Do you know anyone who owns Susan Boyle’s album? I don’t, and I know a lot of people who have shitty music in their collections — everything from record collections that stopped in 1994 to flag-waving country to rootsy singer-songwriters who are liked only because they’re rootsy singer-songwriters to obscure metal bands that no one gives a fuck about.
Yet Boyle’s debut album, I Dreamed a Dream, has sold more than three million copies. Granted, that’s not ‘N Sync No Strings Attached numbers, but these days that’s a monster hit.
And it’s No. 1 again this week on Billboard‘s album chart. That makes it six straight weeks that it’s held the top spot. That too is something you don’t see much of anymore.
Still, I don’t know a single person who has Boyle’s album. I have an older friend who got swept up in Boyle fever last year when YouTube clips made the homely Scottish singer a star. He went apeshit over her voice. But he doesn’t even have her album.
So who’s buying it? My mom doesn’t have it. Some guy I saw at a party over the holidays whose wife listens to a lot of crap music doesn’t have it. And as far as I know, nobody on my block or in my office owns the record (or at least they’re not admitting it).
And how are these for stats? Boyle is the first artist ever to debut and spend six consecutive weeks at the top of the album chart, and I Dreamed a Dream is the bestselling debut by a woman — at least since SoundScan starting tabulating these things.
This is how we enter a new decade: with the music industry still in the crapper (with no signs of saving), buoyed mainly by a 49-year-old frumpy woman who looks like one of the Monty Python guys in drag and sounds like that old lady in church who sings a little louder than everyone else because someone in her family once told her she had a beautiful voice. And she’s singing shitty show tunes and desecrating Rolling Stones songs to boot.
And with no big releases on the horizon for the next several weeks, Boyle’s reign at the top will probably last deep into blizzard season. I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound like my dream at all. —Michael Gallucci
This article appears in Jan 6-12, 2010.
Anecdotes don’t make data. Our relations and associations are very self-selecting. So, that you do not know anyone who has bought this album is merely anecdotal. [I was in polling for 8 years.] This album isn’t really my cup of tea, from what I’ve heard of it. But there’s no denying this woman is a beast of a singer. She is that good, so say folks that study voice. It’s sad that a music writer can’t see through his prejudices to see that. The comments on her appearance are juvenile. The state of current music IS sad, but not because of Boyle.
I think this author of this useless article just jealous someone look like your mother or your aunts able to sell massive CD. Your taste of trash, maybe somebody gold. Your taste of gold, maybe somebody trash. Why care about someone else taste or even trash someone else taste? It is like I don’t like spicy food is not like spicy food taste bad. Massive of people in India consume crazy spicy food every day. Michael Jackson is great singer consider by anyone. Tell you the truth. I don’t own any his album, my mom don’t own any his album, my close friends don’t own any his album. Is that mean MJ is a trash singer? Am I going to blast MJ. Of course not. Get a clue.
How about Michael Jackson. Tell you the truth. I don’t own any his album, my mom don’t own any his album, my brother don’t own his album, my sister don’t own his album and my close friends don’t own any his album. And how long MJ album been out, few decade? Is that mean MJ is a trash singer? Am I going to blast MJ. Of course not. Get a clue.
72 owned by CLEVNET libraries, almost all checked out. 55 in Cuyahoga County system, all out w/225 holds.
Someone wants it.
Obviously, you and “your friends” are out of touch with the rest of the world. I suggest you find another job better suited to someone more in touch with what’s going on in the music industry. You haven’t got a clue.
Susan & her album were not widely promoted in the Midwest–a couple of TV specials on 2nd-rate cable channels, & a couple of others, one at an odd time. NO airplay. Plus she’s British, not American. So YOU might have heard ABOUT her, & decided you didn’t like her, but the people you know might not even know she has an album out. I’m in the Midwest too, & a lot of my friends don’t know about her album either. So I gave them one for Christmas, & now they love it. Once she hits Oprah & a couple of other popular shows here, more people will know her and she’ll have still more sales.
I own it. I love it. Sorry if I don’t work in your office building or live in your neighborhood. And quite frankly, Miss Boyle is a far better singer than you are a writer.