-67%??? is that normal?

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i think ATYCLB was a drop of 59% so i guess with the huge numbers in the first week that this is kind of normal.... still sold more than ATYCLB did in its second week
 
..i really think is a decent result for this "poor selling" (for all)second week..more than 1,1 million copies in 10 working days..1 platinum certified..the same copies ATYCLB sold in 7 weeks..i didn't wait for too much..really..well done U2!!..
 
The huge drop is to be expected for several reasons:
  • Huge opening week sales - the rush factor caused a large second week drop. This happens with movies a lot in the U.S.
  • Thanksgiving week gave everyone a long weekend to shop. Also, many stores had sales on music - getting HTDAAB for as low as $7.99. Those low prices are gone (for now), so overall sales has dropped.
  • The post-Thanksgiving week is notoriously slow, for just about everything. This includes movies and music. Jay-Z/Linkin Park would have easily crossed 400,000 copies if they had released a week earlier.
  • U2 haven't done any new promotion this week. The week of and before the album's release, U2 were on TV (SNL) and doing a free concert. This put U2 on everyone's minds. With no new promotion, the album has returned "back to earth".
  • No new single push. "Vertigo" has been out for a while now, and many have purchased it in some form (CD or iTunes). With no new single being played to push the album, sales will slump a bit until the next hit song.

The drop is still larger than I hoped. I optimistically thought U2 might only see a 50% drop, but then realized that this is highly unlikely. This is U2, not Eminem or any other "hot, young" artist. And then, when I refreshed my memory and saw that ATYCLB had a 59% drop, I realized that HTDAAB will have a drop of 60% or more given all of the above conditions.

Still, while we might be disappointed to see the big drop in sales, it's only one spot on the charts. Jay-Z, who is hot, didn't crush U2. U2 are still above Eminem and they beat out many other "hot, young" artists, like Kelly Clarkson and all the other American Idols. They also beat out several other debuts from various rap artists.

In other words, while the drop is high, the sales are still ridiculously strong. They've sold 1.1M copies in just 13 days! Eminem sold 1.6M copies of his current album in 10 days. That comparison alone says a LOT!
 
doctorwho said:
The huge drop is to be expected for several reasons:
  • Huge opening week sales - the rush factor caused a large second week drop. This happens with movies a lot in the U.S.
  • Thanksgiving week gave everyone a long weekend to shop. Also, many stores had sales on music - getting HTDAAB for as low as $7.99. Those low prices are gone (for now), so overall sales has dropped.
  • The post-Thanksgiving week is notoriously slow, for just about everything. This includes movies and music. Jay-Z/Linkin Park would have easily crossed 400,000 copies if they had released a week earlier.
  • U2 haven't done any new promotion this week. The week of and before the album's release, U2 were on TV (SNL) and doing a free concert. This put U2 on everyone's minds. With no new promotion, the album has returned "back to earth".
  • No new single push. "Vertigo" has been out for a while now, and many have purchased it in some form (CD or iTunes). With no new single being played to push the album, sales will slump a bit until the next hit song.

The drop is still larger than I hoped. I optimistically thought U2 might only see a 50% drop, but then realized that this is highly unlikely. This is U2, not Eminem or any other "hot, young" artist. And then, when I refreshed my memory and saw that ATYCLB had a 59% drop, I realized that HTDAAB will have a drop of 60% or more given all of the above conditions.

Still, while we might be disappointed to see the big drop in sales, it's only one spot on the charts. Jay-Z, who is hot, didn't crush U2. U2 are still above Eminem and they beat out many other "hot, young" artists, like Kelly Clarkson and all the other American Idols. They also beat out several other debuts from various rap artists.

In other words, while the drop is high, the sales are still ridiculously strong. They've sold 1.1M copies in just 13 days! Eminem sold 1.6M copies of his current album in 10 days. That comparison alone says a LOT!

I'm actually surprised by the huge drop because U2 has a fanbase that is primarily in its 30s unlike a lot of these younger artist. Typically, the artist with the older fanbase will see a smaller decline in their second week sales, because more people in the older fanbase are likely to take their time in getting the new album, (not forever), but some will not feel the need to have it the day it comes out.
 
STING2 said:


I'm actually surprised by the huge drop because U2 has a fanbase that is primarily in its 30s unlike a lot of these younger artist. Typically, the artist with the older fanbase will see a smaller decline in their second week sales, because more people in the older fanbase are likely to take their time in getting the new album, (not forever), but some will not feel the need to have it the day it comes out.

You have a point - however, if music sales are like movies, the exact opposite will occur.

The huge opening was obtained by a strong lead single and outstanding marketing. This attracted the younger crowd, hence leading to very high sales.

However, as U2's fan base is older, the rush factor diminishes a lot. People who are older can generally wait a while to get a CD or see a movie. For example, some movies that cater to an older audience will have tremendous legs (see "My Big Fat Greek Wedding"). ATYCLB catered older and it also had tremendous legs.

Therefore, my guess is that barring a huge hit single, from here on out, HTDAAB will behave a lot like ATYCLB. It will see steady, but lower sales for a long time. It might not crank out 100,000+ copies a week after the holidays like some artists (Eminem) will, but it could still sell quite well throughout 2005. And with this early boost, we might see 3x Platinum sooner than we did for ATYCLB.

Lastly, I can't stress enough that while the drop is big, these numbers are still huge - especially for a 25 year old band. U2's second week beat out Kelly Clarkson (who already had one top 10 hit and is now working on a second). Addtionally, to prove how slow the week after Thanksgiving is, take a good look at the numbers on the chart. Gwen Stefani dropped 61%. Toby Keith dropped 61%. Fantasia, despite the American Idol push, dropped 65%. Destiny's Child, Eminem and Shania Twain - all big, hot, young artists saw drops around 50%. Heck, Destiny's Child is barely hanging in the Top 10 after a scant 3 weeks. That's more surprising to me than U2's drop. Even Clay Aiken's Christmas album dropped 30% - and it's the holiday season!

So while the drop is big, the overall sales are still outstanding compared to most artists. I bet Kelly Clarkson, T.I. or Nas wouldn't have minded a debut week of 273,000 copies, and this is what U2 got for their second week!
 
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I think the first week sales for HTDAAB in the US were definitely inflated by the high powered marketing campaign (primarily IPOD) as well as numerours TV apperances and the low pricing. This may have added another 200k of sales, so instead of selling 640k in week 1, it sold 840k. There was alot of pent up demand - particularly on the first day where it sold over 200K copies.

Week 2 was always going to be tough and as Dr Who pointed out - no TV appearances. Don't be too disappointed at 272k - this is still about 100K or 50% more than ATYLB sales in week 2.

By appearing on the Johnathon Ross show in the UK (and no thanksgiving), this may have helped their sales stabilise to only a 40% drop in Britain. 127k in the second week in the U.K is a mighty effort.

So total album sales in the US stand at 1.1m and the UK at 328K -the similarities here are that both albums are now slightly over the 1x platinum status by about the same margin.

To put things in perspective, ATYCLB had sold 604k by week 2 and HTDAAB has already done 1.1m. It is now at 26% of total albums sales of ATYCLB in the US. Importantly, it is still at number 2 and now has spent 2 weeks in the top 10. Remember ATYCLB spent only 3 weeks in the top 10 altogether (3, 5 and 10). I am quietly confident that the album can stay in the top 10 thru at least December.

I would be expecting another drop next week in chart placings (maybe 4 or 5), but sales should still be strong as the lead-in to Christmas.

Question for Dr Who - when the album sold 259k the week before Christmas, what was its chart placing

One last note - for me with Vertigo being on radio since last September, now would have been the time to release another single a couple of weeks after album release to keep the album being played on radio. February is just far too late from some reports I have heard of the next single release - Vertigo would be key track being played for over 4 months - too long!!!!.
 
zoo tv mcg said:
Remember ATYCLB spent only 3 weeks in the top 10 altogether (3, 5 and 10). I am quietly confident that the album can stay in the top 10 thru at least December.


What's important to note in your sentence above is that the third week in the top 10 didn't occur until 2002 - after U2 won 4 Grammy awards and performed at the ceremony! These awards also followed U2 performing at the Super Bowl. Having two major high profile events like that gave ATYCLB another major push. However, when ATYCLB debuted, it only spent 2 weeks in the top 10 before falling out (even though sales remained strong).

Question for Dr Who - when the album sold 259k the week before Christmas, what was its chart placing


Here are the first 19 U.S. chart positions for ATYLCB:

3-5-12-22-23-24-20-18-22-16
19-19-25-33-37-35-11-15-25

Sales for those weeks (rounded to nearest thousand):

428,000 + 176,000 + 119,000 + 125,000 + 100,000 + 113,000
+ 154,000 + 259,000 + 108,000 + 66,000 + 59,000 + 57,000
+ 47,000 + 44,000 + 41,000 + 49,000 + 85,000 + 74,000 + 55,000


To answer your question, Christmas week of 2000 (seems like just yesterday... has 4 years gone by that fast?) saw sales of 259,000 copies. This gave ATYCLB a push back into the top 20 at #18.

Looking at that number and chart position again proves just how strong holiday sales are. In its second week, ATYCLB sold 176,000 copies ranking it at #5. Six weeks later, ATYCLB sells 83,000 copies more than it did its second week yet can only chart at #18! Furthermore, the week before, U2 sold 154,000 copies and charted at #20. This again shows the strength of holiday sales - typically albums at #20 sell only 50,000 copies or less. Therefore, I expect to see strong sales for HTDAAB throughout the holidays.

One last point... as you can see, after the holidays, ATYCLB had its big drop, but then stabilized. This is what HTDAAB needs to do to go 3x or 4x Platinum. If we see huge post-holiday drops, then clearly this album won't be the monster seller some predict (despite its early success).

One last note - for me with Vertigo being on radio since last September, now would have been the time to release another single a couple of weeks after album release to keep the album being played on radio. February is just far too late from some reports I have heard of the next single release - Vertigo would be key track being played for over 4 months - too long!!!!.

I completely agree with this. Even if there is no official CD single release until February, get that song on the radio now! "Mysterious Ways" was already playing on the radio as the second single by this time in 1991. Granted, the song really became a hit in 1992, but by having it on the radio before the holiday, it kept AB in the spotlight well after Christmas ended. The video for the second HTDAAB single is already filmed and should be edited by now. So get "All Because of You" on the radio NOW!
 
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Yeah, "ABOY" has already been released to radio stations....."Vertigo" is still getting a lot of airplay, so it'll take a few weeks before they all start putting "ABOY" in heavy rotation. February is when the actual CD single is supposed to come out, but the song itself has probably been sent out to all of the US stations already.
 
doctorwho said:


What's important to note in your sentence above is that the third week in the top 10 didn't occur until 2002 - after U2 won 4 Grammy awards and performed at the ceremony! These awards also followed U2 performing at the Super Bowl. Having two major high profile events like that gave ATYCLB another major push. However, when ATYCLB debuted, it only spent 2 weeks in the top 10 before falling out (even though sales remained strong).



I had actually forgotten for a moment about them performing at the Super Bowl ! That was HUGE !

How can I have forgotten that they won big in back to back years when Beautiful Day won 3 awards, 2 of the biggest, and the following year they won 4 for various songs and the album.

Then there was Elevation in the Tombraider movie and MTV with a Making of the Video for this song. And the football video theme of Stuck during the playoffs and right around the Super Bowl.

Remembering things like this just causes me to be a little more cautious about being optimistic for HTDAAB in the long run. So many songs off of ATYCLB were everywhere for so long, I just can't imagine it being that same way with this CD. I'm not saying it can't happen, it just seems like quite a task.

And we can't forget that for several weeks after Sept 11, 2001, radio and tv turned to heartfelt and meaningful music, unlike the stuff they regularly play, and U2 was at the forefront of this with their music being used with videos of those days. There was also the televised marathon in which they performed Walk On.

I can't say that ATYCLB is in my top 3 U2 cds, but there was definitely something special about it.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see how things pan out with HTDAAB.
 
6 weeks out, I predict the "Bomb" will have sold 2,128,000 copies in the USA. The last week in those 6 weeks is the week after Christmas week. It should all go something like this:

840,000 + 273,000 + 190,000 + 250,000 + 410,000 + 165,000

Then if the album could just sell at a steady 100,000 , give or take a few thousand, for the rest of January and February, it will be at the 3 million mark in the USA by the time the tour begins in March! If that happens, U2 will probably have to play outdoors when they come back in the fall, in order to meet the increased demand, as the album could be closing in on the 4 million mark already by then. ATYCLB did not hit the 3 million mark until around the end of the last leg of the American tour in the Fall of 2001.

Then again, if the band play a 50 show first leg in the Spring with multiple shows in many cities, that may undercut any attempt to play outdoors in the fall. A smaller Arena tour like they did on ZOO TV would be more appropriate if they were going to go outdoors in the fall.
 
Sting2 - The 410,000 is the big number around Christmas and I guess you are assuming the album to still be in the top 10. I think there it has every chance given that it still a strong number 2. It will surely do better than ATYCLB's position of 18 so the sales should be way better. This is the key really for it to retain and extend its lead over ATYCLB in the first 2 months of release as it probably won't chart for 2 years in the top 200.

Tour wise, I think the strategy that worked for them on the JT and Zoo Tv tours should be used. Arena's first to give them a taste and then come back in the summer with a stadium tour to satisfy all the fans. POP went straight into stadiums and they got burnt in some cities, hence their conservatism here. McGuiness is still saying arena's in summer from his quote a few weeks ago, but I have no doubt that if the album does well, they will do stadiums in the US in summer.

As for all other parts of the world - they will have to go straight into stadiums such is their popularity (they are reported doing 30 stadium gigs in Europe which will only partly satisfy demand).

In Melbourne, they will play either the MCG (the c stands for cricket for all you baseball fans) or the Telstra Dome - probably for 2 nights to 100k fans

As for single number 2, releasing to radio is half the equation. They also have to get this video from NYC out asap - this should be a sensational video with crowds going banana's, the city backdrop and will really build hype for the tour. I think for the ROW, Sometimes will be a better choice to showcase the depth of the album for single number 2
 
I think that U2 won't lose the #2 spot in the next week (em had 2 drops of nearly 50% in a row) and there's even a chance that the album could even increase its sales ( Christmas is near)...
 
Everyone hear is pretty optimistic they'll be playing stadiums in the fall. I hope your right.
 
zoo tv mcg said:
One last note - for me with Vertigo being on radio since last September, now would have been the time to release another single a couple of weeks after album release to keep the album being played on radio. February is just far too late from some reports I have heard of the next single release - Vertigo would be key track being played for over 4 months - too long!!!!.

Perhaps the people at Interscope actually heard us! :wink: Here's what I just found on @U2:

Interscope Records have delivered U2's second single from HTDAAB to U.S. radio stations -- "All Because Of You." The song choice is no surprise, but the timing is sooner than expected. Our radio contact tells us it wasn't expected until after the holidays, but since the song is already performing well on Alternative and Modern Rock stations Interscope may have "decided to strike while the iron is hot."

An image of the radio promo CD is above right. For you collectors, it's a one-track CD in a standard jewel case. Catalog number is INTR-11319-2. (Thx TC)


@U2 also has an image of the promo (the red, black and white image is being carried through for this as well).

As far as I'm concerned, this is brilliant news! "Vertigo" did its job! Good work! It got the album plenty of notice, causing over 1.1M in sales in just 13 days!! Those type of numbers are up there with the likes of Eminem!

But "Vertigo" is now starting to fall. It's also been a bit overplayed thanks to the iTunes/iPod commercial. It's time for something fresh - and ABoY is the perfect choice. It's much like "Mysterious Ways" in that it's a great rocking song, with a catchy hook that's just meant for radio. Admittedly some U2 fans don't like HTDAAB or ABoY because of this very featured, but then the same could have been said about "Mysterious Ways". By officially releasing ABoY to radio now, it should carry the album through the holidays and into January and February. Then, right before the tour (late Feb.) release the next single, this time a slower song (ala "One") like "Sometimes...".

That should give the album a sustained run for 4-5 months until the tour gets going full swing.
 
Something missing form all the promotion is video play or the lack of it. MTV and VH1 rarely if ever play videos when people would actually see them from 3 pm to 11 pm during the week. I have not seen the video for Vertigo once! Of course I was able to find it on the internet, but the interesting thing here is that 12 years ago when Achtung Baby was around, you could see U2 video's from that album multiple times a day! This is a huge difference, and a reason why the I-Pod commercial was important, although I feel the I-Pod Commercial does not have the same impact as having your entire video played every hour on MTV.
 
The problem with MTV is that I never see videos on it. In fact, I never watch it. On the rare times I think of MTV and how great it would be to see some music videos, whenever I tune in, they have some sort of silly show on. 12 years ago, one could turn in and see music videos. Not so true any more.

VH1 does play more videos, but they too have tons of other shows.

In other words, I'm not sure MTV or VH-1 are the powers they used to be in the music world. Years ago, MTV and VH-1 exposure could really help a song or an artist. But given that these stations now play very few music videos, I contend that their effect on the success of an artist/song has been reduced significantly. I'm not saying there's no effect - after all, shows like TRL still carry some weight. It's just that these aren't the same stations they were in 1992.
 
STING2 said:
6 weeks out, I predict the "Bomb" will have sold 2,128,000 copies in the USA. The last week in those 6 weeks is the week after Christmas week. It should all go something like this:

840,000 + 273,000 + 190,000 + 250,000 + 410,000 + 165,000


The first week (840,000) and the second week (288,000 by SoundScan) are already recorded. But if HTDAAB only slips to 190,000 copies next week and then starts to rise as you are predicting for the holidays, that will be incredible! :yes:

I'm sure you based that prediction on ATYCLB's sales - so it is possible. However, as others wrote, to see 410,000 copies sold during Christmas week would be very high. I'm not saying it can't happen, I'd just be surprised if it did.

A lot of things go into sales, including the release date and how the holidays fall in the calendar year. In 2000, Christmas came on a Monday. That means sales were recorded from Monday Dec. 18th to Sunday Dec. 24th. Having a full week of sales that ran right up to the day before Christmas is what gave ATYCLB that huge pre-Christmas week. In contrast, Christmas falls on a Saturday this year. So the bulk of the sales will be from Monday, Dec. 20th through only Friday, December 24th. Having 2 less days of pre-Christmas sales means that HTDAAB might not see that extra huge bump in sales like ATYCLB did. It'll still rise significantly, but I'm not sure it'll reach the heights you are predicting (410,000 copies).

Post-Christmas sales could be strong though. Many people who got a Best Buy card might go shopping on the 26th and after and pick up a copy of HTDAAB.

In other words, while I don't think sales will be as high as Sting is predicting due to how the holiday falls, I do think we'll see some very big numbers for the rest of this month.
 
doctorwho said:


The first week (840,000) and the second week (288,000 by SoundScan) are already recorded. But if HTDAAB only slips to 190,000 copies next week and then starts to rise as you are predicting for the holidays, that will be incredible! :yes:

I'm sure you based that prediction on ATYCLB's sales - so it is possible. However, as others wrote, to see 410,000 copies sold during Christmas week would be very high. I'm not saying it can't happen, I'd just be surprised if it did.

A lot of things go into sales, including the release date and how the holidays fall in the calendar year. In 2000, Christmas came on a Monday. That means sales were recorded from Monday Dec. 18th to Sunday Dec. 24th. Having a full week of sales that ran right up to the day before Christmas is what gave ATYCLB that huge pre-Christmas week. In contrast, Christmas falls on a Saturday this year. So the bulk of the sales will be from Monday, Dec. 20th through only Friday, December 24th. Having 2 less days of pre-Christmas sales means that HTDAAB might not see that extra huge bump in sales like ATYCLB did. It'll still rise significantly, but I'm not sure it'll reach the heights you are predicting (410,000 copies).

Post-Christmas sales could be strong though. Many people who got a Best Buy card might go shopping on the 26th and after and pick up a copy of HTDAAB.

In other words, while I don't think sales will be as high as Sting is predicting due to how the holiday falls, I do think we'll see some very big numbers for the rest of this month.

I agree that my numbers are probably a little high. Still, at a minimum I predict the Christmas week sales will by higher than the 2nd week sales of the album. That means 300,000+ copies sold that week.
 
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