b, 21you hear that song at basketball games and shit...
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b, 21but, i guess one hit wonder status is not next big thing...
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b, 21lol at "one hit wonder status," as if she were some obscure artist before "Paper Planes" or is destined to drop back into the sidelines. It's not like she's the Bahama Men.
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b, 21um, yeah, to mainstream america (ie. the people you have to sell records to in order to be "the next big thing") she was totally obscure b4 Paper Planes... don't debate this, please...
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Dude her music has been in heavy-rotation teevee advertisements for years. She was on the last Missy album.
b, 21you hear that song at basketball games and shit...
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b, 21but, i guess one hit wonder status is not next big thing...
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b, 21lol at "one hit wonder status," as if she were some obscure artist before "Paper Planes" or is destined to drop back into the sidelines. It's not like she's the Bahama Men.
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b, 21um, yeah, to mainstream america (ie. the people you have to sell records to in order to be "the next big thing") she was totally obscure b4 Paper Planes... don't debate this, please...
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b, 21Dude her music has been in heavy-rotation teevee advertisements for years. She was on the last Missy album.
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Yeah word I'm just laughing at dudes who are all on some M.I.A. is a small potatoes artist. She's never been that.
b, 21you hear that song at basketball games and shit...
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b, 21but, i guess one hit wonder status is not next big thing...
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b, 21lol at "one hit wonder status," as if she were some obscure artist before "Paper Planes" or is destined to drop back into the sidelines. It's not like she's the Bahama Men.
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b, 21um, yeah, to mainstream america (ie. the people you have to sell records to in order to be "the next big thing") she was totally obscure b4 Paper Planes... don't debate this, please...
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b, 21Dude her music has been in heavy-rotation teevee advertisements for years. She was on the last Missy album.
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21galang was on a car commercial, am i missing others?b, 21b, 21recording w/ missy is not the sureshot path to mainstream sucess, ask lady sovereign...b, 21b, 21i guess there is a confusion as to what "next big thing" means... to me, it means like Gwen Stenfani/Pink status in the US... as far as i can tell MIA is nowhere near that... alright, i'm done w/ this...
Is MIA selling records?b, 21b, 21Licensing is off the chain. But what about units? Does it even matter?b, 21b, 21I still don't think your average wallmart shopper could pick her out of a line-up... even if they jam the SWAGGER record
b, 21Licensing is off the chain. But what about units? Does it even matter?
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b, 21I still don't think your average wallmart shopper could pick her out of a line-up... even if they jam the SWAGGER record
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21So what constitutes "next big thing?" That's what were talking about right? She's a relatively big artist in pop music. This cannot be denied. Maybe not Lil' Wayne big but dude she's big. I don't know what the numbers are NOW but I'm sure their huge at least off the single of Paper Planes. And yeah, I don't know if that really matters that much anyway like you said. Licensing, she kills. Touring, she kills.b, 21b, 21And she might not be recognizable to the Peggy Hills of the world but I would guess that her daughter probably knows her.
Yeah I mean obviously this thread was DEAD WRONG 3.5 years ago or what have you. And MIA is clearly now exactly what Zvi and myself and others were saying (hoping?) she wasn't going to be.b, 21b, 21I'm not hatting really it's still not my bag. I can't even really mess with paper planes. I like the hook but I'll take Fif or someone rhyming on it rather than MIA. Wifey goes to her jams though. Haha.b, 21b, 21It's just interesting to me (and it dates the whole industry) how much the idea of first week sales was going to be predictive of someone's career. Obviously the hype created something of a different animal, to the extent that we can agree maybe the unit sales per se are not even relevant.
b, 21Yeah I mean obviously this thread was DEAD WRONG 3.5 years ago or what have you. And MIA is clearly now exactly what Zvi and myself and others were saying (hoping?) she wasn't going to be.
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b, 21I'm not hatting really it's still not my bag. I can't even really mess with paper planes. I like the hook but I'll take Fif or someone rhyming on it rather than MIA. Wifey goes to her jams though. Haha.
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b, 21It's just interesting to me (and it dates the whole industry) how much the idea of first week sales was going to be predictive of someone's career. Obviously the hype created something of a different animal, to the extent that we can agree maybe the unit sales per se are not even relevant.
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Yeah and, like I said before in this thread, even though I'm someone who has shared the stage with her and have many close friends tied into her work, she's never really been my "thing" either. Again - I dig some of the songs and think a lot of the production is good (especially coming from a club DJ perspective) and I also do appreciate her for being an artist who was able to be at least a figurehead to a new slant in pop music. But ultimately what we all have to recognize is that it's way bigger than M.I.A. It's a good example of the paradigm shift of the industry.
I wouldn't disagree with any of what's been written here, but I do think there are some interesting things to note:b, 21b, 211. The more things change, the more they stay the same: Television and Film are still the most powerful tools to break music. For all of the critical blowjobs that MIA received, she was never really able to break out of the sales and notoriety box afforded to "critical darlings". One good synch opportunity changed all of that. More proof that no one cares about music critics, which was one of my central points here. It AMAZES me how much power the moving picture has to sell music. My firm reps a singer-songwriter named Sara Bareilles who wrote a rad little song called "Love Song" that Epic quietly dumped into the market with low expectations. 10 seconds in a Rhapsody commercial changed all of that and turned it into a smash. Shit, Mario's album tanked and then his tie in to Dancing With The Stars pushed him to acceptable sales. I could probably come up with a thousand more examples.b, 21b, 212. MIA is still for all intents and purposes a "one hit wonder". She's not totally disposable like The Shop Boys or whatever, but her album and single sales are about on par with Mims or Flo-Rida. Not a criticism so much as an observation that if she disappeared tomorrow, she would be chalked up as "that girl with the airplanes song". I am curious to see if she can have another single that impacts. If lightening strikes twice, it's then that the game has changed for her.b, 21b, 213. The most interesting aspect of all of this to me is the amount and duration of label support that MIA received: in most instances, if an artist doesn't have strong first-week sales, they are quickly forgotten about and it's on to the next act. MIA got constant support from XL and Interscope for damn near two years. There's nothing wrong with this, in fact it's awesome and I wish that more labels would do it for more artists. I think you would see alot more "breakout" unexpected hit records/acts. b, 21b, 21Her music still leaves me cold and I find some of her recent statements about her marriage and other things to be puzzling, but it's undeniable that Kanye has pushed the "mainstream" much farther in the direction of the kind of music she makes. Overall I think that's a good thing, but I cannot help but wish that lots of more deserving musicians would get the same sort of prolonged push she's gotten.
Good points all around. b, 21b, 21I do think that MIA's future success isn't guaranteed. I don't think she's a "one hit wonder" but the success of "Paper Planes" was also a bit of a fluke owed to the placement in two big movies as Z pointed out. It's like when an iTunes ad plucks an indie rock song out of its niche. You can bet Feist's album sales went up-up-up after "1,2,3,4" ended up in that Nano ad a year or so ago. As Z points out: that shit matters, heavily. b, 21b, 21ANyways: I would go back to something (I think) I said much earlier in the thread (perhaps back in 2005) which is that the presumption that music criticism factors into sales is a strawman fiction that's circulated well-enough but I'd question who actually ever thought this was possibly true. b, 21b, 21When an artist, for example, has both critical and commercial success, it's very rare that they'd ever credit the former for leading to the latter. If an artist has commercial success but gets dogged on by critics, they're quick to note: "F*ck a critic!" and laugh their way to the bank (well, more like their label laughs their way but you get the idea). If an artist has bad critical AND commercial success, that's when the sour grapes, e.g. "you motherfucking, shit-talking critics are taking money out of my pockets!" comes out. b, 21b, 21And straight up - you can't have it all three ways. b, 21b, 21This said, I thought it was interesting to hear the other week (from an record industry analyst) that one of the few critical outlets where reviews still matter (commercially speaking) is...NPR. And this kind of goes to Z's point even though he's talking about TV and film and not radio but NPR has a built-in audience with some shared demographic profiles AND they're a semi-captive audience (insofar that you don't really channel surf off of All Things Considered or Morning Edition) and all that adds up a consumer base that will respond to the exposure of artists discussed on NPR. b, 21b, 21Obviously, we're not talking platinum numbers but there's a pretty huge difference between "bang for your buck" of something reviewed positively on NPR vs. Entertainment Weekly. The latter has a massive circulation but according to their own head critic, the music section is the least read of all their sections in the magazine (oof) and so what gets discussed there doesn't really effectively translate into commercial sales. b, 21b, 21Of course, NPR would be exception and not the rule. I think the main reason why music critics still have a lifeline has very little to do with the idea that they serve a valuable function within the marketplace and has more to do with valuing the point of any art criticism.
b, 21Every so often, the GBs like to give some shine to those struggling artists who don???t have the luxury of the media hype machine (i.e. The Man) puffing them up to ridiculous heights that no one could live up to. There???s a whole world of untapped, unnoticed talent out there just waiting for some kind of recognition ??? an opportunity to prove that, yes, there???s more to music than what you see on eMpTyV (haha ??? I just made that up) or hear on the ray-D???-oh (not as clever, but it???s hard to top the MTV one). In the past, we put you on to such hidden gems as Dizzee Rascal, The Streets, Lil Jon, Cam???ron, and most recently The Game (it took forever for us to convince people that he was an actual person, and not a thing). Now we have yet another mumbling, accented, not-really-rapper to present to you, the discerning music fan: Maya Arulpragasam, also known to us (and soon the world) as M.I.A.
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b, 21The most important thing you need to know about this new artist is, she is totally hot! And totally not white! From what we heard, this exotic brown-skinned beauty (but not black, don???t worry!) has roots in Sri Linka (there was also something about London in there, but F*ck that, let???s not mess with a good fantasy here) and has seen, like, a lot of heavy stuff in her time. This ain???t no Britney Spears, honey chil???. Her style is incredible as well. She just doesn???t dress like girls at the mall do! It???s so refreshing. This is probably due to the fact that she makes a lot of her own clothes. Yes, you read right. Patterns and prints that were once only known to dorm wallpaper or casino carpeting become intriguing dresses and leggings when met with M.I.A.???s considerable skill on the mini-scissors. T-shirts that were once campy when worn by Disney World tourists become fashion-forward icons when adorned by her.
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b, 21And the music? Oh my god, the music. It???s just so ??? so ??? well, if I had more space to tell you, I totally would; but I can see that my word limit is up. I promise to tell you what it???s like next time. I???d have to actually hear some of it first, of course. Haven???t had a chance to, honestly. I went to her site to do that, but ??? I mean, have you seen those pics of her? She???
b, 21If an artist has bad critical AND commercial success, that's when the sour grapes, e.g. "you motherfucking, shit-talking critics are taking money out of my pockets!" comes out.
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Do artists from any genres besides rap do this?
b, 21If an artist has bad critical AND commercial success, that's when the sour grapes, e.g. "you motherfucking, shit-talking critics are taking money out of my pockets!" comes out.
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21I think Paul McCartney said that after his recent release.
b, 21This said, I thought it was interesting to hear the other week (from an record industry analyst) that one of the few critical outlets where reviews still matter (commercially speaking) is...NPR. And this kind of goes to Z's point even though he's talking about TV and film and not radio but NPR has a built-in audience with some shared demographic profiles AND they're a semi-captive audience (insofar that you don't really channel surf off of All Things Considered or Morning Edition) and all that adds up a consumer base that will respond to the exposure of artists discussed on NPR.
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b, 21Obviously, we're not talking platinum numbers but there's a pretty huge difference between "bang for your buck" of something reviewed positively on NPR vs. Entertainment Weekly. The latter has a massive circulation but according to their own head critic, the music section is the
least read of all their sections in the magazine (oof) and so what gets discussed there doesn't really effectively translate into commercial sales. b, 21b, 21Of course, NPR would be exception and not the rule. I think the main reason why music critics still have a lifeline has very little to do with the idea that they serve a valuable function within the marketplace and has more to do with valuing the point of any art criticism. b, 21b, 21h, 21
font class="post"1b, 21b, 21I really hope you're only referring to the monday through friday NPR shows and not "Sound Opinions" (which is garbahjjh).
font class="post"1b, 21b, 21LOL b, 21b, 21You know what I"m saying. That schitt is still in every newspaper stand and grocery store around the country.
She's been in pretty much every mag though so any could be used as a decent example; I'm sure a lot of people know who she is even if they couldn't name a single song she's done.
b, 21I really hope you're only referring to the monday through friday NPR shows and not "Sound Opinions" (which is garbahjjh).
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Please. Like I'd ride for that sausage fest.b, 21b, 21I meant the big national shows. Like, getting your shit spoken about on Fresh Air = a good boost to sales and that makes sense if you think about who NPR's audience tends to be. b, 21b, 21b, 21
font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Dud(ess) - is this some "pregnant women unite" thing? B/c MIA looks TERRIBLE there...not b/c she's pregnant but because her whole get-up is garbage. b, 21b, 21You, on the coach, with a dog slobbering next to you = hotter than MIA here.
b, 21If an artist has bad critical AND commercial success, that's when the sour grapes, e.g. "you motherfucking, shit-talking critics are taking money out of my pockets!" comes out.
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b, 21Do artists from any genres besides rap do this?
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font class="post"1b, 21b, 21Not the "money out of my pockets" part but indie rock dudes can be embarrassingly sensitive about reviews. They make mad rappers look stoic by comparison.
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