| david (galashiels) 23.04.2009 18:43 |
would ,the cosmos rocks,been a bigger hit if advertising was better.in my region(the scottish borders),there was little or no adverts for it.and as for the forethcoming release.live in the ukraine.i dont expect much more.if queen productions had been a bit more on the ball it could have been a massive hit.i and many others loved the album,went ballistic at the secc,and thought it was so so much better than,return of the champions(basicly queens greatest hits with a few extra tracks).maybe queen productions or a couple of band members thought it would fail.i think that had a massive advertising campaing been launched it could.and should,have been a bigger hit.i even know someone who knows i am a lover of queen and q+pr,(not a lover a such lol),and is a queen fan in a very small way herself.that she didnt even know about ,the comos rocks,till 2 weeks after it's release..so maybe this time they will go for glory,a massive advertising blitz.maybe even posters lol.after all apart from rock in rio,this is queen or queen+paul rodgers second biggest concert ever(now the purists will tell me there was a bigger one lol).in fact for a 1 night concert this may have been the biggest.(sorry if rio was bigger).yes i know that this release is nearly the same as return of the champions.but there was 1extra song(cleb)lol.so for fuck sake....queen productions.get your act together and advertise.unless you want one of the biggest bands in history to fade away(no pun intended)..me myself i will be buying the tin(cd,dvd,tshirt).but i will still be watching the uncut version i downloaded from my friends at queenzone.complete with ukranian comments between songs..nice. |
| david (galashiels) 23.04.2009 18:45 |
o i forgot.if anyone has the secc gig.11.10.2008,uncut in hd i will pay many many scottish pounds for a copy lol. |
| Sheer Brass Neck 23.04.2009 18:56 |
David, here's my two cents. No. In the days of the internet, all it's takes is for something to catch the imagination of a few people (see Susan Boyle, Paul Potts, the ukelele chick) for a band or artist to break. IMHO, there is nothing of interest to the general public on TCR that would demand any attention. Why, for instance, wouldn't the record companies get behind a Queen release, given their stature and the fact that they are a cash cow for all of their record companies in the UK and Europe? The songs weren't there, that's why!!! From the moment this alliance took place, people were skeptical because Queen music was larger than life and totally different than the music of their peers. God bless the three of them for trying, but they succeeded in making the best Bad Co. album ever, and worst Queen album ever, by a mile. You can't flog a product that people don't believe in, and very few people (outside of this board and QOL) believed in TCR. |
| steven 35638 23.04.2009 23:33 |
In contrast, I would argue that better advertisement would have been beneficial in making the album a more successful endeavor. Granted, people would still have argued that without Freddie Mercury the album would be substandard. Around the same time prior to the release of Cosmos Rocks, AC/DC was busy promoting their new album. I recall walking on Broadway in New York City and witnessing huge, and I do mean gigantic, light up signs promoting their new album. The album ended up gaining a lot of recognition, and was a success, in my opinion. I bought it too! But to be honest, I didn't enjoy it and consider it to be more of the same from them -- which bores me to death. So, I have to ask myself -- was the album a success primarily because of adequate advertisement? Would similar advertisement for Queen on such major locations have helped them much in the same way as it helped AC/DC? Honestly, I'm leaning toward advertisement. If I had a nickel for everytime I had to tell people Queen aren't dead I'd be a friggin' millionaire. By the way, I'm not implying Cosmos Rocks is a masterpiece. |
| Yara 24.04.2009 00:32 |
Yes, I think the album could have done better had it been better marketed. But, and the but here is strong enough as to almost deny what I wrote before, I guess even a massive advertising offense would ultimately reach a limit - that of the album itself. If people did get to know the album but failed to relate to it, then no advertising in the world would save it from maybe an even greater failure: the lack of commercial success despite huge advertising. That'd be really a knock out. I guess no matter how much advertising they made, the album would still have had a very pale reception, even if slightly better than what it actually got. Because the guys didn't set very high standards nor create too much expectation, many people welcomed the album as a low-profile, modest output of a very tentative musical partnership which was still haunted by the shadow of Freddie Mercury. In this sense, and because the guys did manage to put the album together and tour with it, and most importantly, suceeded in doing so having as a partner none other than Paul Rodgers, who's a tremendous and legendary singer, the album was a personal success for them, I guess. And that's also very important: if the guys are happy with the work they have done, as they seemed to be indeed, Paul included, then it was worth it from the point of view of artists who will always have to struggle not only against the odds of lack of creativity, as any musician, but also against the overwhelming legacy of Freddie Mercury, which makes people more resistant to whatever they happen to record: many people will either doubt their relevance and capacity or judge them according to Queen's older standards, which were largely laid out by someone who's not there anymore... |
| lalaalalaa 24.04.2009 07:51 |
I didn't even know Queen + Paul Rodgers existed until I saw the Return of the Champions DVD at a store. I was like "when did this happen???" So their advertising was pitiful for Return of the Champions as well as the Cosmos Rocks. (of course it might just be that we never hear this stuff in the U.S.) |
| Vali 24.04.2009 09:20 |
I'd say, not the ROTC album, but the 2005 tour really had much advertising and media coverage in Europe, compared to the non-existing for TCR and its tour in 2008. I remember my city, Barcelona, with many, many flyers, posters, etc, of the QPR gig hanging in the streets back in 2005, as well as many ads for the WWRY musical (I even managed to "steal" two flyers from a bank office, he he), radio ads, TV ads, etc etc etc The fact of the time coincidence of both events at Barcelona and their generous publicity made the QPR gig to be sold out, with more than 18.000 people attending. Then, in 2008, I only saw "one" (literally, one) poster in the street announcing the new tour, hence only 11.000 people attending the gig at the same venue ... wich could be, more or less, considered a success |
| Wiley 24.04.2009 10:55 |
I think the album would have sold more copies/made a bigger buzz if they had appeared in TV shows, made a couple of videos for their songs, release another single, do radio shows here and there and, you know, actually PROMOTING YOUR FRICKIN' ALBUM!! Maybe they didn't want to risk it. From a financial point of view, they probably made more money with the tour and selling only 400,000 copies with ZERO promotion than if they had sold 800,000 copies with a huge promotion campaign. If that was their "strategy": lower costs, maximize return on investment, then they are geniuses. If this is the case, then they are not disappointed by the album's sales as they expected them and this "failure" won't affect their decision to move forward with their work relationship. That's me with a lot of wishful thinking. If they really expected the album to sell by itself and to have a sleeper hit that would motivate them to do something else later, well, they failed miserably. They migh as well have called the album "The Works 2". |
| The Real Wizard 24.04.2009 10:59 |
Sheer Brass Neck wrote: In the days of the internet, all it's takes is for something to catch the imagination of a few people (see Susan Boyle, Paul Potts, the ukelele chick) for a band or artist to break. IMHO, there is nothing of interest to the general public on TCR that would demand any attention. To me, those are two completely unrelated statements. While that may be your personal opinion on the album, that has little to do why it didn't sell well. People on TV talent shows are on a whole different level in our pop culture of quick consumption of all new things good and bad. Paul Potts and Susan Boyle will be forgotten in 5 years. Queen are on an entirely different level, as they have been in the media for about 35 years. But no matter what they create, they won't get mass marketing, even if it it's as good as A Night At The Opera. Marketing creates an artificial sense of supply and demand for a product, no matter the quality. The media does not feel the need to push anything done by Queen, and that's where the buck stops. U2's latest album was bought by millions because it was marketed to incredible lengths before anyone had heard a note, not because all buyers are U2 fans who have bought every previous U2 record. Plenty of curious rock music fans would have bought the QPR album had they heard about its existence. More people went to a single concert in the Ukraine than bought the album worldwide. Does that mean the new songs didn't go down well live, or that they didn't get constant reminders to buy the new album, like U2's, or AC/DC's? Our pop culture creates the idea of what is marketable, and the name U2 is exactly that, especially when Bono is all over the news for non-musical reasons. Compared to The Cosmos Rocks, Britney Spears' latest record has sold about 10x as many copies. Does that mean it's a better record, or that there's some kind of supply and demand at work? AC/DC's last album is the same album that they've created for the last 30 years (Angus Young even admits it), yet they sell millions too. Does that mean AC/DC's latest record is inherently better than QPR's? To me, QPR is a great record, created by three legends who simply want to create more music. Aside from Freddie Mercury not being there, Queen's and Paul's trademark sounds are all over the record, and it holds up against much Queen's and Paul's back catalogues. If it had sold 10 million copies, those facts would not be any different. Sales and quality are two completely different issues. |
| Negative Creep 24.04.2009 13:28 |
So what if it had had loads of promotion? A boost in short term sales would have had no effect on the content of the album. They had no problem shifting tickets for the gigs as they were Queen nostalgia fests - majority of people attending obviously werent too fussed about hearing any new output, coz it ain't Queen and they probably aren't to arsed about hearing new songs sung by Paul Rodgers. Reactions in the online "Queen community" haven't exactly been great, to say the least. Also, it isn't EMI's fault the "band" failed to deliver any suitable material for a lead-off single, or indeed any possible subsequent singles. And it isn't EMI who refused to do much promotion - apparently a live show to be broadcast on Radio 2 was on the cards, until a band member vetoed it coz they couldn't be bothered to do any work to shift units. Bit too easy to blame the record company. |
| Wiley 24.04.2009 14:18 |
Negative Creep wrote: So what if it had had loads of promotion? A boost in short term sales would have had no effect on the content of the album. They had no problem shifting tickets for the gigs as they were Queen nostalgia fests - majority of people attending obviously werent too fussed about hearing any new output, coz it ain't Queen and they probably aren't to arsed about hearing new songs sung by Paul Rodgers. Reactions in the online "Queen community" haven't exactly been great, to say the least. Also, it isn't EMI's fault the "band" failed to deliver any suitable material for a lead-off single, or indeed any possible subsequent singles. And it isn't EMI who refused to do much promotion - apparently a live show to be broadcast on Radio 2 was on the cards, until a band member vetoed it coz they couldn't be bothered to do any work to shift units. Bit too easy to blame the record company. Do you know who vetoed that Radio 2 broadcast idea? Regarding the "what if they had loads of promotion", well, they would have sold more albums in the short term like you say. Some people here and there would have liked it, etc. I don't blame the record company actually. I think that THE BAND WAS LAZY. Too bad, I actually like the album very much and I kinda saw it as "A new beginning". I HOPE that they don't care about bad sales, that they are not bummed by this outcome and they choose to make another album together. Sadly, I think that the band though it would be a moderate hit with little work and this would justify more tours or new material. No hit? Let's move on. :( Too damn sad for me. |
| vadenuez 24.04.2009 14:38 |
Lack of promotion is quite a blurry statement regarding poor sales. QPR had a much more than decent response from the public in this last tour which indicates that they're still an important live act. But the fact that the people's high spirits weren't strong enough to go and buy a copy of TCR the day after the concert speaks worlds of how much was Joe Public really interested in listening anything new from them. |
| georgs1963 24.04.2009 16:34 |
I agree on the fact that if it would have been a real Queen album including Freddie and John there would have been no promotion needed, at least in Europe. Here in the States the market always been different for them. I also have notice especially here in the US that over the last few years Freddie has been more embraced , more of a cultural icon and he is constally mentioned in Movies and TV shows. I didnt buy the album because i been A Queen fan for a verly long time and it's been always the 4 of them for me. I remember a statement Freddie made in the mid 80s that if one of them either quit or dies he wouldnt go on as Queen. That's not a knock on Brian or Roger but just how i feel. Queen set themself apart from any other band even the other great ones for several reasons , one of the main one was Freddie, his voice and his musical skill. |
| Sheer Brass Neck 24.04.2009 18:35 |
I'm stupid and need a problem solved. Please help me. Given the fact that in the last five years, and in some cases before that: [listu] [li]Brian and Roger would go to the opening of a closet for promotion purposes [li]a multinational beverage company based a campaign on a Queen song with the biggest artists of the day [li]you can't walk five feet without an ad for the musical WWRY, including tawdry rags in Britain [li]television commercials were done in Britain for GH 3 [li]Queen's songs have been used in advertising for every type of product including erectile dysfunction drugs [li]Queen is arguably the 2nd biggest band in history is GB, Europe and South America [li]there is an unending demand for Queen back product [li]Queen has probably made more money for EMI and their EUR record company than any band ever [li]they have the first record since the death of their iconic singer so curiosity should be massive [li]they appeared on one of Britain's most popular shows to promote C-Lebrity before TCR was completed[/listu] Who in the name of God is going to say "let's not advertise this album?" I'll provide a list of suspects, you tell me why I'm wrong. Jim Beach? No. More money for QP with a big sale. Brian May? No. Perfectionist, spokesman for Queen, proud of the new venture, eager to show Queen was not just Freddie, would not commit time to a project to bury it intentionally (see stereo photo company, BANG). Roger Taylor? No. Wants to keep Queen name alive, proud of the new venture, eager to show Queen was not just Freddie. Paul Rodgers? No. Proud of the new venture, seemed to enjoy the tour, potential for a big payoff. So assuming the band wanted to advertise (as the thread is lack of advertising), who does that leave? EMI? Given all of the factors listed from a-j above, EMI has a band and brand that most people who know music know. Maybe not like The Beatles, but like Elton John, and the Stones. Iconic. Fans of Queen? Uh, no. So who made the decision that TCR should be advertised lightly, if at all? My guess? EMI. Why? Nothing there song-wise. Queen was a spectacular singles band even when their album quality went downhill. Their first single was always something different that set the tone for the album. I'm sure that the EMI execs shit their beds when they heard C-Lebrity and figured if that's the first single, we've got a dog on our hands, let's cut our losses and promote the shit out of the back catalogue. I may be wrong, and would like to hear other reasons, I think the songs couldn't meet the hype, so EMI backed their ad dollars off it. As for my point on Susan Boyle and Paul Potts, lots of things go viral in the world today. If C-Lebrity on Al Murray's show was as amazing as Paul Potts singing the Pavorotti song on Britain's Got Talent, C-Lebrity would have hit huge all over the world. I have lots of long term Queen fans who saw it the next day and found it cliched and boring. People want to be wowed. Whether Paul Potts and Susan Boyle disappear in one year is irrelevant. They touched people with their song. Queen, with 35 years and big business behind them could have done the same thing. They didn't, and if not's because of the music I'd like to know why. |
| beautifulsoup 25.04.2009 11:16 |
Sheer Brass Neck wrote: David, here's my two cents. No. In the days of the internet, all it's takes is for something to catch the imagination of a few people (see Susan Boyle, Paul Potts, the ukelele chick) Who's the ukulele chick? Haven't heard about her. |
| Sheer Brass Neck 25.04.2009 12:18 |
She plays classic songs (she did You're my best friend, Brian mentioned it on his site) on ukelele. Doing stuff with a webcam in her bedroom, she's now playing concerts and is touring or doing shows with Ben Folds. So I guess my awkward point to all of this is that people with no money can command major attention these days. IF they have something that the market believes in. I think very few people on earth believed in QPR or TCR as a Queen project. I read on a forum from a person who LOVES Brian, that they were sad because their favourite ever musician (mine too) had become a brand manager. Ouch. I love Brian and Roger and John and Freddie, but believe this is a vanity project to keep the Queen brand alive. And of course IMHO, which is as worthwhile or worthless as all of ours, by far the worst collection of songs ever on an album, cliched beyond belief and unworthy of the Queen brand. I'd ask, if Bohemian Rhapsody were a new track on TCR, do you think it would disappear as quickly as the album did in the public's consciousness? I don't, but that's because I've heard everything on TCR a million times by other bands in the past. I could never say that about even the worst Queen albums of the past. |
| The Real Wizard 25.04.2009 17:35 |
Negative Creep wrote: Also, it isn't EMI's fault the "band" failed to deliver any suitable material for a lead-off single, or indeed any possible subsequent singles. Who says an album needs a lead-off single in order for it to be a good album or to sell well? Not all albums require a top-10 single in order to be great albums. And who says that's what they were aiming for, anyway? Elton John's latest studio album comes to mind... No doubt, plenty of the public doesn't see Queen as Queen without Freddie Mercury. But they also didn't see Deep Purple as Deep Purple without Richie Blackmore... and Come Taste The Band was far from being a poor record. |
| Winter Land Man 26.04.2009 02:37 |
Sheer Brass Neck wrote: Doing stuff with a webcam in her bedroom Interesting. |
| YourValentine 26.04.2009 14:54 |
Maybe I missed something but the band played 40 concerts in various countries and 3 continents. During the tour they did endless press conferences, TV and radio interviews. Doesn't that count for promotion? There were huge posters promoting the CD plastered all over Europe and lots of TV adverts. QOL launched the "album club". The tracks were played on the radio. What else is a band and their management supposed to do? |
| Negative Creep 26.04.2009 15:18 |
Album's don't sell as much without a decent lead off single to promote it - fact. Sure - it will sell to the hardcore fanbase, but that's about it and has been the case with TCR. They can put as many adverts in magazine etc. as they want - but people aren't going to just buy the album on a whim, as it's very much an unknown quantity. Paul Rodgers isn't this amazingly popular rock singer some people like to think. In fact - most people hadn't heard of him, outside of readers of Classic Rock magazine! I didn't say a lack of lead-off single had any bearing on the quality of the record. Although, the fact that Queen were famed for their singles, yet this album under the Queen banner didn't have anything bordering on having any single quality says something. I don't really understand comparisons with bands like Deep Purple. Was Richie Blackmore the bands singer and main focal point? Did Deep Purple split up for 15 years, then return without said singer and main focal point? Eer... no. They had an ever evolving lineup - Queen didn't. |
| The Real Wizard 26.04.2009 22:23 |
Negative Creep wrote: Album's don't sell as much without a decent lead off single to promote it - fact. Millions of Radiohead fans disagree with you. To word it slightly better: a lead single can help sell an album, but it is not the only way. >Paul Rodgers isn't this amazingly popular rock singer some people like to think. In fact - most people hadn't heard of him, outside of readers of Classic Rock magazine! And I think that's a major cultural difference. Here in North America, Paul Rodgers is a huge name... as least as big as Freddie Mercury. Bad Company was enormously successful here. I honestly can't count how many people were shocked (and interested) when I told them that the remaining members of Queen were collaborating with him. The record was barely marketed here at all. I saw only one ten-second ad for it on TV. If it was marketed adequately, I bet it would have sold very well, because that traditional rock sound sells well here. If AC/DC's latest record could sell millions of copies, so could The Cosmos Rocks. What did Black Ice have to offer that TCR didn't? Certainly not a hit single... they haven't had an exceptionally strong song in almost 20 years, yet the last three AC/DC records have sold incredibly well. >Was Richie Blackmore the bands singer and main focal point? Yes, he absolutely was. Have you ever watched the footage of them at California Jam? He was to Deep Purple like Jimmy Page was to Led Zeppelin. So a Deep Purple record without Blackmore was a major change for the public to accept while Rainbow existed too. |
| Sheer Brass Neck 26.04.2009 23:53 |
"If it was marketed adequately, I bet it would have sold very well, because that traditional rock sound sells well here." And that's why the album didn't get noticed. Bad Company was a cliched band, very Americanized, bluesy rock. Queen was the antithesis of Bad Company. Inventive, risk taking, creative, ridiculous, jaw dropping, awe inspiring and brilliant. So when TCR was basically a Bad Company record (traditional), what does Queen have to do with it?You have two guys who played in Queen, but the spirit of Queen music (for me and millions of others) was nowhere to be found. Further, AC/DC's Black Ice did well for the exact reason TCR didn't: you knew what you were getting. Rhythm heavy chunky licks and good time rock. I'd die if I was an AC/DC fan and they opened Black Ice with Staying Power or Radio Ga Ga. They want meat and potatoes party rock, and AC/DC always delivers. Plus Runaway Train is a classic AC/DC track that fits in well with their catalogue, and they can play that to great response forever. Nothing like that on TCR. So as you're a smart guy Sir GH with a great knowledge of the music biz (seriously, not being a smart ass at all here), why wouldn't the record companies get behind TCR. If you believe the points I made a few posts back, then you'd have to agree that there is probably no record in the last 20 years that should have been promoted more. I honestly believe that Brian and Roger believed that based on the success of the tour, people would support the new record. I think the majority of the fan base wanted to believe it was Queen record, but upon hearing it, didn't buy into it, and the record company figured they should bury it. To me there's no other logical conclusion. |
| Winter Land Man 27.04.2009 02:17 |
The album wasn't a hit because people think it's a comedy album. |
| mike hunt 27.04.2009 03:41 |
I'm not a huge AC/DC fan, but let's be honest. Black Ice is a way way way better album than tcr. no question about that, it's not a brilliant album (what acdc album is) but it's full of straight forward catchy rock songs. Sheer brass neck: if you were an AC/DC fan and you heard staying power or radio ga ga?...how about what most die hard queen fans thought when they heard those songs?....The same reaction I'm sure. |
| YourValentine 27.04.2009 04:37 |
Apparently, there was a big difference between Europe and North America in terms of promoting the album. (There was a single, btw - C-lebrity). While there was zero promotion in the USA and Canada quite a lot was done in Europe and South America. I think that TCR did not sell well because people simply did not give this line-up a chance. They did not buy it because Freddie is not on the album. Very similar to the Genesis album "Calling All Stations" which was virtually boycotted by the fans because Phil Collins was not on it. TCR is not a bad album, there is no reason that it only sold 10% of the numbers Metallica or Axl Rose sold. I cannot think of any promotion tool that would have increased the sales figures in Germany, for example - there were four concerts, lots of radio promotion, lots of airplay, posters, TV ads - everything you need to sell an album but it did not sell. "Made In Heaven" won several platinum awards and was No 1 of the album charts for 10 weeks with considerably less promotion. |
| pittrek 27.04.2009 05:10 |
As some of you know I live in Slovakia. I've seen many posters promoting Death Magnetic everywhere, radio adverts, TV commercials, reviews in magazines .... I have seen absolutely nothing about TCR, nowhere . |
| john bodega 27.04.2009 07:32 |
They should've just said Freddie was on it. SALES! |
| cmsdrums 27.04.2009 08:03 |
Negative Creep wrote:
Paul Rodgers isn't this amazingly popular rock singer some people like to think. In fact - most people hadn't heard of him, outside of readers of Classic Rock magazine!
Although this doesn't seem to be the case in parts of Norht America, I absolutely agree with you on this. In GB and Europe his name is just not known. The fact that he has sold millions of albums doesn't help if people haven't heard of him and his name isn't familiar. There are countless artists (as well as others such as producers, DJs etc..) who have sold millions but couldn't sell out even a village hall because people won't be interested enough without knowing what they are going to hear. I'm not saying I don't like Paul Rodgers (although I must say his solo stuff works better with his voice and style than the original material on TCR), but it is a simple fact that he isn't a big enough draw with the general 'joe public'. |
| Sheer Brass Neck 27.04.2009 08:27 |
Mike Hunt, when Queen fans heard Staying Power and Radio Ga Ga it was probably a bit of a shock. But then again, long time fans who were into Queen from the early days were used to left field choices. So when Jazz rolled around, the idea of a bicycle bell break in a song that featured multiple time signatures was not a surprise, it was a joy, considering the previous albums lead singles were stomping on boards with no music backed by a 12/8 waltz about being champions, which of course followed singles in the mock opera and gospel genres. When AOBTD came about, it seemed they'd lost their minds, but it worked for Queen. Even the misses like Staying Power and Body Language fit into the Queen catalogue of "out there" songs. I think an AC/DC fan would burn their collection if they heard any of those songs in those style on an AC/DC album. Queen fans were always open monded, and part of the anticipation of what a new album would be like musically was the joy of being a Queen fan. Hearing TCR was such a pedestrian experience, it was like Bad Company music, big, corporate, predictable and ultimately forgettable. |
| The Real Wizard 27.04.2009 10:37 |
Sheer Brass Neck wrote: And that's why the album didn't get noticed. Bad Company was a cliched band, very Americanized, bluesy rock. Queen was the antithesis of Bad Company. Inventive, risk taking, creative, ridiculous, jaw dropping, awe inspiring and brilliant. So when TCR was basically a Bad Company record (traditional), what does Queen have to do with it?You have two guys who played in Queen, but the spirit of Queen music (for me and millions of others) was nowhere to be found.Fair enough. But I did find it in a few tracks, like Call Me, Some Things That Glitter, Say It's Not True, and Surf's Up. In fact, I see the latter as a continuation of track 13 from Made In Heaven. And the cover of Runaway was outstanding, full of the Queen spirit. The problem is, most people equate the spirit of Queen with Freddie, whereas I find that two members can very adequately carry the torch. But in the end, the public decides... you'd have to agree that there is probably no record in the last 20 years that should have been promoted more.For sure, it's near the top of the list. I think the majority of the fan base wanted to believe it was Queen record, but upon hearing it, didn't buy into it, and the record company figured they should bury it. To me there's no other logical conclusion. Only the key people know... |
| April 27.04.2009 16:33 |
pittrek wrote: As some of you know I live in Slovakia. I've seen many posters promoting Death Magnetic everywhere, radio adverts, TV commercials, reviews in magazines .... I have seen absolutely nothing about TCR, nowhere . I would also add that there was absolutely no advertising in Russia as well. Only the concert was advertised with help of posters. Once I heard some songs from the album on the radio, about three running, and that's it. But the songs were not aired on the radio to attract other people's attention, who are not die-hard fans. That was a great minus of the promotion team. I am absolutely sure that if the album had been better promoted on the radio and on TV it would have sold more copies. Cause on the whole Russian youth like rocky music. In this case the non-fans just didn't know much about it and preferred to buy some more "modern" music. |
| mike hunt 28.04.2009 03:02 |
Sheer Brass Neck wrote: Mike Hunt, when Queen fans heard Staying Power and Radio Ga Ga it was probably a bit of a shock. But then again, long time fans who were into Queen from the early days were used to left field choices. So when Jazz rolled around, the idea of a bicycle bell break in a song that featured multiple time signatures was not a surprise, it was a joy, considering the previous albums lead singles were stomping on boards with no music backed by a 12/8 waltz about being champions, which of course followed singles in the mock opera and gospel genres. When AOBTD came about, it seemed they'd lost their minds, but it worked for Queen. Even the misses like Staying Power and Body Language fit into the Queen catalogue of "out there" songs. I think an AC/DC fan would burn their collection if they heard any of those songs in those style on an AC/DC album. Queen fans were always open monded, and part of the anticipation of what a new album would be like musically was the joy of being a Queen fan. Hearing TCR was such a pedestrian experience, it was like Bad Company music, big, corporate, predictable and ultimately forgettable. I agree with what your saying, I wouldn't be the queen fan I am if they were like AC/DC. 15 Queen2 Albums! lol..... and yes, TCR was/is forgettable. |
| Makka 05.05.2009 23:43 |
Sheesh, the name of the album put me off straight away. A few of the songs worked but it didn't really inspire me at all. Here in Australia I didn't see any advertising for it. I'm glad this has now all been put to bed! |
| little foetus 06.05.2009 07:55 |
In France, the record was very little promoted. There were some occasionnal ads on radio, it was promoted in big shops during 1 or 2 weeks but then it disappeared. Bercy was far from sold out but it was not a surprise to me as even in 2005, the Zenith, a much smaller place, wasn't even full. About the lack of commercial success of the album, one reason: Freddie is not here and most people think that Queen = Freddie. And don't forget that many fans felt betrayed by the Queen name use and did not buy the album for this reason. Well, then, let's talk about it, I listened to the album and it is a nice blues rock album but nothing more. There are some nice moments (I love Call Me...) but I think most of it isn't original at all and sounds very dated. That's my opinion and I don't think I'm the only one to think so. |
| JoxerTheDeityPirate 06.05.2009 10:57 |
there was a fair bit of promotion in the UK for the release of the album. Al Murray,Radio2's record of the week[album and single,so TCR got a fair bit of airplay to start with],steve wright [roger interview],virgin radio, but they could of at least done a promotional video for the single so it might of been played on VH1 or the other video music stations.When the song entered the charts at 33 the bloke doing the voice over on the video chart programme said "Queen & Paul Rodgers are new entries at 33 but they havent made a video so we move on to number 32",that for me summed up the whole scenario of the album and promotion of it,it seemed to be misguided into the wrong direction of old school radio but not the 'mainstream' of tv.they could of easily done a big brother mock up style video with 'wannabes' instead of themselves if need be like Nickelback. who's to blame? i think its a mixture of all involved from the record company being non-productive to the band itself being out of touch with modern trends and being a tad compacent with it. however,i must point out that U2 went completely overboard with the promotion of their new album in the UK when it was released and it went straight in at number one [compared to 5 for TCR] but vanished down the chart quicker than Lord Lucan in a Freddie look-a-like contest,so its a double edged sword when it comes to getting the PR right.. how much did U2 spend on their promotion and how much did Queen spend on theirs for roughly the same outcome? the money is in the tours these days anyway.. |
| tilomagnet 06.05.2009 12:15 |
YourValentine wrote: I cannot think of any promotion tool that would have increased the sales figures in Germany, for example - there were four concerts, lots of radio promotion, lots of airplay, posters, TV ads - everything you need to sell an album but it did not sell. Huh!? Must have missed this. Without the www I wouldn't even know QPR existed. |
| john bodega 06.05.2009 12:20 |
JoxerTheDeityPirate wrote: how much did U2 spend on their promotion and how much did Queen spend on theirs for roughly the same outcome?True but at least those U2 jerks got a video out of it all. I wanted to see Brian in the Cosmos. |
| doxonrox 06.05.2009 21:36 |
YourValentine wrote: I think that TCR did not sell well because people simply did not give this line-up a chance. They did not buy it because Freddie is not on the album. Very similar to the Genesis album "Calling All Stations" which was virtually boycotted by the fans because Phil Collins was not on it.Phil Collins isn't on that album? I'm off to buy it immediately! |