Is it time for artists to just drop albums without prior warning ?
I have been thinking this for a while. i dont understand why artists are still announcing albums 2 months in advance now when a] they dont have to do any promo nowadays apart from like one webchat. and 2] looking at Taylor Swift, it seems like even releasing one single is now going out of fashion. So whats the point now even announcing the album weeks in advance?. im really looking forward to Taylor Swift's new album but it feels like it was announced bloody months and months ago and it was only like 5 weeks ago wasnt it?? so whats the point in the record label just sitting on it for another 2 months if its all ready to go?
its the shame with Shania Twain. she released her single week before last and she was on This Morning and Dermot asked her if she had an album all ready waiting and she said I do. But she still hasnt even announced a release date and itll probably not be til November / December, and i think well whats the point in even waiting when on album release you'll probably only do like 2 or 3 interviews for ít if that and thats it?? why the wait ??
I dont get it and find it annoying
its the shame with Shania Twain. she released her single week before last and she was on This Morning and Dermot asked her if she had an album all ready waiting and she said I do. But she still hasnt even announced a release date and itll probably not be til November / December, and i think well whats the point in even waiting when on album release you'll probably only do like 2 or 3 interviews for ít if that and thats it?? why the wait ??
I dont get it and find it annoying
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which is fine but it begs the question what was the point of announcing the album at the end of August and then nothing for 7 / 8 weeks??
I agree.
Paramore have just released a single, a video and announced the album....which isn't due until the 2nd February. I was so sure we'd get that release this year.
Can't work out why they're taking until next year to release it. It's like early 2000s marketing....
OMG
So yes like 00s singles 3 -4 months of preorders total the sale and even with that few but the biggest names can sell over 10000 1st week, it will be down to 1000 or less week 2 unless you are an Ed or Adele Or Taylor sized act
Also you want to built up buzz most acts release over 5 tracks before the album comes out so anyone of those tracks could be the catalyst to make you ok I’ll buy the album.
I buy nearly all my albums on preorder, and probably none of the artists they release instant albums are anyone I’d be interested in such as Drake, Kanye, Beyoncé etc
Oh and another reason is vinyl pressing preorders give the record company an idea how many they need. If you are download/streaming only then that won’t matter.
maybe its just the artists i like, but no acts that i know of and like release anywhere near over 5 tracks before album release, they release one if you're lucky!
but yeh i have noticed albums drop out of the top 10 within a week. in fact tbh the past few years i couldnt even tell you who had the no1 single or album unless it was boring Adele. but the weird thing was when she released her album last year, yes it was no1 for a few weeks, but there wasnt really that much buzz like there was for her previous albums. i didnt hear about it that much.
Such a shame their new song is terrible. Reminds me of No Doubt with its ska/punk sound. I really can't get used to it at all. Poor choice of lead single as far as i'm concerned. Hopefully by Feb when album is due they'll have put out at least another 3 tracks.
with a major artist, by the time they've delivered the album to the record company and they've accepted it, it takes weeks or months to arrange and finalise artwork, get the music mastered, and then the art printed and cds pressed, and at the same time the album needs to be sold to retail outlets so there's stock in stores on release day, and advertising arranged, promo arranged, such as booking artists to appear on tv shows and radio shows. tours are often arranged at the same time to maximise sales of both the album and tour, which involves negotiation between artists management and book agents and promoters. with vinyl, it can takes many weeks to get a slot to press, especially large volumes for major artists, so if you want those on sale at the same time as the cd thats more organisation and prep
during those processes, many people become aware of the album as you've got people paid near minimum wage working in factories printing the art and cds etc, so trying to keep it a secret is pointless usually, so if the album release is agreed, it's better to start promoting the album straight away to maximise awareness so you get the best chance of selling the most copies in the initial week, resulting in a chart entry, and it's common for certain stores to only stock chart releases, such as supermarkets, or for others to stock larger quanties of chart releases, thus why record companies try all sorts of tricks to get records in the charts. in the singles chart the song can be played on radio in the chart countdown or get more radioplay due to certain shows only or mainly playing current chart tracks
remember for major artist, they will have worldwide promo, so tv shows across the world, where they can do live appearances or performances, USA, UK, italy, germany, france, canada, japan, etc, and promo ads etc created in various languages, likewise different languages for different worldwide pressings. exclusive versions for certain retailers, such as amazon, target, walmart, and in japan
i get it takes time to get the album ready and the artwork, music etc. but i would expect thats all ready even before the album is even announced. its like i said in my OP, Shania Twain said on This Morning 2 weeks ago her album is all ready to go, but theres still no word on a release date, so whats the hold up ? and in terms of worldwide promo, does that even happen nowadays? it seems to me artists barely do promo now and they usually do promo via video link if they are in another country.
the bit in bold i do get what you mean actually. Word would probably get out anyway by people working in the factories, so probably it is jus t best for the artist to announce it early before someone else does. Also as well announcing it early gives more people time to be award of it
i see your points. its still annoying though. they should at least release a couple of singles to keep us going til album release
The best way IMO is to announce the album no more than a month or two before release and let us have the whole thing at once. Singles really are obsolete in the streaming age anyway. Let the fans decide which songs are the hits. See which songs resonate with the fans then send those to those old fangled radio stations.
I actually prefer this. I was a huge singles buyer in the 90s mostly because like now I love new music and you could never predict who would even release an album. The same is true now , many of my favourite new bands of the last 5 years still haven’t released an album yet. Hot Milk have supported bands like Foo Fighters and they have only released a few EPS and individual tracks in fact their early singles you can’t even get anymore!! If you are a new band is it really worth all the money and effort to release an album when it will probably be lucky to sell 1000 copies in week one, within a month it probably won’t go top 75 as they wouldn’t be able to push through all the greatest hits than dominate the bottom 40 of the album charts. I love a Canadian band called BRKN LOVE, they have released about 6 brilliant songs in the last 12 months and so far not a word of a 2nd album., it’s frustrating but it’s better than not having anything new. Many of us still remember waiting for ‘The Second Coming’ for example.
Also back to my first point now I don’t have to buy singles, I stream those songs so if a great album comes I will buy that physical when in the past I’d rarely buy the album if I’d bought some of the singles as too much money. Now It means I get their latest music as soon as they release it , what’s the issue
I actually think the album is way more irrelevant than the single or track as it is now..
I quite like it. I wasn't sure on first listen though.
they could wait till it's ready, but why delay promoting something when the longer you promote the better chance of bigger initial sales
dunno about her cases, but it usually takes a lot longer than 2 weeks to go from the album being accepted by the record company, so maybe she's just starting her promo now. usually artists official sites or fan sites or social media give more info about what's going on
definately. if an album is being released in mutliple countries, each country will have it's own promo so people in the country know the album exists. the big fans are likely to know first, but most sales are from casual joe bloggs types and they usually need to know and hear something first
a lot of promo will be from marketing people, such as print/radio/tv/internet ads, but if you think of chat shows and stuff like jools holland, alan carr, graham norton, jonathon ross, and then all the saturday evening shows like x factor or pj and duncan or whatever, there's loads of shows in the UK that have people turning up to promote their record, book, movie, tv show, whatever. now pretty much every non third world country in the world will also have their own types of show like that. breakfast tv like GMA, saturday night live, wessen das, there's loads. obviously if the artist can't make the country they may do video link but those shows usually only have guests if they bother to turn up. you need to be a pretty big and popular artist to get away with not turning up and getting a slot on the show
if it's physical singles, they still need to print/press/distribute and arrange sales, which is why these days they usually drop a track a week or so on streaming sites and have podcasts and whatever. sometimes you get nearly half the album before it's out
concert tickets are far worse, selling tickets a year in advance, for a stadium or arena show when you don't know what you are doing or what the weather will be like or what else will be happening then. who wants to stand in a football stadium in the cold and rain, about a mile from the stage, paying £100 a year in advance and then travel etc on top
unless i'm dying to hear something, i usually just wait till the album is out and listen to it then. and often i'll preorder an album but it's on download/streaming days or even weeks before i get my order, so i don't even open it when i get it. still waiting on the SDE of animals to be delivered that was ordered months ago. the new mixes were done in 2018, the album originally written mostly in 1974, recorded originally the following few months and finally released in 1977 and it's taken them over 4 years to argue about the linear notes and stuff before they agreed to let it go on sale, and despite great alternate versions and live versions circulating for years, there's none getting released, which is a shame considering it's one of floyds best albums
Yeh i totally agree with all you've said. i really think singles are completely pointless now. ok they give you an indicator on what the album sound will be but you dont even need that now with all the streaming services and albums are available at just a press of a button at midnight on release day. so singles arent even needed and therefore i can see why Taylor Swift hasnt released any singles, but my issue is announcing it a whole 2 months before release with nothing in between. like i said in my OP, it feels like Taylor Swift announced the album like 6 months ago now and its only been 5 weeks. so it makes the wait drag on and on and on. even cut down to just a month before, that would be better
singles give the opportunity to release standalone tracks, include b sides, have remixes and music videos, and give artists the opportunity to have something to promote the album both before and after it's released, so radio / video play before the album to raise awareness and then more radio / video play after the album to keep reminding people the album exists. it gives the opportunity for the single to chart and then get mainstream radio play and inclusion in chart shows
obviously some artists aren't considered much for remixes, but artists like shania twain, sherly crow and taylor swift in particular have benefited in particular from remixes to give more pop chart friendly and less country sounding, and shania even had several different versions of her biggest selling album with different mixes. other artists will have mixes to get club play or inclusion in other ways where the standard album version might not get played. sometimes a constant drip of one remix a week or so helps keep the artist/album in mind, as has been done recently with a couple of big selling mainstream artists. it gives something new to pop up on main pages/lists of streaming services which helps with promotion
God bless you and him always!!!
Holly
a few artists have done it, but it's usually online/streaming only at first and the physical copies come later. the downside to that is if the physical copies are weeks or months later, they could lose a lot of casual sales as many people have already downloaded it (ie. illegally) or heard it and got bored or forgot about it, at least casual fans. if you thought you had an album that might sell really well you probably won't do it unless you were the type of artist to want to change their name every few weeks and have fans that can't keep up with them anymore
A lot of artists have actually had their physical releases delayed by months after their album releases this year - especially vinyl - due to huge backlogs at production plants. They're all doing fine.
I'd say almost all of the people that actually buy physical media these days are the devoted fans of each artist. Take Kylie Minogue for example, she released more vinyl/cassette variants of Disco than I have pairs of underwear
I guess it also depends on the type of artist. Pop stars rely more on singles - which is fine. I also listen to a lot of alternative bands, and their focus is usually more on albums as a whole. For them - releasing an album in one hit is great, because that's what the fans are waiting for; the album as a cohesive body of work. I'm not sure Kylie doing the same would have the desired effect, but it can genuinely be better for some artists.
One of my favourite bands released an album in lockdown (which in this fanbase was the equivalent of Lady Gaga releasing Artpop vol. 2 - the legendary "mentioned but never materialised" album) - except this one did, and they put it up for pre-order a month in advance and released it all in one go. Having ten new songs by one of my favourite bands to sink my teeth into was incredible. I'd definitely prefer more bands to do that but again, I understand why it wouldn't work for pop acts.
what i see more often is the vinly comes out weeks or months after the cd, so there is the cd/download to buy as well as the streaming so they can make some money above the streaming money. sometimes artists use the album as a way to sell a new tour, and they make the real money from the tour. even if tracks aren't released as singles, there's often tracks put online one way or another so it's rarer to get the full album without anything having been available to hear before it
the other thing about the multiple releases like kylie is casual fans may not buy it the first or second time around, but they may the third time, or they buy the first or second version when the third version drops as it's cheaper. i just got the 3cd version of the last kylie hits for about £3 brand new the other day for example. she released about 42 different versions of that
robbie williams has the multiple versions thing to a tee, four difference coloured tape versions and umpteen different combinations such as cd+ tape, cd+vinly, cd+4 tapes, record+3 tapes, cd+record+tape etc. taylor swift has umpteen versions of her new album too, with signed copies now available. she's dragged out the promo by simply announcing the NAMES of the songs one by one, but you can't hear them. i'll just listen when the whole thing comes out