so what did that Coldplay album end up selling?

I mean, no one is losing money of the disc, but it's not the juggernaut some (many? I? the media?) expected, promoted or predicted.

x-post There is no way that Coldplay album will have two or three more hit singles. I still hear more songs from "Rush of Blood" than "X&Y" when I'm out and about. And "Yellow." Now *that* was a hit single. I didn't even know "Fix You" was a single at all, which means it flops the "you're going to hear this whether you want to or not" hit single test.

"Fix You" wasn't a flop so much as a disappointment - it got loads of play and was definitely a hit, but it didn't end up being the smash that I think a lot of people hoped it would be. I think most people prefer Coldplay when they are a tad less sappy and a bit more rocking, a la "Speed of Sound" and "Clocks."

Just to be clear, I'm not a big Coldplay fan or anything, I'm just defending them because I think Josh is being unfair with them.

The next single from the album is "Talk," which has already racked up considerable airplay on modern rock radio. (I know this stuff because it's part of my day job, by the way.)

I think the thing that is tripping you up is that you're not thinking of this in terms of airplay, you're thinking of it in terms of songs having huge cultural impact. They will certainly have more hits in terms of airplay because radio/video outlets will support them, and the label will push at least one more single after "Talk." The sales will go up a bit, but not dramatically. Bands like Coldplay, U2, and Radiohead only really need their first single to have that massive cultural impact now - they need the first week/first month/first quarter sales to be a blockbuster to maintain their prestige. Coldplay are definitely following the current U2 template now, and will probably do so for the rest of their career.

Not as well yet, but those records had a head start, and I wouldn't put Coldplay in the same commercial bracket as them anyway. If anything this album would be the launching pad to put them in that bracket, which it probably hasn't quite done.

I wouldn't call "Speed of Sound" a GIGANTIC hit, really--its play seemed more based on reputation than on any momentum the song had on its own (there wasn't even a video out at the time it debuted at #8 on the charts, a peak which it never broached again). Five years down the line, it might be their highest charter in the US but I doubt too many will remember it as well as "Clocks," "The Scientist," "Yellow," etc. Unless you're just talking adult contemporary or triple A radio, in which case pretty much any Coldplay single is a guaranteed GIGANTIC hit.

Geir Hongro
any others?

I guess I am supposed to leave ILM now.

GREAT!

*searches for mallet*

BTW, I listened to the album again recently and didn't think it half bad, or at least thought it better than the unfair drubbing it received from some. However, I do not think it unfair to call the album a commercial disappointment, given all that was predicted. Sure, it may get some sudden spike in sales, but compared to past "hit" albums it's a slow (or gradual, if you prefer that word) seller, for sure.

...one guy's ubiquity is anothers anonymity.

http://fanofmusic.free.fr/Site-Charts-BestSellers.htm

His calculations are something about 7 m.

I said that they are following U2's current promotional template, not that their career is a direct analog.

Believe it or not, Josh, there are a lot of really big hits and bestselling albums out there which do not have hits so big that they are entirely unescapable. Just because you are not hearing them without trying does not negate their status as hits!

I hear it at least four times a day when I throw the radio on, and it's not limited to one channel. I hear it on the modern rock, Top 40, the "we play anything we want" and French language pop (which plays maybe five English language songs) stations. Maybe it's different in Canada (which has a history of loving British music that the States ignores), but I can't imagine this song recieving more airplay than it does now, months after its release.

X&Y was a disappointment to many Coldplay fans is the impression that I get. It had pretty massive sales, but its was far less enjoyed it seems than AROBTTH was.

Which may not be too much longer, since the current U2 template you reference = "be the Rolling Stones," and only works when you've already had a pretty fucking major career. X&Y needed to be Coldplay's Joshua Tree. It wasn't. Past tense.

Matthew, your definition of "hit single" is the same one that label marketers use when they put that "featuring the hit single ____" sticker on an album pre-release. Those kinds of hits don't come cheap. "Speed of Sound" was hit-like, anything else has been a fart in the wind.

Given the production costs and delays, the hefty marketing spend, and the release week's share of total sales, I don't see X&Y making any careers at the label.

So how are you defining 'hits?' Anything that places on the charts at all? I think of hits as, bam, there they are, on the radio, coming from passing cars, everywhere, and they're not going away any time soon. I don't think of hits as just every single released from a record, pushed along by heavy promotion, which is why I say to Roger: OTM.

Also per Roger, the hype preceding this record was, indeed, "this is the album that will make Coldplay as big as 'Joshua tree' U2," which clearly it was not - not sales-wise, not live and certainly not in terms of potential career longevity/ubiquity. I still hear "Yellow" and "Clocks" as much as "Speed of Sound." That, to me, indicates hit - if they're still being played a few years later. Just as I still hear "Beautiful Day" as much as if not more than "Vertigo."

(And similarly, I have yet to hear any subsequent single from "Atomic Bomb" out and about in public. Unless it, too, is another one getting many a spin in Starbucks, which of course is just another tier of the pay-to-pay promotion pyramid and not at all indicitive of an album or act's actual popularity.)

-- gear

Oasis' peak in the UK - inability to escape drunken singalongs of "Wonderwall" when trying to enjoy your night out for (a month? two weeks?) too long.

If Coldplay ever get to that stage, just kill me.