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George Michael - Why No Hits In US Since 1998? |
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#1 |
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George Michael - Why No Hits In US Since 1998?
I'm still in total shock over the news that my musical idol for the last 34 years has died, on Christmas Day, no less. It's like a sick joke! Anyway, I don't really care about the charts over the past 5 years or so but, back in the days when the charts, and legitimate record sales actually meant something George Michael completely ruled the roost in the US Billboard Hot 100 Charts. I mean, right from the release of Wham's 2nd album in 1984 onwards and then onto George's solo work in the late 80's, leading up to the early to mid 90's everything George touched seemed to turn to gold in America. I mean, lots of Wham's singles charted high including number 1 hits, 5 consecutive number 1 hits that came from the Faith album, topped the Billboard Hot 100 (quite some achievement, even here in his native UK he didn't have as many number 1's from that album), other number 1 hits (and at least other top 10 hits) with singles from his Listen Without Prejudice and Older albums, as well as other misc single only releases, all followed too. Then, for some reason, George's brilliant and hilarious, tongue in cheek single Outside was released in 1998 and it didn't even make the US Billboard Hot 100! In fact NO OTHER future single of George's ever did! Now I know in the past couple of decades George didn't release much music but what singles he did release all charted here in the UK Top 40. In fact, from 'Outside' onwards I believe he still had a further 12 Top 40 singles here in the UK, yet in the US not a single one of them entered the US bb hot 100. Why is this, does anyone think? It's not like he was suddenly not releasing good music from '98 onwards, he was! Songs like Outside, As, Round Here, Amazing, An Easier Affair and Flawless are all great songs. So why did he fail to chart in America ever again after 'Outside'? Please don't tell me it's because he was officially out as gay that year? It can't be for a reason that petty, surely?! He deserved some success in the US with his later work, it's damn good work. RIP beautiful George. (btw, sorry there's no paragraphs, I can't create them via this phone I'm using).
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#2 |
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Americans can be quite vindictive, didn't he criticise the war (can't remember which) and the President. They probably found his arrest a little disturbing - same happened to Queen I believe after they dressed in drag for their I Want To Break Free video, killed their popularity in the States apparently.
Hit songs aren't the be all and end all when you have talent, Prince sold out everywhere he played. |
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#3 |
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Quote:
I'So why did he fail to chart in America ever again after 'Outside'? Please don't tell me it's because he was officially out as gay that year? It can't be for a reason that petty, surely?!
Thankfully many other countries were more accepting and continued to support his true talent. |
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#4 |
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Quote:
Americans can be quite vindictive, didn't he criticise the war (can't remember which) and the President. They probably found his arrest a little disturbing - same happened to Queen I believe after they dressed in drag for their I Want To Break Free video, killed their popularity in the States apparently.
Hit songs aren't the be all and end all when you have talent, Prince sold out everywhere he played. |
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#5 |
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Interesting article in the Guardian about his problems in the USA: https://www.theguardian.com/music/20...ack-on-america
The writer thinks that his arrest changed this view of the country and broke his heart. |
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#6 |
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Quote:
Americans can be quite vindictive, didn't he criticise the war (can't remember which) and the President. They probably found his arrest a little disturbing - same happened to Queen I believe after they dressed in drag for their I Want To Break Free video, killed their popularity in the States apparently.
Hit songs aren't the be all and end all when you have talent, Prince sold out everywhere he played. |
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#7 |
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There have been TV programmes about Queen where Roger Taylor says after they did the "Drag" video for "I want to break free", Queen pretty much couldn't get on TV in the US.
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#8 |
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i think it was he because he had beef with sony in the mid 90's.. unsuccessfully tried to sue them. wore some headphones labelled 'fony' in his music video to fastlove.. they probably decided to stop distributing him in the USA during/after all that...'coincidentally' when he was suing them was also when he got set up in the public toilet with the undercover cop.
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#9 |
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Think the 0utside video was a turning point too!
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#10 |
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Im sure some chart expert will shed more lights on this but i think that
Back then late 90' early 00 i think that to be eligible for the billboard singles chart your song needed to be send to radio and also physically available as a single in record store(cd/casette single) even if they those format had stop selling well a few years prior. Many record company stopped selling cd singles so many songs were not chart eligible |
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#11 |
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Quote:
Back then late 90' early 00 i think that to be eligible for the billboard singles chart your song needed to be send to radio and also physically available as a single in record store(cd/casette single) even if they those format had stop selling well a few years prior.
It wasn't even until Napster came along in mid-'99 that MP3s really crossed from being something a few copyright-infringing geeks and indie musicians used to something that got noticed by mainstream companies and the man on the street. (#) The industry launched a few half-baked, DRM-encumbered pay services in the early-to-mid-2000s and even the iTunes store didn't come out until 2003 in the US (and mid-2004 in the UK). Not sure when most shops stopped selling them, but the last CD single I bought was Madonna's "Hung Up" in mid-2005 and they were still widely-available then. (#) Remember this is back when the average "man on the street" wasn't an Internet-savvy, tech-obsessed electronics-phile. Quote:
Many record company stopped selling cd singles so many songs were not chart eligible
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#12 |
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Quote:
As sad and pathetic as it seems, I really do think George Michael coming out as gay pretty much ended his career in America. That just says more about America than it does about George Michael.
Thankfully many other countries were more accepting and continued to support his true talent. |
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#13 |
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B*****ks! Virtually all mainstream music sales in the late 90s were physical.
It wasn't even until Napster came along in mid-'99 that MP3s really crossed from being something a few copyright-infringing geeks and indie musicians used to something that got noticed by mainstream companies and the man on the street. (#) The industry launched a few half-baked, DRM-encumbered pay services in the early-to-mid-2000s and even the iTunes store didn't come out until 2003 in the US (and mid-2004 in the UK). Not sure when most shops stopped selling them, but the last CD single I bought was Madonna's "Hung Up" in mid-2005 and they were still widely-available then. (#) Remember this is back when the average "man on the street" wasn't an Internet-savvy, tech-obsessed electronics-phile. No, this is nonsense. As far as mainstream artists like George Michael go, they wouldn't have stopped selling physical copies as long as they were important. A quick read of the billboard hot 100 wiki page tells a different story. Many big radio hits of the late 90s never charted on the hot 100 due to ineligibility as they were not made available as physical singles to buy. Not sure How long this rule lasted or if it even effected George But physical singles in the US were not big from the late 90s onwards and radio airplay was the major factor in determining who made the hot 100. |
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#14 |
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Quote:
A quick read of the billboard hot 100 wiki page tells a different story. Many big radio hits of the late 90s never charted on the hot 100 due to ineligibility as they were not made available as physical singles to buy. Not sure How long this rule lasted or if it even effected George But physical singles in the US were not big from the late 90s onwards and radio airplay was the major factor in determining who made the hot 100.
From the Cd single wiki page In the US, the Billboard Hot 100 made this change in December 1998, after which very few songs were released in the CD single format in the US, but they remained extremely popular in the UK and other countries, where charts were still based solely on single sales and not radio airplay |
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#15 |
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I'm sure his coming out didn't help, but I don't think his later material was as strong or as accessible as his earlier stuff.
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#16 |
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Because most of his records since 1998 have been utter crap? He had some brilliant songs in the 80's and early 90's but hardly any since then.
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#17 |
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Quote:
B*****ks! Virtually all mainstream music sales in the late 90s were physical.
It wasn't even until Napster came along in mid-'99 that MP3s really crossed from being something a few copyright-infringing geeks and indie musicians used to something that got noticed by mainstream companies and the man on the street. (#) The industry launched a few half-baked, DRM-encumbered pay services in the early-to-mid-2000s and even the iTunes store didn't come out until 2003 in the US (and mid-2004 in the UK). Not sure when most shops stopped selling them, but the last CD single I bought was Madonna's "Hung Up" in mid-2005 and they were still widely-available then. (#) Remember this is back when the average "man on the street" wasn't an Internet-savvy, tech-obsessed electronics-phile. No, this is nonsense. As far as mainstream artists like George Michael go, they wouldn't have stopped selling physical copies as long as they were important. |
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#18 |
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Quote:
A quick read of the billboard hot 100 wiki page tells a different story. Many big radio hits of the late 90s never charted on the hot 100 due to ineligibility as they were not made available as physical singles to buy. Not sure How long this rule lasted or if it even effected George But physical singles in the US were not big from the late 90s onwards and radio airplay was the major factor in determining who made the hot 100.
So, I'm not sure what you mean by a "physical" single- maybe it was meant to contrast with a promo/radio-only "single", rather than non-physical MP3? You say many big radio hits were never listed in the top 100 because they weren't available as "physical" singles to buy and then say "physical singles in the US were not big from the late 90s onwards and radio airplay was the major factor in determining who made the hot 100." It does sound a bit contradictory; if a "physical" (i.e. available to buy, non-promo) single was required to get in the charts, regardless, wouldn't they just issue a token release of a few copies, even if they knew it was going to get there mainly via radio play? And wouldn't they do that for a major artist like George Michael? |
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#19 |
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Okay, perhaps I didn't have the whole picture. But my point was that any mainstream tracks available to buy as singles *at all* around the turn of the millennium would have been on CD- i.e. "physical"- single at the very least... but almost certainly not legal download.
So, I'm not sure what you mean by a "physical" single- maybe it was meant to contrast with a promo/radio-only "single", rather than non-physical MP3? You say many big radio hits were never listed in the top 100 because they weren't available as "physical" singles to buy and then say "physical singles in the US were not big from the late 90s onwards and radio airplay was the major factor in determining who made the hot 100." It does sound a bit contradictory; if a "physical" (i.e. available to buy, non-promo) single was required to get in the charts, regardless, wouldn't they just issue a token release of a few copies, even if they knew it was going to get there mainly via radio play? And wouldn't they do that for a major artist like George Michael? |
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#20 |
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George Michael's career lost momentum in the US when he released LWP in 1990. His arrest didn't help matters, but he was struggling years before that. Look at the huge drop in sales between his debut and second album. Even Older could only muster a platinum certification despite two top 10 hits on the Hot 100. His time as a major solo chart act was over pretty quickly in the US, he never came close to recapturing the success of Faith. I know he also had problems with his record label which added to his diminishing commercial viability. To be honest, nothing he released from 1999 onwards is held in high regard or talked about that much. His last studio album was 12 years ago, and he spent the last decade of his life in the press for all the wrong reasons. He was another star coasting on past glories.
All the 1980s icons have struggled post-Millennium. I think a lot of people would be hard pressed to name any album or single that Prince released after 1995. Whitney Houston's Just Whitney and One Wish underperformed in the early 2000s. Madonna hasn't had a #1 single on the Hot 100 for nearly 17 years. In fact, most of her singles since 2000 have flopped or failed to chart, she’s lucky if her albums even chart for more than a few weeks now. Even Barbra Streisand outsells her. Radio play didn’t count towards the Hot 100 until late 1998. Torn by Natalie Imbruglia spent 11 weeks at the top of the Airplay chart (still one of the longest) but only reached #42 on the Hot 100 due to the new rules coming into effect just as the song was losing popularity on the radio. It probably would’ve made the top 5 had the rules changed earlier. Iris by The Goo Goo Dolls suffered a similar fate, although it still managed to peak at #9. Most singles released in the late 1990s/early 2000s charted due to radio play, the only physical release was a promo CD single or the occasional 12” vinyl single (see Britney). |
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#21 |
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You would have thought with the exposure it got. That song he sang at the Olympics would have got him another hit. Though people wanted him to sing one of his hits
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#22 |
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Quote:
So, I'm not sure what you mean by a "physical" single- maybe it was meant to contrast with a promo/radio-only "single", rather than non-physical MP3?
Quote:
A physical single is what it says in the tin. It's not brain surgery. They we not available en masse in the US in the late 90's.
Was it (a) that it was only available to buy as a non-physical download (common now, but as I said, unlikely back then) or (b) that it was a "promo-only" or "radio single"? I originally assumed (a), but what was said since suggests (b). What I still don't get is that if a (physical) release was needed to qualify for the US charts- even if most of the work was done by radio play- why wouldn't they simply have arranged for an intentionally limited single release or whatever they wanted to promote? Anyway, I didn't mean to distract from George Michael's death. I wasn't a huge fan personally, but I'd still say the guy clearly had talent and meant a lot to some people, so no disrespect intended. |
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#23 |
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Torn by Natalie Imbruglia spent 11 weeks at the top of the Airplay chart (still one of the longest) but only reached #42 on the Hot 100 due to the new rules coming into effect just as the song was losing popularity on the radio.
As for George Michael, he had America in the palm of his hands with his album Faith. Even singles like Monkey which aren't really considered as a classic track still made it all the way to #1 in the US Billboard chart. |
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#24 |
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To clarify, what I was asking- and could have phrased better- was what its use as part of "not made available as physical singles to buy" implied." Since the vast majority of mainstream single releases were *only* available to (legally) buy in physical formats back then, it was otherwise redundant.
Was it (a) that it was only available to buy as a non-physical download (common now, but as I said, unlikely back then) or (b) that it was a "promo-only" or "radio single"? I originally assumed (a), but what was said since suggests (b). What I still don't get is that if a (physical) release was needed to qualify for the US charts- even if most of the work was done by radio play- why wouldn't they simply have arranged for an intentionally limited single release or whatever they wanted to promote? Anyway, I didn't mean to distract from George Michael's death. I wasn't a huge fan personally, but I'd still say the guy clearly had talent and meant a lot to some people, so no disrespect intended. The below is what I was referring to. Taken from the billboard hot 100 Wikipedia page "As many Hot 100 chart policies have been modified over the years, one rule always remained constant: songs were not eligible to enter the Hot 100 unless they were available to purchase as a single. However, on December 5, 1998, the Hot 100 changed from being a "singles" chart to a "songs" chart. During the 1990s, a growing trend in the music industry was to promote songs to radio without ever releasing them as singles. It was claimed by major record labels that singles were cannibalizing album sales, so they were slowly phased out. During this period, accusations began to fly of chart manipulation as labels would hold off on releasing a single until airplay was at its absolute peak, thus prompting a top ten or, in some cases, a number one debut. In many cases, a label would delete a single from its catalog after only one week, thus allowing the song to enter the Hot 100, make a high debut and then slowly decline in position as the one-time production of the retail single sold out. It was during this period that several popular mainstream hits never charted on the Hot 100, or charted well after their airplay had declined. During the period that they were not released as singles, the songs were not eligible to chart. Many of these songs dominated the Hot 100 Airplay chart for extended periods of time: 1995 The Rembrandts: "I'll Be There for You" (number one for eight weeks) 1996 No Doubt: "Don't Speak" (number one for 16 weeks) 1997 Sugar Ray featuring Super Cat: "Fly" (number one for six weeks) 1997 Will Smith: "Men in Black" (number one for four weeks) 1997 The Cardigans: "Lovefool" (number two for eight weeks) 1998 Natalie Imbruglia: "Torn" (number one for 11 weeks) 1998 Goo Goo Dolls: "Iris" (number one for 18 weeks) As debate and conflicts occurred more and more often, Billboard finally answered the requests of music industry artists and insiders by including airplay-only singles (or "album cuts") in the Hot 100." |
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#25 |
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Americans can be quite vindictive, didn't he criticise the war (can't remember which) and the President. They probably found his arrest a little disturbing - same happened to Queen I believe after they dressed in drag for their I Want To Break Free video, killed their popularity in the States apparently.
/QUOTE] The size of America always makes generalizations difficult. many of those living in the Blue States probably had no-problem with George's sexuality and opposition to the Gulf War and as we've seen by the Popular Vote there's more Blue State folks than there are in the Red Fly Over States The problem was due to the Radio & TV Stations and the letter-writing campaigns organized by Pressure Groups like The Family Research Council who will get their followers to bombard media companies and their advertisers at anything they perceive as un-American This fearing the loss of Red-State Consumers Media Companies pulled George from their playlists |
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