on exactly what they have done since Idol (?). Unless I am reading this incorrectly, they haven’t had a chance to do anything yet since Idol except some interviews and rehearsing for the tour.

I would also like to agree with the person who previously stated about Daughtry, AI votes do not determine album sales.

BTW: I would still love to see the iTunes sales figures for AI8. What’s the big deal about not revealing them? :ponder_tb:

Adam mentioned he was a little frustrated doing “the Ten Commandments” because the director and producer spoke to him about “Is Anybody Listening?” sounding too gay and to tone it down.

So, yeah. It hasn’t been an easy road for Adam.

There are about a billion reasons why somebody with genius-level talent may not *ever* get à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“discoveredà ¢Ã¢â€š ¬  in an industry like music. Even if that person does have the potential to be a à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã…“global superstar.à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬ 

Great post, lucy. Very thorough and insightful and I agree with everything you wrote.

And you make an important point. Adam wasn’t just a gay artist; he was an openly gay artist with no intention of ever going back in the closet. While a lot of the reasons you cite represent hurdles, I would argue that the issue of his gayness was one of the higher hurdles Adam faced. The whole “why didn’t Adam make it big before” question just seems to tacitly ignore that point. Like it never mattered. But it did. Emphasis on the past tense.

Bottom line: I think Adam would be the first to admit that he came on this show with something to prove. Something to prove to the agents and the record companies and the producers who were unwilling to take a chance on him because of his sexual orientation. He bypassed them all and went directly to the people and put his outsized talent out there for the world to see and fearlessly “put on a show.” Some of my favorite Idol moments were watching Simon’s reaction to the fans’ reactions to an Adam performance. That slow Cheshire cat grin would start spreading over his face and you just knew he was getting it.

Although he didn’t win, Adam was HUGELY successful on this basically (no matter how hard it tries not to be) cheesy show pitched squarely to small town Middle America. As Adam has said, you don’t get a record deal unless you have a fanbase. Adam proved he has a fanbase, because he had to … because those agents, producers and record companies thought his being openly gay might get in the way of acquiring a fanbase. Wrong.

Now (hopefully) the gay issue is on a back burner. It may never go away completely, but at least it’s manageable, on a low simmer. And the fact that it is no longer a controlling issue is exciting and one of the reasons I’m so hopeful about Adam’s future prospects. Because in so many other areas Adam is strong and evolved: his beautifully trained voice, his performance instincts and polish, his confidence, his musical knowledge, his business savvy. Now that this sexual orientation/fanbase hurdle (which never should have been a hurdle in the first place) has been removed, Adam is in a flat out sprint. Yeah, I’m liking his chances a lot.

I live in Connecticut, so Proposition 8, is California’s deal. It appears California is more conservative than the worldview realizes. I’m not here to debate politics. In the theatrical world, in the art/literary world, in the show business world in general, I’m certain being gay is not a foreign concept. Nor is it a foreign concept in a household in Texas or Montana or North Carolina or Maine.

I do not believe Adam being gay held him back in the industry. That just doesn’t fly for me at all. Adam lived openly as a gay man as I live openly as a heterosexual woman. I don’t mention my sexuality ever second of every waking moment. No one cares. We all live our lives, struggling to make our mortgages, car payments, rent, seeking employment, finding love, dying…

The media decided to run with the gay thing. The media chose to judge most Americans as being homophobic. The media tried to force feed us this crap over and over again. It appears many of Adam’s fans swallowed it. America, in fact, chose Adam Lambert over Danny Gokey, basing it on, I would hope, talent and not that Danny was a conservative Christian. Or are we all prejudice in our own unique way?

Adam is a young man, hoping to have a long music career. Was exploiting his sexuality his decision or a decision that the media and producers made for him? Not one person that I know mentioned Adam was gay. It was always about the music and personal taste.

On another front, all I can say is whoa, Mayfair, just, I don’t even know. I’m always amazed by generalizations that fly so freely. Not to get all patriotic, but I think we do damn well here in America, melding a variety of cultures, religions, and political viewpoints.

We could have a thousand testimonials from people all over the world, stating Adam is the greatest. Kris’s fans worldwide would attest the same about him. He does have them, as well.

I balk at fanaticism, find it disturbing on all levels. The mindset freaks me out — so much bad comes from it.

Bottom line is: all we can do is wait and see about Wilshire, Hi-Fi, as well as, Adam Lambert’s future success. I hope he can rise above it all.

In terms of INXS, though, the grassy knoll is a few football fields long, a lot of fans are not satisfied they are getting the total story from any side right now and the sadder thing is JD is writing some great stuff which he is sharing with fans online. Despite his flaws, that boy is like a cat and I think he has some lives yet.

These shows do show that there is a great deal of undiscovered brilliant talent out there and Idol and Rockstar doesn’t even scratch the surface.