Jan 212011
#1 With a...?
The old Yahoo Groups version of Rock Town Hall putters along with a weekly industry comment or two from our old friend Links Linkerson. His latest entry, which he actually typed (rather than cut and pasted from a Billboard.com ULR), is pretty interesting:
This week’s #1 album is by Cake. It sold only 44,000 records. An all-time new low for a #1 record. At least they self-released it, so they should actually make money of those sales.
Poor Cake I was rooting for them on this comeback. I was an intern at RED distribution when their debut was released. I think this week is a fluke there were no real new releases with any star power. The big names can still sell 100k opening week
100k … whoopdedoo.
I’ve got this record. My GF is a big CAKE fan. If you liek CAKE, then this is okay. We love the single, “Sick Of You.”
This, and the Billboard article, confirms something that me and my bandmates have been talking about for some time: The album is dead, the single lives. If The Beatles killed the singles-oriented market and created the one for album as art form, then iTunes and digital downloads have killed it. It’s great for an independent group like ours who cut down greatly on the expense of “making an album” and getting our music to the masses (www.itunes.com/latelydavid). But it’s also a little sad because I like large albums.
TB
We should be dancing that anything remotely “r-o-c-k” is even on the Billboard charts.
I’m still not buying singles. They’re stupid. They look cool, but playing them is a hassle, and the download will never become my primary means of listening to music so I won’t be looking at my credit card and wondering what happened to 200 bucks a month and I’ve got nothing to show for it but a bunch of impulse single buys.