The story of the week is not Amos Lee entering the chart with an anemic sales total of 40,000.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s like seeing your name in print in the newspaper.\u00c2\u00a0 All your homies call you up thrilled and the following day you’re forgotten.\u00c2\u00a0 Ditto with Cake.\u00c2\u00a0 These are not bad stories, the fans come out and support these acts, they can make a living playing music.\u00c2\u00a0 But they’re never going to go platinum.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re never going to blow up like Mumford & Sons.<\/p>\n
Could it be the Hot AC play?\u00c2\u00a0 And there’s been adult radio spins, but there are barely any adult radio stations.<\/p>\n
We could debate all week long what’s fueling Mumford’s sales, but the fact is Mumford & Sons’ "Sigh No More" sold 31,000 copies this week to place number six on the SoundScan chart.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re almost at 750,000 copies.\u00c2\u00a0 And number 10 on the 2010 chart was Ke$ha, with 1,143,000 copies sold.<\/p>\n
In other words, in the world of recorded music, Mumford & Sons are SUPERSTARS!<\/p>\n
Katy Perry’s vaunted "Teenage Dream" has sold barely over a million.\u00c2\u00a0 Despite being on the chart for 22 weeks.\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, Mumford’s been on the chart for 49.\u00c2\u00a0 You see it takes that long to build.<\/p>\n
And building is the story.<\/p>\n
It’s no longer about the peak.\u00c2\u00a0 The Black Eyed Peas are going to headline the Super Bowl this weekend on the downswing of their career.\u00c2\u00a0 Not because they’re decades beyond their moment in the sun like the classic rockers, but because their latest album, "The Beginning", is the beginning, of the E.N.D.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s over.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s like everybody in America looked at each other and said THESE GUYS SUCK!\u00c2\u00a0 In a world searching for meaning, the Peas are meaningless.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s hard to party all the time when you’re broke and don’t have a job.<\/p>\n
When that happens, you’re looking for something more soul-fulfilling.<\/p>\n
It turns out Top Forty radio is not king.<\/p>\n
Most of those Top Forty acts, which do sell singles on iTunes, can’t tour for shit.\u00c2\u00a0 Whereas Mumford sells every ticket.\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, Mumford underplays and undercharges.\u00c2\u00a0 What a concept!\u00c2\u00a0 Create a frenzy, get everybody talking about you!<\/p>\n
In other words, your friend says he’s going to the show.\u00c2\u00a0 Do you want to come?\u00c2\u00a0 You debate.\u00c2\u00a0 The Ticketmaster charges, the lame opening act, you’re gonna pass.\u00c2\u00a0 But when your friend is going to the show of an act you’ve never heard of, and is foaming at the mouth about it, and you get excited and want to go too and you can’t get a ticket you’re frustrated and ask yourself WHAT IN HELL IS GOING ON HERE?<\/p>\n
What is going on here?<\/p>\n
The media is driving towards a cliff of its own device.\u00c2\u00a0 The record labels and the movie studios and the newspapers and magazines and TV stations are in cahoots, believing it’s still the nineties, when hype is everything and it pays to be mainstream.<\/p>\n
You know how you become mainstream today?\u00c2\u00a0 By driving in the complete other direction and doing something so different, so unique, so ALIVE that the public is drawn to it.<\/p>\n
Mumford doesn’t need the usual suspects.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s just the music.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s enough.\u00c2\u00a0 Acoustic instruments, no beats, HUH?<\/p>\n
You can decry the Internet.\u00c2\u00a0 But it’s the Net that breaks these new acts.\u00c2\u00a0 Because the mainstream, if it cares at all, cares last. People are looking for something new.\u00c2\u00a0 And they’ve found Mumford & Sons…\u00c2\u00a0 WHO’S NEXT?<\/p>\n
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The story of the week is not Amos Lee entering the chart with an anemic sales total of 40,000.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s like seeing your name in print in the newspaper.\u00c2\u00a0 All your homies call you up thrilled and the following day you’re forgotten.\u00c2\u00a0 Ditto with Cake.\u00c2\u00a0 These are not bad stories, the fans come out and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-Yt","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3749"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3749\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3750,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3749\/revisions\/3750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}