Comments on: After ‘Idol,’ a ‘Glee’-ful Upset on the Charts

By: Chris Molanphy

Chris Molanphy — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 14:42:19 +0000

@bth: All fair points, but I acknowledge the way Cook, overall, crushes Allen’s sales total toward the end of the above post (”It also has to be said that as impressive as Allen’s nearly half-million cumulative downloads are, one year ago this week, preceding victor David Cook shifted 942,000 songs, nearly twice as many as Allen did this past week”).

If I may refine your point, I think 2009 will go down as a stellar year for Idol as a TV show and a singing contest, but a potentially mediocre one (not quite Hicks-like, but close) for selling records, unless Lambert’s album turns into a surprise seller.

@BradNelson: Yeah, the Seether cover of Wham! has been in the Modern Top 10 for a couple of months now. I talked about it a bit in this post (scroll down about three-fourths of the way):

http://idolator.com/5216761/fergie-power-how-the-spun-off-diva-dragged-her-homeboys-to-no-1

At the time I was speculating about “Careless” going to No. 1, but that’s clearly not happening.

By: DocStrange

DocStrange — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 01:58:59 +0000

@BradNelson: My local alternative doesn't play it, but the active rock station loves it. Since I know some people who listen to active rock radio, I have heard it. And it is indeed an atrocity.

By: BradNelson

BradNelson — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 00:18:59 +0000

Reading the charts at the bottom of these always reveals some previously unknown horror to me.

This week: Seether covered “Careless Whisper”? I will spend the rest of my life evading ever hearing that. Just imagining it is filling my brain with awful.

By: bth

bth — Sat, 30 May 2009 18:16:31 +0000

But even if you convert the 10K compilation albums that Allen sold into 120K total singles (12 songs per compilation), that would only get Allen to 620K singles downloaded. The Kris Allen iTunes pass only had No Boundaries (no other singles), so maybe you can add another 10K to that — which would get you to 630K, still far short of Cook’s 942K.

And as for the crappiness of No Boundaries, even if you substituted Cook’s 236K sold for the amount Allen sold of NB, Allen still would not be within sniffing distance of Cook’s 942K from last year. (Same analysis applies to Lambert BTW in case you were wondering.) All in all, I think it was just a crappy year for Idol (despite all the media humping on Adam’s leg), AND the franchise is in decline.

By: Varina

Varina — Sat, 30 May 2009 01:12:22 +0000

Regarding Cook’s debuts versus Allen’s, there’s also the small matter of just how much “No Boundaries” sucks. Kris’s winning moment was kind of weird; Cook’s was triumphant and emotional and he got a much better Coronation Song.

By: DocStrange

DocStrange — Fri, 29 May 2009 22:36:22 +0000

You know what sucks? With 3 top 40 appearance this week, Kris Allen is automatically not a one hit wonder.

Since I seem to be one of the few people on the planet to have never cared about American Idol, I shouldn’t care, but I do as a chart geek.