Not very many artists do this, but, when they are in the "whole Tv promo" and doing the shows like Leno,Letterman,Craig Ferguson,Conan,Kimmel,or Carson Daily or anyone of the Morning shows, since radio doesnt do this, and Video stations dont do this. When they go on these shows they should play different songs for each show, as opposed to playing the damn single on all of the shows, which makes no sense but 95% of them do it. The person that showed me this was Norah Jones who to this day rarely does the same song on different shows, back in 2002 when she came out and started getting the talk shows she ended up playing almost the whole album on different shows, and the same for her second album, and now with the third album shes been on three talk shows so far, and three different songs played. this is a great idea, not sure why everyone doesnt do this. Also doing this was Mellencamp most recently on the Kimmel,Letterman show played 4 different tracks. Thats the only way you are gonna get hurt, plus its a nice thing for your fans!

The problem though is that you don't know who's watching, and when. You don't wanna play an album track that wont go over on a national TV stage.

If you've got that one big hit and say you're on a show with different audiences (ex: The Man Show and Oprah), you play that one hit song on both shows.

I think the artists like to put their best foot forward so to speak and by choosing a song as a single, they consider that song to be their best foot.

th13182 said:

Well i just think they are shooting themselves in the foot, one reason would be, singles dont exist anymore another would be since album sales are almost non-existent anymore, you need to show people you have more than one song out there. If your a young pop/rb artist chances are the audience has heard your hit, and they would be best served playing another song, since they are the ones with struggling sales. For veteran artists or just ones with Loyal followings, talk shows to them arent so much about promoting the record as they are a chance to play, warm up for a tour, do something for your fans. I would say that this theory was the reason for Norah Jones "Come Away with me" doing the business it did, sure "Dont Know why" was the hit, but she did it once and that was on Leno 2002 and that was it, then she proceeded to play different tracks on different shows. Im not even sure thats why she did it that way, i think it was just because the band wanted to work on playing on other songs. With TOP 40 artists by planning one song everywhere they are killing their sales, and setting themselves up for a one hit wonder status.

Yeah, I definately see your point. I think the networks want the popular songs played though.

The only thing that would make sense is if the best song FOR THE MARKET THE TALK SHOW AIMS AT is chosen. Sometimes the best song for that audience is simply the most popular one.

I think Oprah's audience could have enjoyed a different song instead of "So Excited".

edit: "so excited" and "nasty" is what janet jackson performed on Oprah

If I'm not mistaken Diana Ross did this when she was promoting her album...

The reason im mainly saying this is about new artist Katharine McPhee who has a good debut album, stronger than i thought it would be. So she was an American Idol runner up obviously every show jumped to book her, she did about 9 different shows in the last 2 weeks and on EVERY show she sang the single, which is just about the weakest song on the album. On this cd are two ballads that would make Mariah and Christina look over their shoulders and be scared of the "Voice" that could blow them away. So im thinking that labels think that just because you appear on a show people will buy your record, NO, it doesnt work like that anymore, especially if you are new, you need to sell your record, people dont want to put down $$ for one song albums anymore, also networks cant dictate what you play, they can only stop "cursing", so labels in some cases DO dictate what the artist plays, once again another mistake by people at the labels who have NO CLUE how to market their artists at all. The older artists like a Mellencamp and Norah Jones are gonna play what they want because who is gonna stop them.

It does make sense. Especially when artists do The Today Show,Regis and The view all in one morning. I wouldnt mind it as long as the music is good.

It would work with artists who are consistent. Some people try to dip into every other genre and it may appear like they're all over the place.

Sometimes non singles are too long or not tv friendly.
I've bought many cd's that have radio friendly songs and then the rest of the album is naughty

lastdecember said:

is that Mariah on Ur avatar???

interesting...

i just read a book on the pixies, and there was a story about when their song "here comes your man" was a semi-big hit, and the arsenio hall show wanted them to come on and play the song. the pixies responded by saying they'd be happy to play on the show, but only if they could do a different song from the album. arsenio hall said no, and the pixies wound up not appearing on the show.

SO. i can only assume that these shows require artists to play the big hits or whatever new single has been released - no surprises, no obscure songs.

of course, someone like prince has been able to command the ability to play whatever he wants, like when he did 'everlasting now' and 'ballad of dorothy parker' on leno, or when he did that cracktacular 'dolphin' performance on letterman...but i think prince's appeal has always been the spectacle of what he's gonna do, not so much what song he's gonna play. though i think that aspect of his stage persona has died down in the past few years, and by his own design he's become a performer who comes on and plays the hits these days.

Anx said:

But can they play another song?

MikeMatronik said:

I would say as the artist you can play whatever the hell you want, since most networks dont know about who they book and what their single is. I can see a label maybe saying to an artist what they have to promote, but then again, a more establsihed artist can play what they want, since people are tuning in to see them. My examples of Norah Jones and John Mellencamp, show more of how this works to their advantage in every aspect, especially not being radio or video artists that will get alot of play, talk shows have almost become gigs at this point and you should go out there and give a few examples of who you are. I feel Katharine Mcphee missed this opportunity, because she was on about 9 different shows, and even though her album sold well, she played the same song 9 times when there are much better songs on the album and ones that showcase her vocals more, so i think it was clearly a missed opportunity.