What Stevie and fans can learn from Sia and Tom Petty...
 

1. Sia's album 1000 Forms of Fear was heavily promoted with very smart videos using Maddie Zieglar from Dance Moms. It debuted at #1 on the American Charts, selling 52,000 copies it's first week. (By the way, that is horrible for a #1 album.)

Here are the amount of views her music videos have received. (This does not include the views from Ellen, The Grammies, or Saturday Night Live.)

Chandelier = 660,000,000 views.
Elastic Heart = 230,000,000 views
Big Girls Don't Cry = 15,000,000 views.

Did all those views do much good? Not really. To date Sia's album still has not went gold in the United States. It has only sold 177,000 in the United States. That's horrible. In Your Dreams has sold more. It has been certified in other countries but for all the views and awards she has been nominated for, it's awful.

Australia (ARIA) Gold 35,000 copies sold
France (SNEP) Platinum 100,000*
Poland (ZPAV) Gold 10,000*
United Kingdom Gold 100,000^
United States 177,000

2. Tom Petty
Came out with a critically acclaimed album, Hypnotic Eye that debuted at #1. It sold 131,000 copies in the United States which was pretty good. Guess what? The album still has not went gold. That is god-awful for a #1 album. The Heartbreakers released 2 songs from the album and none of them charted. Hypnotic Eye has not been certified anything in any country. :(

What Stevie can learn from both is that getting a new album to go Gold in the United States is next to impossible these days. What fans can learn from Sia and Tom Petty is lay off Stevie. She is pretty much helpless in this environment. The only thing that has helped her are TV appearances and maybe the Rolling Stone article, but going Gold is a very big long shot. (Country music artists are even having trouble now.) She has to make albums for the long haul and for artistic reasons.

It is not 'god-awful' for a #1 album to not go Gold nowadays.

For an album to sell 500,000 copies, you need it to stay on the charts for a while and a hit single is vital as otherwise it will fall off of the charts within weeks. People like Petty don't have hit singles these days, nobody over the age of 50 does, not even Madonna can seem to do it nowadays and her album is falling quickly.

If/when Fleetwood Mac bring out their new album, I think it will hit #1. Even if it sells >100,000 in its first week it'll be downhill from there which is totally natural in the current industry. Will it go Gold? Unless they promote it hard and it stays in the top 10 for over 2 months then no.

Does it matter, no! It's very hard to get a Gold album nowadays.

No it doesn't matter. To some people who post chart information about 24k all the time it seemed to matter.

???? That is the point of my post. It is god-awful. Nowadays the music industry is god-awful. Did you read my entire post? Even Sia, nearing a billion video views for songs from that album, isn't halfway to a Gold album in the U.S. And Chandelier was a top 10 hit in the U.S.

Back in the day, when an album hit number 1, it at least went gold.

Unless your name is Taylor Swift, a lot of artists have to adjust their expectations, especially older artists. There will come a day when even everything Taylor touches doesn't turn to gold (or platinum).

Tom released his catalog today in Hi-Res digital formats! Click for info + see Tom discuss the importance of Hi-Res: http://t.co/XPJgbyS92K

— Tom Petty (@tompetty) April 7, 2015

What fans can learn is that Tom Petty isn't a sell out and he refuses to do the same thing over & over again.. ...He does not focus on one thing he did 37 years ago (FM anyone) He puts out "new product" every few years and moves on...He's also releasing his ENTIRE CATALOG on Hi-Res formats (When if ever will SN & FM do this?) Tom seems to be very involved with things while LB says they (FM) have little say in what happens with FM"s back catalog...It's interesting because both FM and TP are with WB...

FM has some albums on HD Tracks (like Petty). HDTracks remasters the source they are given to offer the highest quality, uncompressed files and they allow you to choose the type of audio file as well. Best for higher end audio systems to really hear the difference.