Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

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Dog
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#271 Post by Dog »

Tenlow wrote:
Kiran wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 12:21 pm
Dog wrote: How could you possibly know what any of these albums would have sold without any promotion? Very hard to deduce that the signed prints, radio and magazine interviews, TV appearances and Monkey business video made no difference at all. You are wildly speculating. If they’d done no promotion this forum would have been buzzing with negativity. They’ve done an excellent job and the sales and chart position reflect this.
Yes speculation, but I'm speculating that they are not getting much interest from non PSBs fans. PSBs are not a young group, you either like them or you don't. If you are in the don't category, no matter how many TV appearances or 5 star reviews they get, you aren't going to buy their records.
It's not so much speculation though when the last 4 studio albums have (more or less) sold the same amount of records in the "long" run. Their fanbase in the UK buys the records and a small amount of "casual" fans. You can see the numbers yourself over the last 10 years. Of course they still need promotion in order to create media buzz, reviews, interviews, performances and what not. They even did an excellent job again this time around. But ultimately the results are suspiciously similar ;)
You can’t say because the albums have sold similar amounts that the promotion has made no difference. They promoted every album. Presumably the likelihood would be their fanbase would have declined over a decade - consistent sales could point to promotion making the difference. Your conclusion doesn’t stack up.
Woof.

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Tenlow
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#272 Post by Tenlow »

Dog wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 12:50 pm
Tenlow wrote:
Kiran wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 12:21 pm Yes speculation, but I'm speculating that they are not getting much interest from non PSBs fans. PSBs are not a young group, you either like them or you don't. If you are in the don't category, no matter how many TV appearances or 5 star reviews they get, you aren't going to buy their records.
It's not so much speculation though when the last 4 studio albums have (more or less) sold the same amount of records in the "long" run. Their fanbase in the UK buys the records and a small amount of "casual" fans. You can see the numbers yourself over the last 10 years. Of course they still need promotion in order to create media buzz, reviews, interviews, performances and what not. They even did an excellent job again this time around. But ultimately the results are suspiciously similar ;)
You can’t say because the albums have sold similar amounts that the promotion has made no difference. They promoted every album. Presumably the likelihood would be their fanbase would have declined over a decade - consistent sales could point to promotion making the difference. Your conclusion doesn’t stack up.
I didn't say it made no difference. I said they might have sold 10k anyway to the fanbase. So the additional 7k are still quite a difference :)

Their fanbase has been declining for many years. At a certain point though there is a remaining core that doesn't shrink much further :)

Regarding consistent sales: Hotspot sold slightly less than Super even though it had more formats available (2CD and cassette). So doing the math, it's likely that Hotspot sold copies to fever people than Super did and (at least) not to many more than Electric as well, if at all.
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#273 Post by alig »

MrTennant wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 11:51 am The sales are being really low almost everywhere, even for PSB.
True. The decline started after Fundamental. Yes did sell well but the general decline of record sales was on the rise.
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#274 Post by 303krs »

Well.

A bit disappointing not to top the charts in the UK because:

- As far as « the album charts » are concerned, Hotspot was (obviously) released in a quiet January week

- The whole BBC PSB friends did their promotion job

- The ITV friends too...

- They were literally everywhere in the press

- Monkey Business is one of the strongest PSB single in ages and its video too

So, that’s basically it. They’ll never top the album charts again in the UK. But does one really care ? Albums, nowadays, are mainly released to sell concert tickets.
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Undertaker
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#275 Post by Undertaker »

Well Fundamental and Yes sold more than Nightlife and Release. Which indicates the fanbase is up and down and also youre right about promotion. Fundamental and Yes had heavy promotion and coverage.

Youre also right about Parlophone not dropping PSB. Thats just bollocks.

Pity it wasnt number 1 but the chart is embarrassing these days. I couldnt even tell you what was Christmas Number 1. There used to be a big interest in the hit parade. Nobody cares a toss anymore. Especially when that ginger c*** has ten songs in the top 10. I mean wtf is that all about?

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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#276 Post by Spittingcat »

I suspect that the promotion created minimal sales and that have not changed the chart position.
Minimal? 20% more sales perhaps. Unlikely to be more.

But they knew that was likely, hence the promotion deliberately doubling up as a push for the ‘hits’ tour, which needs to pull in thousands of less, er, fanatical, more casual PSB fans to fill the seats.
They’ll never top the album charts again in the UK.
I think this true… this and the tour look like one last big push for #1 album and big venue world tour. Good on them!

The interviews this month seem to have made it very clear that they’ll keep writing, recording, and releasing music though… because they love doing so. Lack of big chart success won’t stop them.

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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#277 Post by Tenlow »

Undertaker wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 3:05 pm Well Fundamental and Yes sold more than Nightlife and Release. Which indicates the fanbase is up and down and also youre right about promotion. Fundamental and Yes had heavy promotion and coverage.

Youre also right about Parlophone not dropping PSB. Thats just bollocks.
I spoke about the last 10 years, so basically about Elysium, Electric, Super and now Hotspot and the according sales of these albums.

We all know why Yes sold more than these albums. Guess I don‘t need to explain that. I think Nightlife sold more than Fundamental, too (as it was awarded gold in the UK). Also, Nightlife sold way more than Fundamental globally.

Also, I said „dropping“, basically implying the fact that Parlopone/EMI were not exactly happy with PSBs album sales development (I‘m not speaking about week one alone here) but the total figures. Was Nightlife really the last PSB record to get awarded „gold“ status in the UK? Well, anyway. Correct me if I‘m wrong but I think no (studio) album after Fundamental sold more than 50/60k in the UK in the long run. And most were gone out of the top 75 within a couple of weeks, too.
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#278 Post by Undertaker »

Its fair to say that PSB's sales reduced significantly after Very. That was their last album that really sold to the masses before they became a fanbase only act.

So here are the opening week sales of their albums since Very. Which kinda proves promotion does have an effect...

23,732 Bilingual (#4, 1996)
17,038 Nightlife (#7, 1999)
18,008 Release (#7, 2002)
26,492 Fundamental (#5, 2006)
27,639 Yes (#4, 2009)
10,418 Elysium (#9, 2012)
15,715 Electric (#3, 2013)
16,953 Super (#3, 2016)
16,768 Hotspot (#3, 2020)

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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#279 Post by drunk14 »

Do you have the same data for earlier albums, Undertaker?
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#280 Post by Tenlow »

Undertaker wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 4:09 pm Its fair to say that PSB's sales reduced significantly after Very. That was their last album that really sold to the masses before they became a fanbase only act.

So here are the opening week sales of their albums since Very. Which kinda proves promotion does have an effect...

23,732 Bilingual (#4, 1996)
17,038 Nightlife (#7, 1999)
18,008 Release (#7, 2002)
26,492 Fundamental (#5, 2006)
27,639 Yes (#4, 2009)
10,418 Elysium (#9, 2012)
15,715 Electric (#3, 2013)
16,953 Super (#3, 2016)
16,768 Hotspot (#3, 2020)
Thanks for the full data!

These are, however, "just" opening sales. Nightlife still sold more than Fundamental and even Yes in the long run. Which matters more than opening weeks I guess. Promotion definitely matters though, no doubt. They still haven't sold more than 50-60k of an album in the long run for "ages" and are unlikely to do so, no matter the amount of promotion.
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#281 Post by alig »

There was an uptick with Super after Electric.
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#282 Post by Undertaker »

Tenlow wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 4:41 pm
Undertaker wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 4:09 pm Its fair to say that PSB's sales reduced significantly after Very. That was their last album that really sold to the masses before they became a fanbase only act.

So here are the opening week sales of their albums since Very. Which kinda proves promotion does have an effect...

23,732 Bilingual (#4, 1996)
17,038 Nightlife (#7, 1999)
18,008 Release (#7, 2002)
26,492 Fundamental (#5, 2006)
27,639 Yes (#4, 2009)
10,418 Elysium (#9, 2012)
15,715 Electric (#3, 2013)
16,953 Super (#3, 2016)
16,768 Hotspot (#3, 2020)
Thanks for the full data!

These are, however, "just" opening sales. Nightlife still sold more than Fundamental and even Yes in the long run. Which matters more than opening weeks I guess. Promotion definitely matters though, no doubt. They still haven't sold more than 50-60k of an album in the long run for "ages" and are unlikely to do so, no matter the amount of promotion.
Well for starters, Nightlife has a 7 year advantage on Fundamental. Also, you're making the mistake that certificates are issued on sales. They're not. They're awarded on albums shipped. Downloads didnt start to count until mid 2000's, so the only way companies were going to sell Nightlife, was to order the physical copy.

Nightlife's chart run in the UK was ...

United Kingdom: 7--28-60-103-177-OUT

So we can assume by those figures, Fundamental probably sold as many units in its first week than Nightlife did in its first 5 weeks.

They might be first week sales but the first week is usually a pretty good indicator of how the album sold overall. No way are casual fans buying thousands of PSB cds months and years after release. So imo, first week sales are a pretty good indicator whether promotion works and its quite clear that promotion does work, merely looking at the opening figures from Nightlife to Hotspot. There are too many differences in the figures to suggest otherwise.

I cant even remember any promotion for Elysium.

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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#283 Post by Undertaker »

drunk14 wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 4:28 pm Do you have the same data for earlier albums, Undertaker?
Afraid not mate, sorry. Hopefully they'll emerge though.

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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#284 Post by y3potential »

Undertaker wrote: Sat 01 Feb 2020, 3:05 pm Well Fundamental and Yes sold more than Nightlife and Release. Which indicates the fanbase is up and down and also youre right about promotion. Fundamental and Yes had heavy promotion and coverage.

Youre also right about Parlophone not dropping PSB. Thats just bollocks.

Pity it wasnt number 1 but the chart is embarrassing these days. I couldnt even tell you what was Christmas Number 1. There used to be a big interest in the hit parade. Nobody cares a toss anymore. Especially when that ginger c*** has ten songs in the top 10. I mean wtf is that all about?

I thought I was the only person that still said 'hit parade' these days (channelling my inner Smashie and Nicey, mate). Thank you Undertaker.
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Re: Is there any possibility for a Number 1 album? Look at the list of releases

#285 Post by Disco. »

Yes, had sold 70,210 copies in the U.K by October 2010.

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