The new album is 'ready' but what exactly does this mean?

[Deleted member 1074]

But did his latest three albums sell bad, really? (Obviously Quarry didn't anyway). Except Swords, which isn't even a studio album, I've gotten the impression that all his latest albums sold fairly well. Of course, internet makes every CD sell less than it should, but that's the same for all.

The drop in sales for studio albums is shocking.

YATQ - 400,000
ROTT - 200,000
YOR - 84,000

 

[Irryco]

The drop in sales for studio albums is shocking.

YATQ - 400,000
ROTT - 200,000
YOR - 84,000

Oh, yeah, that's undeniable. Do you think it will have evened out a bit between ROTT and YOR after a couple years? YOT has been in stores for less than half as long, after all.

 

[Deleted member 1074]

Oh, yeah, that's undeniable. Do you think it will have evened out a bit between ROTT and YOR after a couple years? YOT has been in stores for less than half as long, after all.

I don't think so, no. Quarry sold so well because it had multiple strong singles and numerous b-sides for the singles, plus it was his first album in 7 years and was highly promoted.

ROTT was almost immediately rushed out and sales dropped by half...probably because the singles were very weak and he wasn't whoring himself out as much as he did for Quarry. Several live tracks were thrown in as b-sides which hurt the sales of the later singles.

After numerous delays and numerous controversial statements, YOR was released with relatively no promotion and a weak lead single with only two new b-sides.

Basically, it seems like he let the success of Quarry go to his head and he decided to coast on that success for the next two albums rather than put forth the maximum effort to promote them.

 

[Maurice E]

The drop in sales for studio albums is shocking.
YATQ - 400,000
ROTT - 200,000
YOR - 84,000

It is a bit but, remember, altho I got YOR figures from the latest Music Week, the other 2 are estimates.
Someone like Mr J De Wit probably has more accurate figures. YATQ went platinum (300,000) when it was still in the chart so I think 400,000 is probably fairly accurate...

 

[Maurice E]

I don't think so, no. Quarry sold so well because it had multiple strong singles and numerous b-sides for the singles, plus it was his first album in 7 years and was highly promoted.

ROTT was almost immediately rushed out and sales dropped by half...probably because the singles were very weak and he wasn't whoring himself out as much as he did for Quarry. Several live tracks were thrown in as b-sides which hurt the sales of the later singles.

After numerous delays and numerous controversial statements, YOR was released with relatively no promotion and a weak lead single with only two new b-sides.

Basically, it seems like he let the success of Quarry go to his head and he decided to coast on that success for the next two albums rather than put forth the maximum effort to promote them.

Like a radioactive isotope, Morrissey albums usually have a predictable 'half life', and it's usually two weeks i.e. around half of all eventual sales occur in the first two weeks.
Quarry sold about 70,000 in the first week (on a huge amount of hype, first album in 7 years, and an NME/XfM hit in Irish Blood). Reviews for the album weren’t actually all that good. It scored the worst out of all the three recent albums on Metacritic (the website which combines tons of reviews http://www.metacritic.com/person/morrissey) but there was a huge amount of hype for the album, and the Irish Blood single got people excited. With First of the Gang's release, the unthinkable happened. Moz had a genuine radio hit, and for the first time since Viva Hate, one of his albums was rescued from obscurity, as it flew back up the charts just about returning to the top 20. It was a genuinely great, radio-friendly single. However, Let Me Kiss You and Jesus had no similar impact (the album had disappeared from the top 75 by then) and that wasn't surprising either - they hardly got any airplay. 90% of the core fan-base buys the albums in week 1 - it will only sell well beyond then if subsequent singles have good radio support.
ROTT did fairly well on the back of the post-Quarry hype and good airplay for the unspectacular You Have Killed Me but the subsequent singles were ignored. The ROTT tour was the most extensive of them all but concerts tend to have very little impact on album sales unless they’re huge events that get televised (e.g. Glastonbury).
The post-Quarry hype had subsided by the time YOR came along. Paris was a good enough song but only really picked up airplay on Radio 2 (altho they did play it loads). Then Something is Squeezing was released - quite foolishly (in my humble) as the last 40 seconds 'don't gimme any more' is hugely grating and radio stations were right not to play it. If the wonderfully tuneful (and therefore radio-friendly) 'Carol' had been released instead, it would have easily reversed the album's fortunes, not to Quarry levels but it could've sold 150,000.
After the first week of release, albums don't really sell according to how strong or good they are (Your Arsenal is one of his worst selling albums in the UK) - it's all about songs on the radio.

 

[Bluebirds]

He should do a Ponce. I mean Prince. Release the new album free with the book and get The Mail On Sunday to serialise it.. both at the same time. They'd adore the Immigration chapter.