Jacko Album Sales in Free Fall
Michael Jackson's album, Invincible, is struggling on the album charts.
According to numbers supplied last night by Hits magazine's Web site, SoundScan says that Jackson sold only 178,583 copies of Invincible last week. That brings the total number sold to around 740,000 in three weeks.
For any other artist, this number would be terrific. But for Jackson, the self-named King of Pop, it's terrifying.
Invincible is said to have cost $30 million to make over a two or three year period. So far, even with an increased royalty rate I'm told Jackson negotiated for last summer, his take on Invincible is a measly $2.5 million.
He owes Sony Music between $200-$260 million from tax free loans. The loans have made it possible for Sony to place liens against Jackson for his music publishing assets, including the Beatles catalog. The catalog, estimated by sources who know its value well, is worth around $400 million.
According to sources I spoke with this week, Jackson also has about 120 people on his weekly payroll including workers at Neverland Ranch, publicists, caretakers, nannies and, one would hope, veterinarians. This may also include dermatologists and/or plastic surgeons.
Additionally, Jackson presumably pays the bills of the mother of his children, the former Debbie Rowe.
Sales for Invincible started at 360,000 for the first week, dropped to 202,000 the second week and are now another 7 percent off. What's startling about this is that Jackson had a big ratings success with his 30th anniversary solo concert on CBS last Tuesday, Dec.13.
But even that show didn't move fans out in big enough numbers to the record stores. Invincible finished in fourth place this week, behind Garth Brooks, Britney Spears and Shakira. Ironically, Shakira is on Jackson's label, Epic, but sold more copies with 206,785.
Meantime, it's not like it's so easy to sell CDs out there these days anyway. Paul McCartney's done everything to promote his new Driving Rain album short of dressing up like a real beetle and biting Yoko Ono in the ass. He's flogged the thing in concert, written special charity songs and issued press releases around the clock. Doesn't matter, as it turns out. Driving Rain clocked in with a very poor showing: 67,000 copies and a debut at No. 27.
It's too bad, too, because Driving Rain – like McCartney's Flaming Pie – is excellent, and deserves to be a hit. Somehow the public is not responding to his campaign though. I wonder why. … Anyway, Driving Rain is turning out to be a curse for its producer, David Kahne.
He was just let go from his executive position at Warner Bros. Records by new WB leader Tom Whalley. Maybe Whalley didn't like his A&R people doing outside projects for other labels, in this case Capitol. If that's a trend, then DreamWorks Records' John McClain, who manages Sony act Michael Jackson, should look out too.
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Michael Jackson's album, Invincible, is struggling on the album charts.
According to numbers supplied last night by Hits magazine's Web site, SoundScan says that Jackson sold only 178,583 copies of Invincible last week. That brings the total number sold to around 740,000 in three weeks.
For any other artist, this number would be terrific. But for Jackson, the self-named King of Pop, it's terrifying.
Invincible is said to have cost $30 million to make over a two or three year period. So far, even with an increased royalty rate I'm told Jackson negotiated for last summer, his take on Invincible is a measly $2.5 million.
He owes Sony Music between $200-$260 million from tax free loans. The loans have made it possible for Sony to place liens against Jackson for his music publishing assets, including the Beatles catalog. The catalog, estimated by sources who know its value well, is worth around $400 million.
According to sources I spoke with this week, Jackson also has about 120 people on his weekly payroll including workers at Neverland Ranch, publicists, caretakers, nannies and, one would hope, veterinarians. This may also include dermatologists and/or plastic surgeons.
Additionally, Jackson presumably pays the bills of the mother of his children, the former Debbie Rowe.
Sales for Invincible started at 360,000 for the first week, dropped to 202,000 the second week and are now another 7 percent off. What's startling about this is that Jackson had a big ratings success with his 30th anniversary solo concert on CBS last Tuesday, Dec.13.
But even that show didn't move fans out in big enough numbers to the record stores. Invincible finished in fourth place this week, behind Garth Brooks, Britney Spears and Shakira. Ironically, Shakira is on Jackson's label, Epic, but sold more copies with 206,785.
Meantime, it's not like it's so easy to sell CDs out there these days anyway. Paul McCartney's done everything to promote his new Driving Rain album short of dressing up like a real beetle and biting Yoko Ono in the ass. He's flogged the thing in concert, written special charity songs and issued press releases around the clock. Doesn't matter, as it turns out. Driving Rain clocked in with a very poor showing: 67,000 copies and a debut at No. 27.
It's too bad, too, because Driving Rain – like McCartney's Flaming Pie – is excellent, and deserves to be a hit. Somehow the public is not responding to his campaign though. I wonder why. … Anyway, Driving Rain is turning out to be a curse for its producer, David Kahne.
He was just let go from his executive position at Warner Bros. Records by new WB leader Tom Whalley. Maybe Whalley didn't like his A&R people doing outside projects for other labels, in this case Capitol. If that's a trend, then DreamWorks Records' John McClain, who manages Sony act Michael Jackson, should look out too.
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