I’m pretty sure Fantasia 3rd album more than her 2nd.   So it is possible to not face the declining Idol model (but it is very rare). I think that Fantasia is a good model for many Idols – if they can just generate a gold album they’ll be okay.The problem is when the first album sells a ton and then sales drop 90% for the second!

I’m pretty sure Fantasia 3rd album more than her 2nd.   So it is possible to not face the declining Idol model (but it is very rare).

If so, it’s not documented anywhere. Third and second Fantasia albums probably did sell roughly the same (assuming the Wikipedia info is slightly outdated), so yes, it’s possible to break the “slump” pattern on the THIRD album in relation to the SECOND album, given very solid radio play in one’s home genre. But Fantasia showed the normal slump from debut to sophomore albums.

I update the Idol sophomore slump chart only about once a year, in December or January, so it’s not perfectly up-to-date, but it’ll give you the general pattern.*

*So if anybody’s snowflake’s sophomore numbers are un-represented (released in 2012) or under-represented (Idol Chatter provided updates on a 2011 album after mid-December 2011), assume I’ll get to it in about 6-8 weeks, when I do the global updates for the whole site. Specific reminders won’t be necessary.

No one is stating that Carrie or Daughtry are “commercial faiures”, just that they experienced the sophomore slump.

The soph slump means that an Idol’s second album is somewhere around 25%-50% (or even less) of their debut album. Carrie and Daughtry’s second albums fit this pattern. Once again, that doesn’t mean their numbers or their second eras were in any way considered to be “failures”, it means that they also followed the pattern of all Idols NNK(not named Kelly) in having a sophomore slump.

My predictions many months ago was that he might sell 100-125K (IIRC), but might get to 150K if he gets a hit song.  Although I was thinking then more of another single from the album becoming a hit, but since they hadn’t really promoted a new single, and “Home” must now be considered a hit, I would still go for 125-150K. 

I think the first week sales numbers will depend on whether or not enough people make the connection between P2′s album and the fact that P2 is the one who sings “Home.” Ironically, one thing going for him is his name LOL. People are more likely to remember it.

I’m still sticking to 100k, unless the promo is significant, which I really don’t expect until next year with the new single release.

 I don’t consider Carrie and Daughtry’s sophomore albums commercial failures by any means.

Neither does anyone else, OffLeash..but they both had a Sophomore Slump – look at Eilonwy’s facts. Every Idol but one. 

Isn’t it possible that referring to that slump as a commercial failure is the point of disagreement? That’s a Bubble verdict, I think. The Labels all have access to plenty of data for Idol sales patterns, for 11 years. How can their Bean Counters not expect the pattern to hold true? There’s only been one outlier in 11 years.

Even though money talks, certainly – there can be more than one reason why an artist and a Label are no longer a good fit. Or, I suppose, you can have a Label that would only be satisfied w/more than the debut numbers from an Idol artist. But that is unrealistic, and doomed to disappointment.

Bean Counters are realistic and fact driven  - not constrained by any Bubble notions – but they are constrained by the unrealistic advances in the idol contracts…which may lead to Labels trying to stuff artists in boxes where they don’t begin to fit. 

Without the ‘commercial failure’ tag, and considering we really don’t know the Label’s expectations – the Slump simply represents comparative numbers, IMO. They have a lot to tell us about the Idol patterns – but they don’t have to be characterized as a ‘failure’. That word confuses more than it clarifies.

JMO. Of Course.

Not all Idol slumps are what I consider commercial failures, as I’ve already explained. My idea of commercial failure would be the sales numbers we’ve seen this year for some alums. I don’t however know the terms of the sophomore albums contracts, or of those the label didn’t have to sign but picked up their option. Did the labels still manage to recoup their investments and/or are the alums sharing some expenses? No idea. For those who are still with their respective labels, I would assume the labels either recouped their expenses, or are willing to keep trying.

As an aside, I disagree with the notion that Idols should be considered “new artists” by the labels. Yes, it would be ideal, but let’s not forget that the label didn’t discover them and decide to add them to their rosters because they loved what they heard. The winners and runner ups were imposed on the labels by a contract with the show. Maybe the other finalists were subjected to terms that were favorable enough for the label to take a chance they might not have otherwise.

Beyonce is already on board to do the half time show at the Super Bowl this year. 
Home will probably be used in a SB commercial, though. :)

Not all Idol slumps are what I consider commercial failures, as I’ve already explained.

You have, OffLeash. It’s your explanation of how you arrive at the “Commercial Failure” verdict that I disagree with. We can all have our own ideas of what constitutes a ‘commercial failure’, based on choosing varying arbitrary percentages from the list of Idol Sophomore Slump figures. Each person is certainly free to chose a percentage for a cut-off point, which may or may not take other economic or trend driven conditions into consideration.

What we cannot know, as you say, is what the different Labels financial expectations are/were – and so each ‘failure’ tag is subjective to the person making it, without any provable connection to the reality of the industry. What we will not get from that approach is agreement, or even a factual baseline. So, the tag itself tells us nothing but personal opinion.

We cannot even use whether the artist in question is retained by the Label as an indicator – since we don’t know the variables there either…most of the time, we never will. 

I’m uncomfortable with pronouncements based on so many assumptions, more so when I don’t even find them necessary.There are plenty of very nice facts which don’t require that a subjective individual judgement be attached to make them useful in numbers projections.

So, I will respectfully disagree with your conclusions…Way it goes.

In re your ETA – I didn’t see this ‘new artist’ argument – it’s not mine, so I will omit addressing it here. 

But the Labels may try to be fiscally responsible, and maximize their financial return on the winner they are required to sign by contract, this may or may not work out well for the artist. It’s a gamble for both parties. Labels would never agree to sign that contract with Idol Alphabet Soup if they didn’t like the short term odds a lot.

But any of the other persons signed, the runner-up by tradition, or other finishers they chose, are not imposed…and the same realities of the Idol Sales Pattern apply – so any fumbling about that the Labels do in choosing which of their subsidiary labels or producers, or songs or genres to give the artist is totally on their own heads. There is no contractual obligation to the show to sign these additional artists.

IMO. Of Course.

Some of the songs I was unsure of with the shorter snippets I think I will love upon hearing these longer versions. ‘Can’t Go Wrong’, ‘Tell Me a Story’, ‘Fool’s Dance’, to name a few. Not really any song I dislike now! :D Still really diggin’ that ‘Wicked Game’ cover too.

‘So Easy’ really does sound like a TV theme.. like for a Dawson’s Creek, One Tree Hill, etc. type of show, haha.

At this point, Interscope has not announced that they are going to market P2 to only the AAA format with the next single or with the album. There are some, who aren’t involved in the marketing plan, who have decided to label PP is a AAA artist. That doesn’t mean that is how his label sees him.

Over 90% of P2′s airplay is coming from formats outside of AAA. His album has songs that could easily be follow ups to the M&S sounding Home, especially on the HAC format.

Gotye released his album at the worst time possible, January 31st, and it has already sold over 700K. Not bad for a AAA artist. With Philip coming from an AI win and having Home at the top of the charts, he should be able to do better than this since he gets the benefit of releasing during the best purchasing time of the year.

well they won’t be marketing him as a Pop artist. I would think they will send his next single to both AAA and HAC radio (possibly to alt rock radio as well, although it appears Home wasn’t actually sent to that format, rather that a few alt rock stations independently started playing it)

Gotye didn’t try to market himself only to AAA, either. It just happened to be that outside of STIUTK, that was the format that kept playing him.

No major label hopes to exclusively market artists to one format, but A&R reps do look at the style of the music that they are producing and make judgments about what the core format is. It is not unreasonable for fans to say that P2′s style seems like an obvious fit for AAA and, if AI stigma doesn’t rear its head again, would be more likely to get continued airplay there (it’s worth noting that M&S themselves didn’t hit the top 20 with IWW on HAC even though it went #1 on HAC and Alt; LOTTL’s song structure is actually less conventional so I’m not expecting a much different pattern there).

I hope P2 will do well. But what will make him a mainstream artist is continued reception from mainstream radio, not just one huge single. Same as it ever was.