Can Stevie break the trend?

[vivfox]

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

I know somebody who will release at least five this year, one being a double album...

Robert Pollard.

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

I know somebody who will release at least five this year, one being a double album...

I wouldn't even want my favorite artist to do this. To me, it cheapens the output. Just like a baseball legend flooding the market with too many autographed rookie cards. Once every year or two is great, but FIVE? How can you maintain artistic merit doing that?

Michele

[bluefox4000]

Originally Posted by louielouie2000

To your average album buyer, Stevie's even less known than the names you mentioned (Sheryl, Alanis, etc). Her fame was decades before those women. And now Stevie's been inactive in recording new material for a full decade. On top of that, she's in her 60s... the oldest chart topping woman was Cher, who is far better known than Stevie and was over a decade younger when she had her last big hit. Anyone who actually believes Stevie is going to have any sort of sales or radio chart success at this point in the game is just seriously deluded.

I was just about to post that. I believe Stevie's day has passed. We'll all buy..but really how many will.really

Mick

[Jondalar]

Originally Posted by louielouie2000

To your average album buyer, Stevie's even less known than the names you mentioned (Sheryl, Alanis, etc). Her fame was decades before those women. And now Stevie's been inactive in recording new material for a full decade. On top of that, she's in her 60s... the oldest chart topping woman was Cher, who is far better known than Stevie and was over a decade younger when she had her last big hit. Anyone who actually believes Stevie is going to have any sort of sales or radio chart success at this point in the game is just seriously deluded.

Yes, this is true to a point, but considering the fact that Stevie gets listed more on American Idol and was used by Taylor Swift and cited Michelle Branch-- something is going on. Stevie's IT thing hasn't qiete wamed completely yet. And is it just me or is Stevie more popular than ever overseas. The only place Crystal Visions is gold is in Australia.

[KarmaContestant]

Originally Posted by Jondalar

There was a time in mid and late 90s when female singer songwriters ruled the charts. However, now it seems like some of them are in danger of getting dropped by their record companies. Sheryl Crow, Melissa Ethridge, Tracey Chapman, Jewel, Alanis Morrisette cannot even sale enough records to earn Gold status, forget about platinum. Can Stevie break this trend? Both her and Lucinda Williams are releasing albums this year and it will be interesting to see just what happens. I think if Stevie gets a gold album it will give record companies some hope that older singer songwriters can sell records.

I'm going to directly answer the question and say "No."

Those artists were popular in the mid-to-late 90's because they were the voices of that generation. I was 20 in the summer of 1994, and you could not get away from Crow's "All I Wanna Do (Is Have Some Fun)" or Sarah McLachlan's "Posession" on the radio. It was everywhere, and the people listeing to and buying that music were the 16-22 crowd - my friends. Alanis was the -IT- girl all through 1995. Tori Amos was huge with Boys For Pele, and Under The Pink before that. We were -way- into our own angst and melodrama.

Part of this is simply the shift in musical tastes. Through the late 80's and early 90's, many of the female artists on the radio were fairly poppy in terms of sound and style, and the mid 90's brought a shift in sound that appealed to a younger crowd. The music of the mid-90's was generally more serious and the lyrics spoke to the personal trials that many young people were going through - we wanted to hear songs about lost love and deception, not songs about dancing in the steets or shaking our booties to the Conga. Good grief - remember Expose and Bananarama? My friends and I laughed at the older (and by older I mean those who were 26-32, lol) people listening to Gloria Estefan and Janet Jackson. Like, get with the times!

I guess what I'm saying is that these days the trends in popular music by female artists are with R&B, hip-hop and dance-pop. Thats' why the mega sellers continue to be Gaga, Beyonce, Britney and others like them....but I think that by the end of this decade we'll see another shift in music. Teenaged fans and early 20-somethings set the musical trends we hear on the radio. As they grow older, the trends they helped drive become part of the past as another musical trend moves in. We get older and forget to follow every word spoken by our musical heroes. We forget they might still even make music, and sales decline to abysmal numbers.

Just like the hair bands of the 80's. The world changed forever when Smells Like Teen Spirit hit the radio waves. By 1994 the glam rockers were jokes from an earlier era....much like many people these days consider Stevie to be...and Janet...and Madonna, Sarah, Tori, Kate, Heart. It never ends - someday Britney and Gaga and Adele and Florence & The Machine will be has-beens too, who can't sell more than a couple hundred thousand albums on their best years. There are rare exceptions but Stevie is not one of them and the generation that Stevie represented is far from being the generation setting musical trends.

But I'm a fan for life.

[TerraRhiannon]

Originally Posted by DestinyRules

As for Red Velvet Car, I bought it off iTunes, even though I don't consider myself a dyed in the wool Heart fan the way Heartboy is, for instance. But of the songs on that record, the two I play the most often are "There You Go" (and yes, I *know* it isn't Stevie singing the harmonies, but it sounds so much like her that I imagine it's her) and "WTF". I can see myself playing "Hey You" if I'm in the right mood, but having only one song burrow into my music playing brain means the rest of the record isn't earth-shattering.

As a dedicated die hard Heartmonger Imma take a second to gush & say RVC is probably one of the best albums they've done since Heart. My favorites from Red Velvet Car are Red Velvet Car, Queen City, Hey You, Safronia's Mark & Sunflower Okay basically the whole album to me is flawless

Back on topic, I believe that Stevie could get a Gold album, with this new Rod/Stevie tour and everything going on it's safe to say she'll definitely get a good number of sales. PLUS, Secret Love is already at number 13 on the Rock iTunes chart. I believe at one point today it had a high of 12 Yayayayay.

[greendaze5]

Originally Posted by TerraRhiannon

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"]As a dedicated die hard Heartmonger Imma take a second to gush & say RVC is probably one of the best albums they've done since Heart. My favorites from Red Velvet Car are Red Velvet Car, Queen City, Hey You, Safronia's Mark & Sunflower Okay basically the whole album to me is flawless

Speaking of Heart and 'Red Velvet Car', the band is selling the CD on their web site for only $10, and $25 for an autographed copy:

http://www.heart-music.com/store/

Nice if Stevie does likewise when 'IYD' comes out, or at least do another 'Barnes and Noble' signing.

[TerraRhiannon]

Originally Posted by greendaze5

Speaking of Heart and 'Red Velvet Car', the band is selling the CD on their web site for only $10, and $25 for an autographed copy:

http://www.heart-music.com/store/

Nice if Stevie does likewise when 'IYD' comes out, or at least do another 'Barnes and Noble' signing.

Oh I know. I definitely know. I got a signed copy by Ann & Nancy at the concert last week.

Pertaining to the topic, this a quote that Ann said during their performance on the 3rd in Halifax:

"You know, we've had maybe 13 albums, our new album marks the 13th album we've made....and none of those albums have been hit albums, if you know what I mean. Some of them sort of under the radar, some of them made simply because we felt like it, without any expectations. This next song, is a title song to an album that we made because we were crazy, crazy with desire....to make music. This is called Desire Walks On." ----and then they performed Desire Walks On.

So, I think it's great when artists keep making music, even if none of it's a hit.... Stevie needs to make music, it's what she does and is passionate about, like the Wilson sistas. And no matter what I will always think it's fabulous.

[Jondalar]

Originally Posted by TerraRhiannon

Oh I know. I definitely know. I got a signed copy by Ann & Nancy at the concert last week.

Pertaining to the topic, this a quote that Ann said during their performance on the 3rd in Halifax:

"You know, we've had maybe 13 albums, our new album marks the 13th album we've made....and none of those albums have been hit albums, if you know what I mean. Some of them sort of under the radar, some of them made simply because we felt like it, without any expectations. This next song, is a title song to an album that we made because we were crazy, crazy with desire....to make music. This is called Desire Walks On." ----and then they performed Desire Walks On.

So, I think it's great when artists keep making music, even if none of it's a hit.... Stevie needs to make music, it's what she does and is passionate about, like the Wilson sistas. And no matter what I will always think it's fabulous.

Stevie said the reason why she made this album was to be creative. She bucked advice and made it.

[TerraRhiannon]

Originally Posted by Jondalar

Stevie said the reason why she made this album was to be creative. She bucked advice and made it.

Yeah exactly, and if no one buys it, she said at least she did it for herself, because she needs to, I think she said.