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George Michael - Why No Hits In US Since 1998?


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Old 27-12-2016, 21:20
chrisqc
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Billboard published an article today as Last Christmas entered the Hot 100 for the 1st time ever this week
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Old 27-12-2016, 23:32
mickmars
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George's USA career slowed down as a result of two things a long time before the gay arrest etc.
Him refusing to go down the traditional promotion route of appearing in videos and doing a major tour,and his record company thinking if he can't be bothered to promote LWP,then why should they.
IMO,they were both at fault.
The USA was not like Britain,where you can do Top of the Pops and reach a huge music audience,they have thousands of radio stations,not just a few national stations.
It was an entirely different ball game in the early to mid 90s
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Old 29-12-2016, 16:39
Evil Genius
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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.
Agreed. American radio is still pretty conservative, and when he also made 'Shoot the Dog', as an earlier poster pointed out, a lot of America took that as an attack on their patriotism.

To give you another example of their conservatism, when Queen released 'I want to break free', it damaged their future success in the US due to the video,
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Old 29-12-2016, 16:58
Cricketblade
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Or you know...most pop acts have a shelf life.
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Old 29-12-2016, 19:03
Rodney
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To give you another example of their conservatism, when Queen released 'I want to break free', it damaged their future success in the US due to the video,
Indeed. Queen were basically dead in America after the Break free video was released. It wasn't until Live Aid that they got back some (but not all) off their US street cred - having been more popular in the US than the UK in the early 80s.
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Old 29-12-2016, 19:05
FusionFury
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American's can't take to everyone, not even George and his razzmatazz.

In the end tho does it really matter? we in the UK and Britain enjoyed his music.
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Old 30-12-2016, 06:27
Lyricalis
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American's can't take to everyone, not even George and his razzmatazz.

In the end tho does it really matter? we in the UK and Britain enjoyed his music.
Yes, it's not like he died penniless and he was always popular here in the UK and lots of other places.
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Old 30-12-2016, 17:38
egghead1
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I see the "ban The Sun" brigade are out in force on Twitter due to an old tweet from George where he bemoans them calling him a "poof "and a "pervert" due to this stance on the Iraq war apparently. Andrew Ridgeley has requested their campaign for a song to be re released for charity is changed to one he didnt write due to his displeasure at said paper.
Obviously it MUST be true from a fan POV. A tabloid did hack his phone though when all that furore came out.
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Old 30-12-2016, 18:25
bryemycaz
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Indeed. Queen were basically dead in America after the Break free video was released. It wasn't until Live Aid that they got back some (but not all) off their US street cred - having been more popular in the US than the UK in the early 80s.
They didn't really get it back until after Freddie died and that was not because he died. It was because Bohemian Rhapsody was in Waynes World.
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Old 30-12-2016, 19:46
mrprosser
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George's long running dispute with Sony probably had something to do with it as well, It is hard to be in the charts when you stop releasing records because you are in a 3 year legal dispute with your publishing company.

A 3 year hiatus followed by getting caught proposing lewd acts in an LA public convenience don't go down well with the sort of people who have elected Donald Trump to be leader of the free world 🤡
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Old 31-12-2016, 12:16
vauxhall1964
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American's can't take to everyone, not even George and his razzmatazz.

.
but that's the whole point of this thread: America did take to him massively in his Faith period. Then dropped him when the rest of the world kept on buying his records
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Old 31-12-2016, 12:20
vauxhall1964
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Radio play didn’t count towards the Hot 100 until late 1998. .
Radio play has counted towards the Billboard Hot 100 since the 50s
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Old 31-12-2016, 13:04
Hav_mor91
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It's simple really when you look at it and he said it himself in an interview I recently watched. In America unlike most other places you have to be visible, you have to tour and your face needs to be seen.

When he himself decided with LWP that he no longer wanted to promote his records or be another poster boy pin up and fore go touring he sealed his own fate. Sony refused to promote him and thus America forever switched off. He didn't do too badly sold about anoth 5 mil a few top 10's but he would never reach the heights of Faith.
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Old 01-01-2017, 17:52
mickmars
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It's simple really when you look at it and he said it himself in an interview I recently watched. In America unlike most other places you have to be visible, you have to tour and your face needs to be seen.

When he himself decided with LWP that he no longer wanted to promote his records or be another poster boy pin up and fore go touring he sealed his own fate. Sony refused to promote him and thus America forever switched off. He didn't do too badly sold about anoth 5 mil a few top 10's but he would never reach the heights of Faith.
Exactly,it had nothing to do with homophobia - just business
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Old 04-01-2017, 13:27
vauxhall1964
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Exactly,it had nothing to do with homophobia - just business
rather naive. America didn't do out gay popstars in the 90s. Plus his anti Bush record would've killed many a career off over there ... ask the Dixie Chicks
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Old 04-01-2017, 13:56
drakhen
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People are too quick to assume that George's coming out and his criticism of the war damaged his career in the USA. His dispute with Sony and the fact that his material didn't sit with US radio at the time were much more damaging. And as has already been pointed out, his decline started well before the toilet incident. He went from a Diamond record with Faith to "only" going double platinum with Listen without Prejudice.

Somebody brought up the Dixie Chicks earlier, but their situation was completely different. They are American, more or less said they were ashamed that Bush was their president and their fanbase were typically Bush supporters.
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Old 04-01-2017, 14:01
unique
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the simple explanation would be his work since 1998 wasn't as popular and commercial as earlier work. I'm a big fan and I wouldn't consider his stuff after then to be anywhere near as good as the stuff prior to then. his covers album wasn't exactly bursting full of potential hits. freeek and shoot the dog weren't a patch on his biggest hits and the video for shoot the dog probably wouldn't get it much prime time tv play. patience just wasn't that good an album compared to his earlier ones
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Old 04-01-2017, 14:04
dave2702
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rather naive. America didn't do out gay popstars in the 90s. Plus his anti Bush record would've killed many a career off over there ... ask the Dixie Chicks
Different markets, the Dixie Chicks largely played to Country Music Audiences who were switched off by the Country Stations. George was largely listened to Metropolitan audiences and so weren't quite as affected by his anti War/ anti Bush stance

Though there is always a problem in the US that being against the war means being against Service Men & Women which is a big definitely not in the US.

As others have said his refusal to tour and promote records in the US is largely what diminished his career. There's always someone else willing to come and play for 5 minutes on the Tonight Show
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Old Yesterday, 11:57
spaceygal
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I see a lot of people here are claiming that George had stopped having hits in America long before 1998 and no longer had any success in America after Faith. That is totally incorrect. He may not have had as many number 1 hits as he'd had from his Faith album but he still had several hits in the Billboard Hot 100. He continued to have chart hits up to and including his Older album. Looking at his discography here are his US Billboard Hot 100 placings:

Praying for Time - No.1
Freedom 90 - No.8
Waiting For That Day - No.27
Mother's Pride - No.46
Don't Let The Sun Go Down On Me (with Elton) - No.1
Too Funky - No.10
Somebody To Love - No.30
Killer/Papa Was A Rollin' Stone - No.69
Five Live E.P. - No.46
Jesus To A Child - No.7
Fastlove - No.8

His Listen Without Prejudice album reached No.2 and his Older album reached No.6.

Then came 1998 and his single Outside - absolutely NONE of his single releases from that point on entered the Billboard Hot 100, not even at number 99 or 100!

These are his single releases from 1998 onwards:

Outside
As (with Mary J Blige)
If I Told You That (with Whitney Houston)
Freeek!
Shoot The Dog
Amazing
Flawless
Round Here
John And Elvis Are Dead
An Easier Affair
This Is Not Real Love (with Mutya Buena)
Heal The Pain (with Paul McCartney)
December Song
True Faith
White Light
Let Her Down Easy

I don't know if ALL the above songs were officially released as singles in the US or not but I'm sure most of them would have been, in some format or another, even if just digital downloads, but NONE of them got anywhere near the charts. Whereas here in the UK the majority of these songs all charted, including 11 of them being in the Top 20 and they were hits in various other European countries and in Australia. Just not the US. It's such a shame as there's some damn good songs amongst that list. I think Outside, Amazing, Round Here and This Is Not Real Love are as good as anything he'd released earlier in his career.

It's such a shame he never released more music than he did but I just have to be happy with all the beautiful music that he has left us with.
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Old Yesterday, 12:52
Johnny_Cash
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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.
Great post, sums up downloading and sales from that period well.
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