oooh get Stephano

Message

jamie1978 · #46 Post by **jamie1978** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 10:58 am

XTZ1969 wrote: I think 'Other People's Songs' & 'Nightbird' have sold more copies in Germany than the UK.

Hardly an achievement, given the abysmal sales figures here.

The PSB's are in a completely different league sales-wise. They and the word 'erasure' simply dont belong in the same sentence.

And Andy Bell just isnt very intelligent. Have you heard him in interviews? Not the sharpest tool in the box.

XTZ1969 · #47 Post by **XTZ1969** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 11:45 am

Aaron · #48 Post by **Aaron** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 2:22 pm

Niall wrote:
Aaron wrote:Why don't the two of you piss up a rope?
No need to get shirty!!!

Shirty??

Tony Cologne · #49 Post by **Tony Cologne** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 3:16 pm

Undertaker wrote:
Tony Cologne wrote:I do think Vince Clarke is a genius, but Erasure lyrics rarely have anything to say -- it's like fluffy free form poetry. As for that bulletin board, I've always found it very bitchy and unfriendly. Then there are all those rules about not mentioning chart positions on there etc. Ridiculous.
Yeah. That came in when i told the board that the 2nd single off Nightbird only sold 7,000 units and the guy in charge of the forum called me a liar. Ther ewas no reason at all that i'd lie. The proof was there. The song above them sold 7,100, the song below sold 6,900. Anyway, that forum rule was put into place and i was banned

Dave

Haha. Typical. Wasn't there something else to that? Mute was using a method to inflate sales figures or using a tactic to make it look like the single was selling more than it was. Anyone remember?

profile790 · #50 Post by **profile790** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 9:29 pm

XTZ1969 wrote:Erasure had 3 non-top 20 singles:
'Don't Say Your Love Is Killing Me' #23
'Freedom' #27
'Here I Go Impossible Again' #25
'Rock Me Gently' wasn't released in the UK.
'Rain' & 'Moon And The Sky' were not chart eligible.

14/09/1985 Who Needs Love Like That 55 96-84-79-*55*-60-83->6
30/11/1985 Heavenly Action 100 *100*->1
03/05/1986 Oh L'Amour 85 90-*85*-86-98->4
08/03/1997 Don't Say Your Love Is Killing Me 23 *23*-42->2
21/10/2000 Freedom 27 *27*-60->2
02/07/2005 Here I Go Impossible Again/All This Time Still Falling Out Of Love 25 *25*-63->2

That's SIX singles outside the Top 20. (source: Polyhex.com)

And you may wonder why they released two singles that weren't eligible for the charts. Perhaps "Moon And The Sky" was made ineligible for the charts because the previous single "Freedom", lead single from an album, made only #27?

Oh, by the way: Pet Shop Boys had 8 number 1's in the Billboard dance chart, Erasure had just 2.

XTZ1969 · #51 Post by **XTZ1969** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 9:49 pm

profile790 · #52 Post by **profile790** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 10:02 pm

XTZ1969 wrote:In that case the PSB had 3 non-top 20 singles. The original versions of 'West End Girls' & 'Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money)' peaked at 121 & 116 respectively, and as you know 'Was It Worth It?' reached no.24.
Don't get me wrong, I prefer the Pet Shop Boys but it's fair to say that Erasure sold lots of records between 1986 & 1994. That's all.

Why? Because I count "Oh, l'Amour?"
I'm not claiming Erasure didn't sell records, I just point out that they are a less successful chart act.

Flaffer · #53 Post by **Flaffer** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 10:04 pm

stats-freak wrote:
XTZ1969 wrote:In that case the PSB had 3 non-top 20 singles. The original versions of 'West End Girls' & 'Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money)' peaked at 121 & 116 respectively, and as you know 'Was It Worth It?' reached no.24.
Don't get me wrong, I prefer the Pet Shop Boys but it's fair to say that Erasure sold lots of records between 1986 & 1994. That's all.
Why? Because I count "Oh, l'Amour?"
I'm not claiming Erasure didn't sell records, I just point out that they are a less successful chart act.

and m,ore importantly than that they are shite

XTZ1969 · #54 Post by **XTZ1969** » Wed 20 Jul 2005, 10:48 pm

Dreamcatcher2003 · Thu 21 Jul 2005, 6:22 am

Flaffer wrote:
stats-freak wrote:
XTZ1969 wrote:In that case the PSB had 3 non-top 20 singles. The original versions of 'West End Girls' & 'Opportunities (Let's Make Lots Of Money)' peaked at 121 & 116 respectively, and as you know 'Was It Worth It?' reached no.24.
Don't get me wrong, I prefer the Pet Shop Boys but it's fair to say that Erasure sold lots of records between 1986 & 1994. That's all.
Why? Because I count "Oh, l'Amour?"
I'm not claiming Erasure didn't sell records, I just point out that they are a less successful chart act.
and m,ore importantly than that they are shite

And that's true, too...

Devices · #56 Post by **Devices** » Thu 21 Jul 2005, 6:23 am

Tony Cologne wrote:
Undertaker wrote: Yeah. That came in when i told the board that the 2nd single off Nightbird only sold 7,000 units and the guy in charge of the forum called me a liar. Ther ewas no reason at all that i'd lie. The proof was there. The song above them sold 7,100, the song below sold 6,900. Anyway, that forum rule was put into place and i was banned

Dave
Haha. Typical. Wasn't there something else to that? Mute was using a method to inflate sales figures or using a tactic to make it look like the single was selling more than it was. Anyone remember?

Yes, they had a chart rigging scheme set up.

A couple of forum moderators were purchasing single sets for people outside the UK. This because sales to individuals outside the UK are not supposed to count toward the UK chart. It makes sense when you think about it. The UK chart is supposed to represent the most popular records *in the UK*, and should thus only include sales to UK individuals. UK online retailers (amazon.co.uk and others) will only report sales to UK customers to the OCC for chart purposes so this was a way for Mute to circumvent chart rules. To sweeten the pot all those who chose to participate received a free slipcase with their order, something they would not have got had they ordered from amazon, hmv, or whoever.

Tony Cologne · #57 Post by **Tony Cologne** » Thu 21 Jul 2005, 7:10 pm

Interesting. Thanks.

Zeus On The Loose · Thu 21 Jul 2005, 7:18 pm

Devices wrote:
Yes, they had a chart rigging scheme set up.

A couple of forum moderators were purchasing single sets for people outside the UK. This because sales to individuals outside the UK are not supposed to count toward the UK chart. It makes sense when you think about it. The UK chart is supposed to represent the most popular records *in the UK*, and should thus only include sales to UK individuals. UK online retailers (amazon.co.uk and others) will only report sales to UK customers to the OCC for chart purposes so this was a way for Mute to circumvent chart rules. To sweeten the pot all those who chose to participate received a free slipcase with their order, something they would not have got had they ordered from amazon, hmv, or whoever.

I don't think that's quite right. The chart represents the number of units bought in the UK, not the number of units bought by Brits so it doesn't matter if the singles were then sent to someone else abroad. They were still legitimate sales in Britain and that doesn't constitute chart rigging. It would have been chart rigging if Erasure were buying tonnes of copies themselves or if somehow, units sold outside the UK had counted for the UK chart. The Amazon etc. system is wrong. An Amazon UK sale's profit goes to the British branch of the record label no matter where the CD is shipped so it should count as a proper UK sale.

Devices · #59 Post by **Devices** » Fri 22 Jul 2005, 6:44 am

I understand the argument you're making, point taken. It's not chart rigging in the traditional sense of bulk buying by the band/label, and no I don't dispute the legitimacy of the actual purchases made by the mods because they were purchases in UK shops for regular retail price. I refer to it as chart rigging because under normal circumstances those purchases would be as imports in the respective countries of the individual fans and would not have counted toward the chart. So although they technically are legally bought in the UK I can't help looking at it in the sense that all along they are destined to end up in the US or wherever in the same hands of people who would normally have bought them in their home country. If that makes sense.

dVTB · #60 Post by **dVTB** » Fri 22 Jul 2005, 11:10 am

As far as I know, PSB only played a chart game once. They released Drunk in the 1st week of January, as a 3CD-set, to guarantee a Top 10 position. Erasure did the same thing 3 or 4 times.

Besides that, Erasure begged people to buy their cd-single; something PSB have never done.

Erasure also had this DVD-single trick, where the single version of a certain track (wasn't it Solisbury Hill?) was only available on the DVD, forcing fans to buy it. Pet Shop Boys have always released the single versions of their singles on a regular audio format.

Furthermore, Erasure released 2 singles that were deliberately made ineligible for the charts. Probably this was done to prevent them from very low chart entries. PSB have never deliberately released ineligible singles. Their only release that didn't count for the charts was the "I Get Along" DVD, since it featured a portion of the song E-mail. This partly explains the poor chart result for this PSB single ( #18 ), which - by the way - is still 7 places higher than Erasure's latest offering.