Even if that is true (which is debatable), that's not the point. The point is that THEY DID BUY MILLIONS OF COPIES, regardless of why.
What I was doing was providing PROOF that people still BUY music by the MOTHERLOAD. And hence, the reason why NLOTH has only sold 3 million copies worldwide so far isn't solely because of the currently decreasing sales market...but has more to do with the fact that many U2 fans just don't like NLOTH.
Are you just joshing us? Because you really can't be this oblivious to the truth. Yes, people have bought tons of Jackson's albums the past two weeks. That's because he died. These albums would NOT have been bought had the man been alive and well.
Jackson's catalog did sell well every year - about 500K total in the U.S. That's a good sum. U2 usually sees pretty strong catalog sales too. The 80's "Best Of" and now "U2-18" sell well, as does JT. I'd estimate about 300K a year for those albums in the U.S. So those albums sell regardless. But they don't sell in the hundreds of thousands in mere weeks unless something extraordinary has occurred. Sadly, the extraordinary event was Jackson's passing.
U2's latest is selling well for a NORMAL album in a NORMAL situation. Look at overall worldwide sales. Through the middle of July, NLOTH is the only album released this year that's cross 3M in total sales. Read that again: only one album released in 2009 has sold 3M copies worldwide thus far this year. And this includes releases by Eminem, Green Day, Springsteen, Kelly Clarkson, etc. How do you account for all of these other artists not having big sales? By your reasoning, fans of those artists must not like those albums either - and I highly doubt that fans of all these artists suddenly went "blech" to all of these releases simultaneously.
In 2000, artists could sell 8-10M copies in a year just in the U.S.! File sharing was around then, but many didn't have broadband internet connections and file sharing was still a novel concept. And mp3's? Few knew what this meant back then. Hence, people bought CD's.
In 2009, almost everyone has an mp3 player of some sort, whether it's an iPod/iPhone, Blackberry, Zune or portable player, or even on their computer. Broadband connections are the norm, not the exception. Downloading a CD takes minutes, not days. While the older file sharing sites are gone, FTP, torrents and YouTube make obtaining music easy. Why buy a CD when accessing it from your computer - even if it's illegal - is so ridiculously easy?
If one wants to be legal, that's also just as simple. iTunes (and other similar sites, like Amazon and Walmart) make getting a song easier than ever. Like a song? Download it for 99 cents (in the U.S.). Don't like it in a month? No big deal, it only cost a buck. Gone are the days when a person had to buy an entire album just to get one song. That was a huge complaint in the late 90's as singles were tougher to obtain. People were forced to buy the entire CD, at ridiculous prices ($18-20 at some stores!), just for one song. Now, a person can get just that song for 99 cents (or $1.49). With people cherry-picking the songs they want, this also leads to a drop in album sales.
If you don't believe this, explain how artists could have huge hits, but soft album sales? Clarkson, Eminem and Flo Rida have all enjoyed big hit songs, mostly thanks to iTunes downloads. But their album sales don't reflect the same level of success. Years ago, a big hit song meant a big hit album. Now, that's not necessarily true. U2 are one of the rare exceptions - they are an album band and their albums still sell. NLOTH has yet to produce a big hit, yet the album is the top selling album worldwide this year.
This isn't to say that NLOTH is some runaway smash hit. The album has yet to reach the 1M mark in the U.S. and is fighting to stay relevant. Kings of Leon haven't had monster hits with their latest, but the hits they've enjoyed have been big enough to keep the album selling well. U2 needs a hit like this from NLOTH. When U2 fans didn't like GOYB, I knew this was a bad choice of a single and I worried about a "Pop" effect - which appears to have occurred. "Magnificent" didn't do much for whatever reason. Not sure if there was that "conspiracy" or not, but it wasn't a big hit. However, U2 now have the Blackberry commercial for "Crazy" and it's coinciding with the tour. Already NLOTH sales have picked up in certain areas. "Crazy" is reminiscent of the songs U2 have released this decade and is arguably the most "pop" song on the album. If the Blackberry commercial takes off and the song gets good airplay, we could see a big boost for NLOTH. This boost could then be further supported by the tour.
Now, going back to Jackson - these sales are due to his sad passing. Yes, people are willing to buy CD's. But this is an exception, not the norm, in today's world. To say that U2's sales are weak because people don't like NLOTH - and the proof of this is that Jackson can sell - is outright ridiculous. Elvis sold tons when he passed. John Lennon's last album became a megahit when he was killed. Elvis and Lennon already sold well, but their deaths brought them to another level. People wanted something to remember. Further proof of this comes with artists like Janis Joplin, who had her only big hit song - that actually went to #1 - and her best selling album both occurring posthumously. While I adore Joplin, it's clear that her biggest successes were because of her death.
Jackson already enjoyed tremendous success in his life, like Elvis and Lennon. But his death brought back memories of the work he created. People are responding to those memories. When a famous person dies - especially when he/she dies suddenly - we grieve. And we grieve by remembering their work (book, movie, music, etc.). The last "Batman" movie grossed over $500M in the U.S., only the second movie to do reach these numbers. While it is a very good film, how much of that success can be attributed to Heath Ledger's passing? Ledger gave a fantastic performance and people wanted to remember him on top - the same way people want to remember Jackson: by buying his biggest hits.
So yes, people are willing to buy CD's, but as I wrote, if Jackson were alive, we would not be seeing his albums flying off the shelves. This is an exception - rules are not based on exceptions. Jackson's success now can be attributed to the cliche, "death as a career move". His death is helping him sell his music better than he has since the early 90's.
U2's album is selling about as well as can be expected in this market. If NLOTH can produce at least one hit song, that's all U2 will need for the album to rise up the charts again and linger because of the tour. That's all HTDAAB needed (as "Vertigo" pretty much carried that album early on and the tour kept it going).
But even if this hit song occurs, I wouldn't expect more than 2M in sales in the U.S. In fact, I wrote in another thread that I hope NLOTH could get 2M in sales (in the U.S.). I saw the market and knew that the days of 3M in sales (in the U.S.) were gone. If U2 could get 2M in the U.S. and hopefully about 4M in the rest of the world, that would be a success by 2009 standards. To argue against this is not facing reality of the music world right now. Seeing big sales by a deceased artist who died suddenly does not prove that people are buying. It's like stating that U2 sold 3M copies, so why haven't Springsteen or Green Day or Clarkson? All of them are doing about the best they could in today's CD sales world.
The real money these days comes from touring. This is why Jackson was to go on tour. This is why Beyonce and the Jonas Bros. and Hannah Montanna and anyone else is on tour. Years ago, artists made $$ from album sales and often lost money on tours. This has changed. The money comes from touring, not from album sales. The fact that U2 still sold 3M+ copies of NLOTH, and still have potential hit singles and an entire tour yet to come suggests they could be one of the few artists that could sell 5M or more come the year's end. And this is why many here feel that NLOTH is doing just fine. It may not be the biggest album of the year, but it's doing about as good as it can.
I can say this - if, God forbid, something tragic happened to U2 or Bono, NLOTH and JT and the "Best Of" albums would all be selling boatloads. People would buy the recent release as well as the best of the past (just as they are doing for Jackson). I just hope that day doesn't come any time soon.