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The Michael Jackson Chart Watch

staywild23 said:
Great info, thank you!

Something I am curious about is how Thriller 40 (or anniversary releases in general) impact general sales across an artist's discography? How does a rerelease of one album impact the streams/purchases of the others, including compilations like Number Ones and the Essential Michael Jackson? Do we generally see an increase across the discography? If so, I'm wondering if the sales for Number Ones your mentioning might increase post T40's release. No idea if there is anything to this though.
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Release of Thriller 40 should increase the sales/streams of Number Ones, as the three big ones from Thriller are on Number Ones.

But there has been a lack of promotion for Thriller 40 thus far, so we will see if Number Ones sales & streams rise post Thriller 40.
 
Nite Line said:
Release of Thriller 40 should increase the sales/streams of Number Ones, as the three big ones from Thriller are on Number Ones.

But there has been a lack of promotion for Thriller 40 thus far, so we will see if Number Ones sales & streams rise post Thriller 40.
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Good point. I know this isn't the correct thread for this, but this one is so much more positive in general. I'm just going to ask (feel free to ignore if you don't want to derail). What kind of promotion would we hope for with an anniversary release? I'm not sure I've ever followed an artist through an anniversary release and, honestly, most of the time I find out about other artists doing them It's just from seeing an album in a store. For example, last night I decided to stream Norah Jones' 'Come Away With Me' album for the first time in years. Love it. Searched Amazon for vinyl out of curiosity and, apparently, there was a 20th anniversary re-release in April. Now, I'm not at all comparing that album to Thriller, or Norah to Michael, but my point is how much promo is typical for an anniversary release? Should the expectation bet that the general public are aware?

Again, not meaning to derail here. I'm just genuinely curious. I wasn't a fan yet when Thriller 25 and Bad 25 came out. I don't know what the protocol has been.
 
staywild23 said:
Good point. I know this isn't the correct thread for this, but this one is so much more positive in general. I'm just going to ask (feel free to ignore if you don't want to derail). What kind of promotion would we hope for with an anniversary release? I'm not sure I've ever followed an artist through an anniversary release and, honestly, most of the time I find out about other artists doing them It's just from seeing an album in a store. For example, last night I decided to stream Norah Jones' 'Come Away With Me' album for the first time in years. Love it. Searched Amazon for vinyl out of curiosity and, apparently, there was a 20th anniversary re-release in April. Now, I'm not at all comparing that album to Thriller, or Norah to Michael, but my point is how much promo is typical for an anniversary release? Should the expectation bet that the general public are aware?

Again, not meaning to derail here. I'm just genuinely curious. I wasn't a fan yet when Thriller 25 and Bad 25 came out. I don't know what the protocol has been.
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It really depends on the artist. In the UK the Norah Jones thing really just consisted of several features, couple of interviews, lots of nice reviews. Some nice pieces giving an overview of her career. There might have been other things but not that I noticed.
 
zinniabooklover said:
It really depends on the artist. In the UK the Norah Jones thing really just consisted of several features, couple of interviews, lots of nice reviews. Some nice pieces giving an overview of her career. There might have been other things but not that I noticed.
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Thank you for that context! I wonder how it changes with it being a posthumous release. Obviously that limits things. That said, I can't remember if this was discussed on the board but there is going to be Victory Tour Documentary on CNN (strangely) sometime this fall, I think, obviously the Thriller doc is happening, we are anticipating 4k releases of videos which should, at the very least, circulate around social media... hmm. I'm sure there is other stuff they could do, though, to get it out there for the general public. I'm just not sure what. I'm not sure who the target audience is here.

Anyway, I fear I'm venturing "derailing" territory and I know we have several threads that already discuss this stuff. So I apologize. I'm just curious but somewhat afraid to even engage in those ones. This and the photo threads are my safe spaces lol.
 
staywild23 said:
Thank you for that context! I wonder how it changes with it being a posthumous release. Obviously that limits things. That said, I can't remember if this was discussed on the board but there is going to be Victory Tour Documentary on CNN (strangely) sometime this fall, I think, obviously the Thriller doc is happening, we are anticipating 4k releases of videos which should, at the very least, circulate around social media... hmm. I'm sure there is other stuff they could do, though, to get it out there for the general public. I'm just not sure what. I'm not sure who the target audience is here.
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I don't think anybody knows, lol.
 
We often hear and celebrate MJ’s biggest charting hits but I think it is time to put some forgotten stats into the limelight
Surprising and rare nr 1 hits:

- Ireland: MJ scored 5 nr 1 hits from the bad album just like in the US: IJCSLY, Bad, TWYMMF and surprisingly Liberian girl and Leave me alone. In total MJ scored 9 nr 1 hits in Ireland placing him behind abba, the beatles, westlife and U2 in the all time list.
- Smooth Criminal criminally missed out on the nr 1 spot in both UK and the US but he had more success overseas with the song hitting nr 1 in Belgium, Holland, Iceland, Finland and Spain
- one day in your life surfed on the success of Off the wall and went to nr 1 six years after its initial release in 1981 in Belgium, UK, Holland and South Africa
- Thriller like Smooth Criminal surprisingly didn’t hit nr 1 in both Uk and US but again overseas countries came to the rescue as the song hit nr 1 in Belgium, Spain, France and Portugal. Since 2018 it recharted in the US on Halloween reaching respectively nrs 31, 44, 48 and nr 19
- Say say say was not just a hit it was a smash hit reaching nr 1 in the US, Canada, Finland, France, Italy, Norway, Spain and Sweden
- Remember the time, while it was a worldwide top 10 hit it must have been disappointing for MJ that it didn’t reach nr 1 in his homecountry or the UK. Especially since it was only the 2nd single of Dangerous but perhaps he found some solace in the fact it got to nr 1 in New Zealand.
- In the closet. The hard NJS sound didn’t prove to be super popular in the singles charts, the song did favorably in most charts but not extraordinary. In Greece however the sing hit nr 1
- Give in to me as the 7th release of Dangerous still managed to hit nr 1 in both Poland and New Zealand, overall it did much better than the NJS releases like Jam and In the closet in most charts.
- They don’t care about us hit nr 1 in Germany, it was very surprisingly Michael’s first ever nr 1 hit in Germany. It went on to sell 1 million copies there. It hit the same heights in Italy, Czech Republic, Hungary.
- Earth Song, not one without two as this song became MJ’s second consecutive nr 1 hit in Germany, also eventually selling well over 1 million copies. In general this song is seen as MJ’s crowning achievement in the country, it is more liked than the holy trinity of beat it, thriller and billie jean over there.
It also hit nr 1 in the UK becoming Michael’s only Christmas nr 1 hit in the country which is something hugely important in the country.
- Stranger in Moscow was a letdown compared to the other HIStory singles in the charts but at least it still was nr 1 in Spain, Italy and the Czech Republic. I wonder what the Russians thought…
- You rock my world hit the top 10 worldwide which isn’t a surprise for a first single but it did especially well in France hitting nr 1 for 4 weeks
 
staywild23 said:
Good point. I know this isn't the correct thread for this, but this one is so much more positive in general. I'm just going to ask (feel free to ignore if you don't want to derail). What kind of promotion would we hope for with an anniversary release? I'm not sure I've ever followed an artist through an anniversary release and, honestly, most of the time I find out about other artists doing them It's just from seeing an album in a store. For example, last night I decided to stream Norah Jones' 'Come Away With Me' album for the first time in years. Love it. Searched Amazon for vinyl out of curiosity and, apparently, there was a 20th anniversary re-release in April. Now, I'm not at all comparing that album to Thriller, or Norah to Michael, but my point is how much promo is typical for an anniversary release? Should the expectation bet that the general public are aware?

Again, not meaning to derail here. I'm just genuinely curious. I wasn't a fan yet when Thriller 25 and Bad 25 came out. I don't know what the protocol has been.
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I think the best way to promote an anniversary album is to have a documentary on the album aired on some big TV channel. Maybe have a concert from the tour associated with the album air on TV too.

Anniversary editions are typically aimed at hardcore fans, so the promotion is usually minimal.
 
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1583977752641753088


EDIT: Ok, so this is one of those things I wanted to verify. When I looked at the top 500 videos across all of YouTube in the past 24 hours, Thriller was not on the list. Both Billie Jean and Smooth Criminal were, however. Each somewhere in the 200 range.

So then I changed the parameters to English only. At that point I saw that Michael Jackson has 5 videos in that list. Billie Jean, Smooth Criminal, Beat It, They Don't Care About Us, and Thriller.

Today's Most Viewed Music Videos on YouTube (Anglophone)

A website that collects and analyzes music data from around the world. All of the charts, sales and streams, constantly updated.
kworb.net
 
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Nite Line said:
I think the best way to promote an anniversary album is to have a documentary on the album aired on some big TV channel.
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For a legacy artist I'd expect radio to be included also. Doesn't matter if younger peeps think radio is irrelevant, there's still a big enough audience, at least for now, for a good radio doc to be part of the promotional push. Not least bc any good radio station almost definitely will have a ton of relevant stuff in their archives.

Just last night on the livestream Taj was talking about the Thriller Challenge. He was encouraging Michael's fans to not only stream Thriller but also to contact radio stations to request the song. In the push to get Thriller to No.1 getting radio airplay is also important.

Nite Line said:
Anniversary editions are typically aimed at hardcore fans, so the promotion is usually minimal.
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Minimal but widespread, I would say. There's been lots of anniversary stuff happening this year, lots of MSM coverage. As with radio, any major MSM outlet will have good stuff in their archives. Wouldn't always be needed but can be great if used well.
 
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I’m happy to see heaven can wait is still going fairly strong with 73000 streams, I was wondering what happened to it after it left the top 10 a few weeks ago.

Also note that 2 thriller versions are in the top 10, if you add both up thriller would jump to nr 3 in the list . It never feels right to me that the holy trinity of MJ songs (beat it billy jean thriller) gets broken up lol.

radio is so important. Millions of people listen to the radio daily at work, in the car in shopping malls you name it! If you get played on the radio you have a hit.
 
filmandmusic said:
I’m happy to see heaven can wait is still going fairly strong with 73000 streams,
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I was so pleased when I saw that. Yay HCW! 🥰

filmandmusic said:
I was wondering what happened to it after it left the top 10 a few weeks ago.
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Indeed.

filmandmusic said:
radio is so important. Millions of people listen to the radio daily at work, in the car in shopping malls you name it! If you get played on the radio you have a hit.
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It really is. People forget or are just dismissive. The car journey / radio at work thing is much bigger than people realise. And not just public or commercial radio but also in-store radio stations, hospitals etc etc. All of that. Even if a community radio station isn't involved in the official collection of stats re airplay, they are still getting that song in front of people, getting it into their day so they are aware of it.
 
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Dani said:
Great numbers!

What do you think how many streams would it take to get the song to the Billbaord Hot 100? Without radio airplays could it be possible at all?

As a number-addict guy :) I like this big activity in this topic. :)
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This isn't an exact answer to your question, but I've been following the Thriller challenge on Twitter and one of the organizers (who is a big chart/number person) has said Thriller (the song) needs to be streamed at least 2 million times in the BB weekly date range in order to reach #1. So that's... a lot lol
 
staywild23 said:
This isn't an exact answer to your question, but I've been following the Thriller challenge on Twitter and one of the organizers (who is a big chart/number person) has said Thriller (the song) needs to be streamed at least 2 million times in the BB weekly date range in order to reach #1. So that's... a lot lol
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@Dani

Ok, I wrote this very, very late in my time and I was exhausted. Anyway, I was extremely wrong about what I wrote lol. I had a feeling I was, but I forgot to double-check until you reacted to my post. I just looked at the tweet I saw about this. I have no idea where I got 2 million from in my response because the actual number it needs is a minimum of 40 million streams 😂

Apparently last year Thriller hit #19 with 12.9 million streams.

So sorry for the misinformation! Blame my poor sleep schedule.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1568665569674788864
 
Dani said:
Great numbers!

What do you think how many streams would it take to get the song to the Billbaord Hot 100? Without radio airplays could it be possible at all?

As a number-addict guy :) I like this big activity in this topic. :)
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oh, you'd need someone else for that question, lol. Not me, for sure. :D

I did get up to speed on this a few months back but now can't remember any of it, lol. IIRC, radio airplay *does* count in America but is not counted in the UK. Someone will come along to correct me if I've got that wrong.

@travis3000 did have this to say recently which jogged my memory a bit:
travis3000 said:
In Chicago's case its all from streaming. 1500 streams= 1 album sale , 150 streams= 1 track sale
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staywild23 said:
@Dani

Ok, I wrote this very, very late in my time and I was exhausted. Anyway, I was extremely wrong about what I wrote lol. I had a feeling I was, but I forgot to double-check until you reacted to my post. I just looked at the tweet I saw about this. I have no idea where I got 2 million from in my response because the actual number it needs is a minimum of 40 million streams 😂

Apparently last year Thriller hit #19 with 12.9 million streams.

So sorry for the misinformation! Blame my poor sleep schedule.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1568665569674788864
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Thank you for sharing, it is very useful information and give us a reference point and now I think Chicago is not far to enter the Billboard HOT 100 maybe 600k-700k daily streams could be enough for a week.
 
Unrelated to Michael but according to the newspaper I read Taylor Swift amassed a record total of 185 million streams on Spotify in 1 day of her new album “midnight”.

It would be an absolute miracle if thriller went nr 1 in a week where miss Swift has a bunch of new songs out. So don’t get your hopes up folks 😀
 
filmandmusic said:
Unrelated to Michael but according to the newspaper I read Taylor Swift amassed a record total of 185 million streams on Spotify in 1 day of her new album “midnight”.

It would be an absolute miracle if thriller went nr 1 in a week where miss Swift has a bunch of new songs out. So don’t get your hopes up folks 😀
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Taylor Swift releases a dozen versions of each album. Michael never needed to do that to amass such sales.

Thriller isn’t reaching number 1, which is nearly impossible for a deceased artist unless they have a song featured in a popular movie/tv show or the song is remixed by a popular contemporary artist.

I think the more realistic target is top 10. Last year, Thriller got to top 20 for the first time since 1984. With the release of Thriller 40, top 10 is a possibility this year.
 
filmandmusic said:
Unrelated to Michael but according to the newspaper I read Taylor Swift amassed a record total of 185 million streams on Spotify in 1 day of her new album “midnight”.
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I think she also broke the records for Apple and Amazon. Michael will have his work cut out going up against the behemoth that is Taylor in 'new music' mode, lol.

filmandmusic said:
It would be an absolute miracle if thriller went nr 1 in a week where miss Swift has a bunch of new songs out. So don’t get your hopes up folks 😀
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For myself, I'm quite calm. What will be will be. J5 didn't have their first 4 singles go to No.1 in the UK. Even after Michael died MITM still didn't get to No.1 in the UK. I'm content to wait and see how it pans out. Maybe we'll get a nice surprise, you never know.
 
filmandmusic said:
Unrelated to Michael but according to the newspaper I read Taylor Swift amassed a record total of 185 million streams on Spotify in 1 day of her new album “midnight”.

It would be an absolute miracle if thriller went nr 1 in a week where miss Swift has a bunch of new songs out. So don’t get your hopes up folks 😀
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Nite Line said:
Taylor Swift releases a dozen versions of each album. Michael never needed to do that to amass such sales.
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Yeah, I just read on Billboard that she released 20 separate versions of 'Midnights.' That certainly put into perspective all these records she's breaking. No offense to her. I have no problem with Taylor. I'm not a fan, but I have nothing against her. I just think it's kind of crazy how inflated a lot of current records seem to be.

Nite Line said:
Thriller isn’t reaching number 1, which is nearly impossible for a deceased artist unless they have a song featured in a popular movie/tv show or the song is remixed by a popular artist.

I think the more realistic target is top 10. Last year, Thriller got to top 20 for the first time since 1984. With the release of Thriller 40, top 10 is a possibility this year.
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Yeah, I actually do think top 10 is possible. It's going to be very hard though. Drake is apparently also dropping some kind of a collab album on October 28th, as well as one of the guys from BTS. I mean, 'Thriller' is going to have a tough time cracking the top 10.

That said... several big artists dropping could also dilute the individual power of each album. Either way, if it got to #19 last year I see no way it won't perform better this year. Not just because of Thriller 40, but because Michael currently has the most monthly listeners and YouTube subscribers he has ever had at this point (please correct me if I'm wrong on this). Also, there is a rumored Halloween playlist that Spotify will be dropping that includes Thriller, so if that turns out to be true that will certainly help.

zinniabooklover said:
I'm content to wait and see how it pans out. Maybe we'll get a nice surprise, you never know.
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That's basically where I'm at. I'm going to do everything in my power as an American fan to stream the hell out of Thriller... I may even buy the digital single (which will mark my first ever digital music purchase lol). I'm not expecting #1, but I never really was. I'm hoping for top 10. I want it for Michael so badly. But I also want it for the fan community that is pushing so freaking hard for Thriller 40 to succeed. I'm still blown away by the website made by FANS to honor the album. I mean, some of these fans are tireless and I admire that.
 
staywild23 said:
But I also want it for the fan community that is pushing so freaking hard for Thriller 40 to succeed. I'm still blown away by the website made by FANS to honor the album. I mean, some of these fans are tireless and I admire that.
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Indeed. I made a similar comment recently on the thread about Michael blogs. I'm just blown away by the hard work, dedication, determination, persistence and focus of Michael's fans. It's awesome. I really do salute them. They never give up.
 
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