They'll do better than folks expect...they already are. Not everybody gets on Leno or gets to open an awards show ya know.

It was great to hear that Trendin was the number one added single on r&b radio too. I don't know what people were expecting but I think they'll have a good run with this release.

This quote from the USA Today article sums up my feelings about what is most important...

"That Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis are back with the group and performing again is reason enough to rejoice," says Hines. "Morris Day is still that suave, perfectly coiffed and suited lothario. The remaining puzzle pieces still fit together perfectly."

asg said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

The label pays for that, not the artist. Morris and them are not paying get disc manufactured and what not, that's the labels job.

The label has to make a profit they dont do anything for charity. if this album only send up selling 20k how will the label make a profit

As I said before: Very few artists sell alot of CDs these days.Unless your name is Adele or Lil Wayne,you're most likely NOT gonna sell alot of CDs.Even Prince's recent CDs barely make it to gold status (I saw a ton of unsold Lotusflower CDs at Target for only 99 cents).How many 80s funk bands even have record deals these days...much less a big-selling album? I don't think anyone involved with this project (the guys themselves or the label) had unrealistic expectations about the sales.

from the USA TODAY article:

Morris Day says the one thing the band has now that it didn't have when Pandemonium was released is a commitment from everybody involved to see the project through. That includes promotional events for the remainder of the year and a full tour in 2012.

This is what's most important to me: that they're gonna stand behind their work,promote it aggressively with a 2012 tour and not give up on it too soon.

minneapolisFunq said:

Has anyone heard trendin on the radio at all?

I'm doubting it gets any play outside of the TwinCities metro area, and even then it must be limited.

"#Trendin" was the Most Added song on R&B/urban stations last week and yes,I have heard it on the radio in my area (northern California).This is a band of guys in their 50s....it's remarkable that they're getting radio airplay at all!

some stations that added "#Trendin" last week:

KJLH/Los Angeles

KMEL/San Francisco

...

[Edited 10/27/11 0:32am]

minneapolisFunq said:

Television still has major influence over the public.

What the hell were you thinking to type that out?

'The Tonight Show with Jay Leno' and 'The Soul Train Awards' are high-profile TV gigs.I'm sure more will follow in the coming weeks.I bet they will perform at the American Music Awards.

dandeeland said:

this project will probabally get shelved very soon. I hope not but why should they do it if noone is buying them. Most Prince fans didn't even buy it.

What do you mean "shelved"? :confused: Once an album is released,it remains on the market for a long time.The guys have already said that they're gonna see this project through with alot of promotional events and a tour in 2012.

asg said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

Anybody, what spot did they come in at?

And also, to a few saying the charts don't measure how good the album/artist is, I'm not arguing that. But when artist put out albums, they wanna sell some records.If the Time or anyone esle didn't care about record sales, they'd give their music out free.

Releasing an album cost money. They have to pay the bills for making it, manufacturing CD, video and then marketing it and even the promotion of travelling is costly when u have 7 guys going around to different cities. They been working for 3yrs on it

They r in the business to make money and then split it 7 ways.

Apart from jam and lewis others r not independently wealthy

The money they make from this project won't be from the CD sales.Most artists don't make most of their income from CD sales these days.They make their money from touring and other opportunities that come their way (merchandising,promotional tie-ins,etc).Just ask Madonna.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

when artist put out albums, they wanna sell some records.If the Time or anyone esle didn't care about record sales, they'd give their music out free.

True,but this is 2011,the era of illegal downloading Most CDs that are released do not sell alot of copies these days.Unless you're a young "hot" artist,you can forget about selling alot of records.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

asg said:

Releasing an album cost money. They have to pay the bills for making it, manufacturing CD, video and then marketing it and even the promotion of travelling is costly when u have 7 guys going around to different cities. They been working for 3yrs on it

They r in the business to make money and then split it 7 ways.

Apart from jam and lewis others r not independently wealthy

The label pays for that, not the artist. Morris and them are not paying get disc manufactured and what not, that's the labels job.

What label?

SoulAlive said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

Javi said:

It doesn't surprise me. We are quite obsessed with Prince here in prince.org, but it must be admitted that Prince and the associated artists are ignored by the majority of the public, even the specialized and serious listeners. Only as a brilliant live act is Prince considered nowadays.

But Prince still charts high wit his albums.

Mostly through things like giving albums away. They aren't giving it away.

Genesia said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

I don't believe this. If they were still the Time and it got pushed, than they would have sold. I told my 45 year old co-worker about it yester, he had know idea.

Uhhhh...your last sentence proves HonestMan's point, you know.

You clearly have no idea how PR works. You don't just call up The Today Show and say, "Hi. I have a new album - put me on your show."

It's called "earned media" for a reason. You have to earn it. They didn't.

Yeah- cause All these new talentless acts EARN the media (with the labels doallrs).

Zannaloaf said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

But Prince still charts high wit his albums.

Mostly through things like giving albums away. They aren't giving it away.

Not true

3121 opened at #1

lotisflow3er opened at #2 with just cd sales counted. urban was number #1 but prince was ahead of him by 30k with just cd sales. but prince didnt release the sales from digitaldownload and urban came out ahead by only 3k. prince was in fact the best selling album that week.

only for musciology the give aways were included but it also had real sales of over 1 million.

L O N G Haul..............................

Zannaloaf said:

Genesia said:

Uhhhh...your last sentence proves HonestMan's point, you know.

You clearly have no idea how PR works. You don't just call up The Today Show and say, "Hi. I have a new album - put me on your show."

It's called "earned media" for a reason. You have to earn it. They didn't.

Yeah- cause All these new talentless acts EARN the media (with the labels doallrs).

They may not have earned the media, personally - but their labels have.

the fellas look old in that video. they should have tried this project back when jam and lewis still had some producing clout.

Genesia said:

Zannaloaf said:

Yeah- cause All these new talentless acts EARN the media (with the labels doallrs).

They may not have earned the media, personally - but their labels have.

But that is business (and money spent)...not musicianship. I respect the business of things, but unfortunately it overshadows the art. And frankly that has partly been the death of good music on a larger level. Back in the 70s and 80s (and probably prior- I worked at WEA during the 80s so I'm talking about what I observed) it was a blend of business people who LOVED the art (even if they screwed the artists). Now it is bottom line $$ for most large labels- which I think is a shame.

asg said:

Zannaloaf said:

Mostly through things like giving albums away. They aren't giving it away.

Not true

3121 opened at #1

lotisflow3er opened at #2 with just cd sales counted. urban was number #1 but prince was ahead of him by 30k with just cd sales. but prince didnt release the sales from digitaldownload and urban came out ahead by only 3k. prince was in fact the best selling album that week.

only for musciology the give aways were included but it also had real sales of over 1 million.

yup people always trying to downplay

As for Condensate, i truly believe as time goes on there will be an increase in sales and publicity, especially when their show hits the road.

Zannaloaf said:

Genesia said:

They may not have earned the media, personally - but their labels have.

But that is business (and money spent)...not musicianship. I respect the business of things, but unfortunately it overshadows the art. And frankly that has partly been the death of good music on a larger level. Back in the 70s and 80s (and probably prior- I worked at WEA during the 80s so I'm talking about what I observed) it was a blend of business people who LOVED the art (even if they screwed the artists). Now it is bottom line $$ for most large labels- which I think is a shame.

Oh, honey - you're so naive. Do you really think the most talented people are the ones who get the attention?

Newsflash: It's always about the money. It has always been about the money.

Zannaloaf said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

But Prince still charts high wit his albums.

Mostly through things like giving albums away. They aren't giving it away.

Lotusflow3r 3 CD set debuted at number 2 on the charts! No giveaway with that one!

wonder505 said:

asg said:

Not true

3121 opened at #1

lotisflow3er opened at #2 with just cd sales counted. urban was number #1 but prince was ahead of him by 30k with just cd sales. but prince didnt release the sales from digitaldownload and urban came out ahead by only 3k. prince was in fact the best selling album that week.

only for musciology the give aways were included but it also had real sales of over 1 million.

yup people always trying to downplay

As for Condensate, i truly believe as time goes on there will be an increase in sales and publicity, especially when their show hits the road.

what u mean downplay.

3121 and lotusflow3er both opened with real sales around 180k and both have gone gold.

Billboard doesnt include any give aways anymore musicology was the only album and they discontinued the pratice after that.

Condensate will not go up. the first week is when all hard core fans buy albums and after that is all downhill. next week it will drop by like 70% . then 50% and then 30% it is the standard trjectory of most albums. And this will be no different unless radio plays them consistently and oprah used to have a huge impact on sales too. I have been following the album charts weekly since the 90s i know a thing or two.

Zannaloaf said:

Genesia said:

They may not have earned the media, personally - but their labels have.

But that is business (and money spent)...not musicianship. I respect the business of things, but unfortunately it overshadows the art. And frankly that has partly been the death of good music on a larger level. Back in the 70s and 80s (and probably prior- I worked at WEA during the 80s so I'm talking about what I observed) it was a blend of business people who LOVED the art (even if they screwed the artists). Now it is bottom line $$ for most large labels- which I think is a shame.

labels always push the younger artish and the older r pushed off. Prince greatly benefitted from this in the 80s it just how things go

asg said:

wonder505 said:

yup people always trying to downplay

As for Condensate, i truly believe as time goes on there will be an increase in sales and publicity, especially when their show hits the road.

what u mean downplay.

3121 and lotusflow3er both opened with real sales around 180k and both have gone gold.

Billboard doesnt include any give aways anymore musicology was the only album and they discontinued the pratice after that.

Condensate will not go up. the first week is when all hard core fans buy albums and after that is all downhill. next week it will drop by like 70% . then 50% and then 30% it is the standard trjectory of most albums. And this will be no different unless radio plays them consistently and oprah used to have a huge impact on sales too. I have been following the album charts weekly since the 90s i know a thing or two.

I think that's what she/he meant. Some people on this site tend to "downplay" any recent success P has had regarding sales/chart debuts, etc.

asg said:

HonestMan13 said:

Zannaloaf said:

Mostly through things like giving albums away. They aren't giving it away.

Lotusflow3r 3 CD set debuted at number 2 on the charts! No giveaway with that one!

They also changed the way they tally sales (post Musicology), so giveaways don't count, at all.

asg said:

The label has to make a profit they dont do anything for charity. if this album only send up selling 20k how will the label make a profit

Record labels don't expect every album to be Thriller. Thousands of albums are released every year and most of them don't sell much. The big albums pay for any little niche record such as Hawaiian folk tunes or spoken word albums. It's like a movie studio isn't expecting an "art film" to make money. They have Die Hard 58 for that. The major labels sometimes release albums to fail on purpose for a tax writeoff. In this case, a small label doesn't need to sell a lot to make a profit. They don't have the big money like a major, so are not spending as much. Printing CD's don't cost a lot, and they don't need to print a lot unless there is a demand, then they print up more copies. Majors often print up a lot of albums and ship them out to stores. If it doesn't sell as expected, then the store returns them to the label or put them in the 99 cent bin. So there's a profit loss. A small label also doesn't have to worry about paying for hype or payola. There's not of radio airplay or media for blues, opera, jazz, or bluegrass. Yet people buy these albums.

chill, it's only week 1 + doesn't take into account any European / Global sales - I suspect that there have been many downloads across Europe given the love P gets over here. In the UK i chose to DL via Amazon as the UK ITunes version only listed 12 trax. I'd love to see how the Euro/global DLs' stack up in the coming weeks.

Also, I suspect that this project will make its money from the forthcoming tour. The CD is truly a great advert and it's really great that Trendin' is getting some airplay.

Genesia said:

getxxxx said:

Their press rolling out was all wrong... They should have been in media weeks leading up to the release and not the week of at radio with Tom Joyner & Doug Banks.

They should have been on GMA, The View, Today or one of those morning shows

Maybe this Leno performance will spark more interest.

How do you know they didn't try?

I think you overestimate the interest of the general public in this.

Totally agree. I'm honestly pretty surprised they are going to appear on Leno. If you ask me, the reason they are on tonight and it was scheduled and announced so far ahead of time is becuase that was what they could get! Even with the names Jam, Lewis Day, etc, the public demand or media interest isn't there like it would for Prince (POSSIBLY for Prince). I'm just glad it got released, and the fans know it is out there.

SoulAlive said:

dandeeland said:

this project will probabally get shelved very soon. I hope not but why should they do it if noone is buying them. Most Prince fans didn't even buy it.

What do you mean "shelved"? :confused: Once an album is released,it remains on the market for a long time.The guys have already said that they're gonna see this project through with alot of promotional events and a tour in 2012.

Shelved? lol Yeah not likely. Most of the Prince fans I know purchased it, but the BIGGER problem is how easy it is for people to just go out and steal the release, you couldn't do that back when What Time is it? came out without a long trench coat lol

This album will sell a lot more as word gets out, the album is pure MPLS perfection, and that is something I have not been able to say in a long ass time!