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Are Madonna's sales numbers a disappointment?
Friday 9 May 2008
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While Madonna scored yet another No. 1 album, it may not have been the blockbuster opening
that some were expecting. She sold 280,000 copies of "Hard Candy", according to Nielsen
SoundScan, in its first week in stores. First things first: With the days of the CD as the
music format of choice seemingly numbered, any album that sells in the six-figure range is
a bonus for the music biz these days.
And those who rolled their eyes at yet another blog alluding to the death of the CD, ask
Madonna herself, who last year signed a $120-million deal with a touring company in Live
Nation. And this summer, fans will get to see that deal start to pay off. Madonna will be
generously coming to a whopping 16 North American markets, according to Billboard.
Yet it's also hard not to note that Madonna's "Hard Candy" sold about 180,000 fewer copies
than Mariah Carey moved two weeks ago. She's still significantly ahead, though, of the
181,000 copies sold by Janet Jackson's "Discipline" when it debuted in March. But back to
Carey. Her "E=MC2" scored the highest debut of the year when it opened at No. 1 after
selling 463,000 copies. In just three weeks on the chart, "E=MC2" has sold more than
740,000 copies.
Album sales may be down across the board, but Madonna would certainly be expected to be
closer to Mariah than, say, Leona Lewis on the diva totem pole. Newcomer Lewis entered at
No. 1 a few weeks ago, her debut, "Spirit", selling 205,000 copies.
To compare "Hard Candy's" stats to Madonna's last record: In 2005 her Euro-influenced
"Confessions on a Dance Floor" opened with 350,000 copies, according to Billboard. It's
rare these days for an artist to actually top the first-week sales of a prior album, but
if anyone could do it, it would certainly be Madonna. And Mariah just did it.
So it's easy to view Madonna's sales tally as a disappointment, a sign that she's losing
her grip on the pop marketplace. But don't. Billboard downplays Madonna's sales dip,
noting that "Confessions" opened during the holiday season. The trade also fairly points
out that Mariah may have benefited from appearances on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" and
"American Idol".
On one hand, Madonna is a bigger international brand than Mariah will ever be, and she
was just inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But on the other, the marketing
campaign for "Hard Candy" was one based less on promotion than on partnerships. The album
may not have been endorsed by Oprah, but the marketing campaign leading up the release
of "Hard Candy" has been far from what anyone would call subtle. There are the Sunsilk
commercials, the branding promotions with Verizon, the odd YouTube video and the video
gift to gossip blogger Perez Hilton.
Additionally, Madonna's lead single, "4 Minutes", has been inescapable. It's still a
top-10 hit, and her second single, "Give It 2 Me", has just debuted in the top 100. But
even more important, "4 Minutes" has given Madonna something she didn't have at all with
"Confessions on a Dance Floor", and that's a hit on U.S. radio.
But if there's a problem - if this is a problem - with "4 Minutes", it's that it is as
much a Justin Timberlake or Timbaland single as it is one from Madonna. It's also a song
that will spur download sales, but not necessarily album sales. For instance, as fun and
silly as it may be, "4 Minutes" also could have appeared on Timbaland's 2007 album "Shock
Value", or Timberlake's "FutureSex/LoveSounds". It's a song fit for an iTunes playlist as
much as it is a new Madonna album.
Indeed, by lining up today's top producers and superstars - Timberlake, Timbaland,
Pharrell Williams, Kanye West, etc. - Madonna has created an album that may sound swell
stacked up with everyone else on the radio, but it also risks the danger of failing to
set itself apart.
But "Hard Candy" doesn't really need to stand alone in order to be a success. The end
result is an album seemingly built to sell millions of single-track downloads, ring tones,
videos and bits of whatever digital accessories exist. And for pop music as business plan,
that may prove to be one of Madonna's smartest moves yet, whether intentional or not.
(Los Angeles Times)
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