Just hanging in there at #45 again this week. It will lose its bullet next week. Too bad.

Bring on the next single!

VoicesCarry said:

Whoops now! ... I'm not surprised - the new single is TOTAL crap.

I still haven't heard it...and that's just fine with me!

Enough of the marshmallow fluff sex kitten stuff - not that I want a return to the big hair and housekey earrings, but can't we just have one more little taste of Miss Jackson If Yer Nasty??

I have faith that "I Want You" will be more successful.

theVelvetRoper said:

I would say the same thing but keep in mind what is going on with this country right now. Granted, "Just A Little While" ain't great but it's not like Clear Channel is that eager to play Janet right now. Take a look at what they did to Howard Stern. These are scary as times!

VinnyM27 said:

True. But, as I've said before, I don't care if I'm the only person who buys Damita Jo, (besides you, of course!), I love Janet anyway. Her sales don't change that fact!

i'm not concerned in the least. if all for you could sell 600,000+ copies in its first week, this will do well also. there is still more than a month of promotion ahead including the diane sawyer interview. janet handles her shit. maybe it won't be quite as successful as past projects but i think it far too premature to start fearing a flop. after all, most promo stuff bgin no sooner than a month prior..for most peeps. girl is all over tv and tabloid...new videos and singles...new major interviews...no worries from me.

SassierBritches said:

I'm just talking about the single, not the album, which is guaranteed to do well on her name alone (even the universally reviled "American Life" made #1 after all), at least initially. What it sells after that will be based on single quality and word of mouth.

"Just A Little While":
Hot 100: 45 to 45*
Hot 100 Airplay: 48 to 49
Top 40 Tracks: 22 to 22
Adult Top 40: 39 to 38*
Top 40 Mainstream: 21 to 18*
Dance Radio Airplay: 18 to 17*

"I Want You":
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks: Debuts at 54*
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay: Debuts at 52*

* = bullet
[This message was edited Thu Feb 26 11:36:14 2004 by VoicesCarry]

oh... i gotcha...yeah, i don't think just a little while was the best choice of a single. i love the song and play it all the time but i'm a huge janet fan. regular radio listeners are not necessarily janet fans...they are just casual listeners. no sense in preching to the choir, right? i think a hot dance track (since the cd has been touted as a hot dance record) would get people to pay closer attention. but that's just me.

SassierBritches said:

Me too. When Janet does dance, it can be sublime.

VoicesCarry said:

I agree. I mean, I like "Just a Little While" because I'm an obsessed Janet fan, but as Janet songs go, it's one of her least impressive, and there could have been a better lead single. She should have just ripped it with a hot dance song, like you guys said. I still think Virgin made a huge mistake by not releasing "Come on Get Up", which would have been a hit for sure.

theVelvetRoper said:

As much as I'd love to hear a hot dance album from Janet and I don't see it happening since both singles hardly feel like dance tracks. Since the unamed dance producer along with that 7 guy that said it was going to be a dance album aren't on the list of producers for the CD, I think Janet changed her mind. The last story I heard about her a few weeks ago said she was still recording the album! I think she might have changed her mind, which is a shame!

theVelvetRoper said:

"And in some surprising music news, Janet Jackson sold only two copies of her new album "Damita Jo". Janet said it is OK and really hopes that they both like it."

I think that the controversy will hopefully help Janet sell albums but not just because she showed her boob. I really think that with things going the way they are with censorship (Howard Stern!) that there will be an uproar and one of the ways that we as consumers can tell the FCC we don't mind we aren't prudes is to support people like Janet. Hey, I was going to buy the album on the first day anyway and the boob (while exciting) did nothing to change my mind either way. I love me some Janet and Connie ain't gonna stop me from buying the new CD!

::"Interlude:Fasten Your Seatbelts"::



"BUT YA ARE, BLANCHE, YA ARE!"



::"Go Deep"::

VinnyM27 said:

I haven't heard the new single but I wish she would do something else instead of another sex album...she's becoming a one note (we already heard that) artist. How about another concept record like Rhythm Nation, something with a little more substance.

Peace, Serveitupfrankie*

serveitupfrankie said:

that's the main problem I have with Janet.Creatively,she seems to be exactly where she was in 1993...playing the horny,aggressive sex-kitten-with-a-smile role.It's become old,boring and predictable.I haven't even heard the new CD yet,but it's a safe bet that it will feature the obligatory faked orgasms and moans,the sly reference to a guy's "package",and other cheap stunts designed to shock people (actually,this is what's wrong with most of today's R&B music in general).In 2004,with everything that's going on in the world right now,do we really need another "sex album" from any artist?

VoicesCarry said:

As I predicted a few weeks ago,Janet will probably experience a slight backlash with this CD.Not necessarily because of the Super Bowl fiasco,although that has given her alot of negative publicity.In my area,we have three R&B/hip-hop stations,but the song isn't really getting much airplay on any of them.There's no question her CD will debut at Number One (she still has a large fanbase),but the overall sales may suffer.

VoicesCarry said:

Btw,what's up the lame strategy of releasing two "first" singles anyway? If I'm not mistaken, Virgin did this in 1996 with the 'Velvet Rope'...they released "Got Til It's Gone" AND "Together Again" simultaneously.As a result,"Got Til It's Gone" suffered.This a flawed strategy that rarely works.For this new CD,they should have just picked ONE strong first single and promote the hell out of it.

I think the media is just sick of EVERY Jackson... we have had non-stop nonsense with stupid stories being put in the paper to try to keep her brother afloat for 15+years..

The Media is tired of being blamed for all these stories.. and michael playing that "catch 22" game around it.

Janet sadly is apart of this because of her last name .. but the media just wants them all dead & gone in the mainstream..they are NOT going to give any of them a break..

but hey with me.. I love Janet and I can careless who buys this new album! IF I can buy it .. thats all I care about.

DavidEye said:

"Got 'til it's Gone" was released before her album was released in September. "Together Again" was released in December. If you're going to criticize their "flawed strategy", at least get the facts straight.
[This message was edited Fri Feb 27 8:16:28 2004 by theVelvetRoper]

DavidEye said:

Are you forgetting The Velvet Rope? That was hardly a "sex album", so don't say that every album since '93 has been so.

theVelvetRoper said:

On its surface, TVR could be interpreted as a sex album, considering the number of sado-masochistic shots of Janet in the booklet and song titles like "Rope Burn", "Tonight's The Night", "Go Deep", and "My Need".

BUT it is a sex album that only pays lip service to sex. It is Janet's "Erotica", with cheeky titles (remember what everyone thought "Deeper And Deeper" was about before they listened to it?) and a hot booklet, but content that says more. It is, I believe, her best album.

While I don't really like what she's done since then (most of AFY, the first two Damita Jo singles), it really shows her artistic potential when she tries something new. But she appears to be on autopilot lately, so I won't be buying the new album until I've heard it. There are several things she really needs to do if she wants to make a great record, though:

a) NO INTERLUDES - useless spacefillers

b) TRIM THE ALBUM - we don't need 75 minutes to feel as if we've made a worthy purchase; even TVR was overlong, but this is a common fault of modern R&B records
[This message was edited Fri Feb 27 8:40:27 2004 by VoicesCarry]

theVelvetRoper said:

AND TVR was released in 1997

DavidEye said:

davideye, i think you are mistaken there. got til it's gone was released before the cd even came out. it was the debut single and video from the album and, while single sales were not incredible, radio airplay and video rotation were on point. together again came out a month or so later but had been burning up the dance floor for a short while before its release. i don't think janet has released two singles at once before and cosidering the circumstances surrounding this go 'round..jalw being leaked and all...it probably wasn't planned and it is just an attempt to use it to janet's advantage. not a bad idea considering she'll have songs on both, urban and pop stations, without the use of a remix version.

theVelvetRoper said:

whoops...sorry to step on your lines...

SassierBritches said:

There is a reason record companies generally avoid releasing 2 singles at once - it splits airplay between them, resulting in lower chart placings for both AND it confuses listeners who now have to keep track of 2 songs ("I called in to request....what's that song called again?") by the same artist who they might not like in the first place (increasing the annoyance factor).

This is more clumsy promotion on the part of Virgin, perhaps the worst label in the world.

The strategy does work in special cases. For example, "Hey Ya!" and "The Way You Move" were promoted almost as if they were from different artists (Big Boi and Andre 3000), and they were therefore easily distinguished. The label is dropping the release strategy of having 1 single from each disc (Speakerboxxx/The Love Below) come out at the same time, and has chosen a song from Andre's disc.
[This message was edited Fri Feb 27 8:49:22 2004 by VoicesCarry]

VoicesCarry said:

i think the new disc has only 3 interludes. sometimes they are great mood shifters and sometimes they are kind of pointless...like the ones on all for you. as for tvr being too long...man, that album is absolutely perfect. even non-janet fans seem to love that one. its just a very deep record. i think the length was appropriate considering every track played a big part of the journey. yeah, yeah, yeah...sounds all cheesy, but its true.

SassierBritches said:

Not as cheesy as that narcissistic interlude from TVR - "There's nothing more depressing than having everything...and still feeling sad. You must learn to water your spiritual garden". Oprah alert!

I would still have trimmed a few songs, but the album still gets 5 stars from me.