2010 Magazine's Albums Of The Year Thread For Posting Lists and Discussion

well, i dont think that cd sales are representative of how most ppl engage w/ music in 2010, esp. compared with a decade ago. do you disagree w/ that?

i agree with sales not being at all representive of how people "engage with" music in 2010, but i still think album sales are still a fair-ish representation of what remains popular with a large percentage of music consumers

'a large' percentage, meaning what exactly? a much smaller one than was the case a decade ago surely. i know we like to think indie took over in the past couple of yrs but you guys cant seriously think that arcade fire or w/e are even in the same world of popularity as like idk semisonic

I mean album sales at this point are pretty much restricted to the most popular of popular stuff, right? Your big-box chain stores are down to stocking pretty much only Top 40 stuff, so I think physical album sales are still really indicative of what is really and truly popular. But I think album sales as a measurment of how people "engage with" msuic is totally missing the point, as you seem to be saying.

but you guys cant seriously think that arcade fire or w/e are even in the same world of popularity as like idk semisonic

Actualy I'd say these two bands are pretty close in terms of overall popularity, but I'm not sure what your yardstick is here. If "album sales", well, no, but it is pretty useless to compare any 2010 band with a 1998 band in terms of sales.

But even if sales are a tiny fraction of what they once were, it doesn't render them useless as a measuring device.

i think they are much more useless as a measuring device of an artist's popularity, because only certain demographics are actually paying for albums now

ask j0rdan s. how many cds he owns

ha

because only certain demographics are actually paying for albums now

I'm not disagreeing with you on this point at all. But "more uselss" /= "completely useless".

I mean, your argument is verging on "ILM poster X never streams music through last.fm, so last.fm isn't a valid measuring device for the popularity of a given artist"

well, any substantive number means *something* but for the purposes of that article, completely useless, yes. id say sales are about as representative of 'the people' as critics' opinions are, just in a different, distorted way

I mean, your argument is verging on "ILM poster X never streams music through last.fm, so last.fm isn't a valid measuring device for the popularity of a given artist"

― one pretty obvious guy in the obvious (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, December 27, 2010 3:00 PM (12 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

its only a valid measuring device for a very narrow demographic! at some level, its pretty useless

like i guarantee you that rap sales are way way way deflated where grown folks R&B sales are only somewhat deflated -- so the impact on popularity is that sade & maxwell suddenly are dominating. or drake is suddenly the best selling rapper *rmde*

but at some levels, I think also very useful; but I think we are getting at the core difficulty when it comes to determining popularity in 2010 - demographics are not only very splintered, but also widely varied simply in how music is consumed, there really isn't a good way at all to definitively say Artist X is more popular than Artist Y

i mean, sade would have sold ridic numbers regardless, but suddenly the number of albums competing w/ her are just like, the absurd eminem cult

I mean, yeah, it'd be great if we could invent something that tracked every ringtone and streamed YouTube play in the world, but until that happens we have to settle for the yardsticks we can access.

but at some levels, I think also very useful; but I think we are getting at the core difficulty when it comes to determining popularity in 2010 - demographics are not only very splintered, but also widely varied simply in how music is consumed, there really isn't a good way at all to definitively say Artist X is more popular than Artist Y

― one pretty obvious guy in the obvious (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, December 27, 2010 3:03 PM (59 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

exactly what im saying -- album sales are, less than ever before, not accurately measuring music's popularity -- theyre simply measuring the # of people willing to pay for an artifact of music when its all available for free online. no way is that a remotely accurate measurement of music's actual popularity

xp You'd have to show that the most "popular" acts overall (in terms of, say, concert tickets, youtube views, merch sales, illegal downloads, free mixtape downloads, subscription service streams, ringtones, whatever) are something other than the ones who sell the most albums. That's probably true in some cases (with, say, legacy acts who can still sell out huge venues without even putting out new product), but I'd still guess the two lists would be pretty similar, for the most part. And if album sales aren't the best indicator of popularity, what is? (Some combo of all the variables I named, and more, maybe, with math formula to be determined later. But I doubt any of them on their own are a better metric than album sales.) That article was still pretty stupid anyway, though.

And if album sales aren't the best indicator of popularity, what is?

im not sure i get the logic behind "although this is now a very inaccurate measurement of popularity, we should continue referring to it w/out acknowledging the considerable shortcomings because we dont have a better method of measurement"

the bungling of gucci's career by major labels is a perfect example to me of sales not actually representing the potential popular energy of an artist. he gave away tons of free music! how do you incorporate that into a major label record sales model?

'a large' percentage, meaning what exactly? a much smaller one than was the case a decade ago surely. i know we like to think indie took over in the past couple of yrs but you guys cant seriously think that arcade fire or w/e are even in the same world of popularity as like idk semisonic

― lyrics is weak ... like clock radio similes (deej), Monday, December 27, 2010 3:49 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Semisonic is a pretty weird example, dude. sure they have one song everyone knows, but virtually no other songs that are remotely as popular, and they had one album go platinum on the strength of that song at a time when it was really easy to go platinum. I'd say a nominal 'indie' band that's had a couple top 5 Billboard debuts and is a decent-sized concert draw is in some ways more popular than Semisonic ever were.

what is a 'decent sized concert draw' -- idk then, what about like weezer or something. is that comparable to arcade fire's level of fame?

Also, Arcade Fire has been on SNL twice, Semisonic never was, I think that certainly says something about relative levels of popularity.

Not sure how much, but Lorne Michaels isn't know for booking no-names these days.

"known"

i think youre arcade fire fans are more likely to pay for records than your soulja boy fans. is arcade fire more popular than soulja boy?

I'd never even heard of that song until I saw deej rep for it so much on ILM. xxxxp

Also, Arcade Fire has been on SNL twice, Semisonic never was, I think that certainly says something about relative levels of popularity.

― one pretty obvious guy in the obvious (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, December 27, 2010 3:13 PM (45 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

LOL

Oh, so you can randomly pick and choose which yardsticks fit your worldview but no one else can?

haha i was repping for semisonic?? i doubt it. maybe i defended it halfheartedly at one pt? my sister had that cd, along with Fastball & matchbox 20 (Maybe thats the band i should be comparing arcade fire with ... i bet you there's no WAY arcade fire are at matchbox 20 levels ... that dude even had a minor solo career!)

I mean, ffs, you are still whining about Gucci not being as big as he is in your little corner of the web.

Oh, so you can randomly pick and choose which yardsticks fit your worldview but no one else can?

― one pretty obvious guy in the obvious (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, December 27, 2010 3:15 PM (11 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

im arguing that most yardsticks are insufficient. youre arguing that sales & SNL appearances are reasonable yardsticks, since we dont have any better ones.

I mean, ffs, you are still whining about Gucci not being as big as he is in your little corner of the web.

― one pretty obvious guy in the obvious (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Monday, December 27, 2010 3:15 PM (21 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i mean FFS you are misrepresenting my argument & thats not at all what im 'whining' about?

Of course its fucking stupid to hold up SNL appearances as an accurate barometer of popularity, but no more so than YouTube plays or w/e.

It was a joke, relax, I just thought it was funny that you found a way to shoehorn Gucci into this argument too!

i dont see how i needed to 'shoehorn' him in, his inability to turn popularity into sales is pretty much a perfect barometer about how 'sales' dont mean what they used to

fwiw youtube views seem equally unscientific to me

I think we agree on 95% of this issue, but we are butting heads over the remaining 5%. I just feel like you are drawing some sort of line and saying, "this is how I listen to music so it must be more accurately reflective of the world as a whole than album sales".

im not saying its MORE reflective, im just arguing that the viability of any yardstick is pretty much nil -- nothing today is as accurate as billboard was at the turn of the decade

of course that model had its own shortcomings -- album sales would often represent no more than single sales. but there was basically only one method to access the music at this point

I'm not saying your barometers are wrong or misleading, quite the opposite. But I also think your ways leave out huge chunks of the music-consuming public simply because they don't fit in with your narrative.

im not leaving them out! i know lots of people like sade! i just think that being able to get people to buy an album is a much more narrow slice of the music-producing industry than it once was

trying to point out the diff between critics & people who still pay for albums isnt much of a hook for an article, though

i just think that being able to get people to buy an album is a much more narrow slice of the music-producing industry than it once was

Again, not arguing this point at all, I agree 100%. I think album sales are a hugely flawed and short-sighted, yet somewhat accurate, method of measuring popularity in 2010. Should it be the single measuring stick to prove that Eminem is more popular than, say, Rihanna? Of course not. But I still find it incredibly useful in some respects and not that far off reality. I mean, if you are thinking that some new-fangled measurement system is suddenly going to prove that Gucci is more popular than Drake, you are going to be disappointed.

i think it would prove that they're much closer in popularity than albums sales would indicate regardless

"But I still find it incredibly useful in some respects and not that far off reality. "

i just dont see how you are jumping to this conclusion

like, theres an entire generation now who literally do not purchase CDs.

unless they are made by taylor swift

i mean, do you realize exactly how much CD sales have fallen in the past decade? its a massive, massive drop-off

i think sales figures include legal downloads now? illegal downloads obv the huge elephant in the room but until someone comes up w/a way of measuring them, they'll remain so

Dude, you are infuriating. I am well aware how much CD sales have fallen off. Whether artist X sells 24% of 10,000,000,000 albums or 24% of 10,000 albums, they are still repping for 24% of all album sales, which, I think, still speaks of a relative level of popularity compared to other artists on the chart.