.... the songs in the R/B section were more gentle to begin with. It's called programming--adding variety to the concert. It gives the concert ebb and flow, relaxation and tension.
Agree with that too....
Wanted to take a moment and go back to that idol judge/ expectations for Adam's career discussion. (scroll alert and it's a long post too :-/ )
I also have a tough time understanding the doom that occasionally overcomes this site, when it comes to Adam's career.
He has two albums out, one went to #3 and the other to #1 in the US charts (+ tons of other charting around the world), worldwide tour - super successful and sold out, grammy nomination, tons of recognitions and awards, Queen concerts...and on and on and on...and all this in three years and there is doom? What is really going on?
One thing I recently noticed is that most doom and gloom posts come from two angles - one well discussed, the other not so much. The well discussed one is radio play and I'll leave it at that. We have discussed that enough.
The other, that I find less often mentioned is coming from an overall commercial angle. Obviously, an album that sells 100K units (so far) has not broken even yet and most people here on this site have spent enough time looking at numbers to have sorted that one out.
First of all: This is not an Adam specific problem, but one that hits the whole music industry and beyond that the book publishing, scientific publication and wider entertainment industry too.
It is unfair to burden expectations for Adam's career with a problem that can only be described as the collapse of the recording business model or even wider the whole intellectual property legislation and commercialization model in its present form.
Meanwhile the marketplace finds all kinds of insane ways to cope with this new reality.
The fact that we were jokingly saying last week that they were holding not idol contestant auditions, but idol judges auditions at Dodger stadium, is just a reflection of the fact that even the Mariah's of this world have figured out that publishing an album is not a way to make money and so they run for a job that piles on the cash while such jobs still exist.
Adam has additional benefits/goals beyond money and others might too. He truly wants to develop new talent and looks forward to that aspect and has the talent to contribute in that role. He also has the benefit that this role will allow him to show more facets of himself, when his public image in the US has been artificially narrowed by the one-sided media frenzy to the "gay artist" dimension only and he needs to widen that perception. So he has additional benefits besides the cash, but the cash is of course nothing to sneeze about either.
Adam has and will always have other sources of income via the Adam Lambert brand. His talent and public persona allow him to have other income. Whether that is good that artists need to rely on alternate sources of income is a totally different discussion, but at least he has that option.
For RCA the story is different, they depend on the recording income to a much larger extent, so for them the house is on fire.
And while they are guilty of lousy single choices, the reality is that given the present market situation, a different single may have done better on radio, but whether there was any way to get the sales to an album breakeven point is doubtful, no matter what they had done.
Measuring Adam's success by these overall economic realities is just not reasonable right now, because there is no reasonable business model available to do it with.
It is clear that a different business model will be needed, one that assigns redeemable value to the original work that is actually created, performed and marketed. It presently does not exist and Adam is one little twig on the branch on the tree that belongs to the whole jungle.
It is important to keep this in perspective when looking where Adam is in his career. He is doing fantastic and he is carving his path, even in difficult times. He is establishing his brand, creating good music, putting on great shows and widening his opportunities beyond those he has already explored. That is more than you can possible ask for.
The bigger problem will have to find a bigger solution, outside of Adam and I hope the world gets together soon to get this resolved, because the present status is not sustainable.
But I would hate to see that Adam is held to such an impossible standard that in such fat years as we are experiencing now, there is such gloom.
Adam is doing fantastic and we can shout it from the rooftops how great things are for him. And whatever his calendar for the next 6 months might be, we should enjoy the ride with him, independent of the industry chaos.
If the jungle behind him folds, he could still go independent and he would be alright.
I want the overall problem resolved, not because of Adam, but because of all the millions of others caught in that mess, who are not necessarily in such a fortunate position. But at the same time, I will gladly enjoy the treats that are available to me in spite of this market or sometimes even because of it. And I am trying to stay 'legal' within the boundaries of what is presently considered that law even though I realize that it is utterly unsuited for its purpose on various levels.
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