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Enquiry: MJ sales and popularity in Eastern Europe during the cold war years?

filmandmusic

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I kind of want go make this the thread to go to when it comes to charts, sales and overall popularity off MJ in countries that were under the influence of Sovjet communism during the 70s and 80s and even the firs half of the 90s. This period didn’t give Western artists much of a chance to make it there due to the immense stand off between Russia and the USA. So basically this is about the countries that were liberated by the communist Sovjet army after WW2.

We all know Michael was big in the UK, France, Belgium, Holland, Spain, Italy etc but what about Russia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, former Yugoslavia etc? We don’t know much, we don’t even know if Western music was easy to get in shops, did the radio play Western music?
The fact is that not a single show of the Bad tour was played in Eastern Europe, so I presume the exposure to Michael’s music was fairly low, maybe there was a huge black market for Western music? Even after the fall of communism when borders and cultures opened up during the Dangerous tour Michael only did 2 shows in Eastern Europe (Russia and Romania).

What do we know? Add it to this thread.
 
filmandmusic said:
I kind of want go make this the thread to go to when it comes to charts, sales and overall popularity off MJ in countries that were under the influence of Sovjet communism during the 70s and 80s and even the firs half of the 90s. This period didn’t give Western artists much of a chance to make it there due to the immense stand off between Russia and the USA. So basically this is about the countries that were liberated by the communist Sovjet army after WW2.

We all know Michael was big in the UK, France, Belgium, Holland, Spain, Italy etc but what about Russia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, former Yugoslavia etc? We don’t know much, we don’t even know if Western music was easy to get in shops, did the radio play Western music?
The fact is that not a single show of the Bad tour was played in Eastern Europe, so I presume the exposure to Michael’s music was fairly low, maybe there was a huge black market for Western music? Even after the fall of communism when borders and cultures opened up during the Dangerous tour Michael only did 2 shows in Eastern Europe (Russia and Romania).

What do we know? Add it to this thread.
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I live in Eastern Europe and all I wanna say is that MJ is really popular in my country. And that's actually quite amazing, because he was only 2 times here
 
Ronald Stain said:
I live in Eastern Europe and all I wanna say is that MJ is really popular in my country. And that's actually quite amazing, because he was only 2 times here
Click to expand...
If you have any articles or website links relating to his popularity in your country you can share them here
 
Nope, the radio wasn't played MJ and most of foreign artists in Poland, i don't know, did in other countries also. For example, in Poland in official radio stations we could only heard Abba, Boney M., Modern Talking or oldies like Charles Aznavour from the ,,west" or bands and artist from other communist countries. To listen MJ, The Beatles and others we needed to listen for example ,,Free Europe Radio" which was illegal. Also in shops we could buy most Polish or russian records.
 
There was certainly an underground market for western/foreign content of all kinds. But nothing explicit on radio or tv. Though I do remember a popular radio afternoon talkshow that used the "bad" instrumental version as their theme song but without explicitly mentioning MJ (or any other western celebrities).
 
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