JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum Bigger than the Beatles and Elvis?

I wonder how many of those 200,000 downloads were purchased by the company? It has been a practice that many record companies have done in the past with their A-list stars so that they could advertise that so-an-so has already sold gold or platinum. When I read that I was very dubious.

Comparing numbers in the year 2007 to the 1950's or 60's is totally ludicrous. The market is so much larger today than it was back then, that there is no valid comparison. I once read that Elvis had generated 65 billion (yes billion) dollars in sales world-wide by 1965. That wasn't all money he made, but also includes dollars generated through licensing his name in products. Who has come close to this? He has been dead for nearly 30 years and he is still selling records and merchandise world-wide in 2007.

Music, like any artform comes down to personal taste and aesthetics. I really do not enjoy listening to either Mariah Carey or Madonna. I have been duly impressed with Mariah's unbelieveable voice, and with Madonna's brilliant career and ability to market herself through reinvention. I still do not care for the music, It does not move me.

I grew up with Elvis and the Beatles, and both really moved me and motivated me in music. The early Elvis was soulful and he was an incredible performer. I admit his music was not as powerful for me after he got out of the army, but the first few years were awesome to me. Perhaps it is because I was from that time period, but their impact was like a tidal wave. Dylan also caused a tidal wave in the way he impacted music and pop culture, in general. The only other artist in my lifetime that I have witnessed that had an impact like a tidal wave, although to a lesser extent than the other three was Bruce Springsteen. When he came out with Born to Run that album re-energized rock-n-roll and brought it back to the central core of what rock-n-roll meant to me growing up. That is why he appeared on the cover of both Time and Newsweek in the same week. As far as I know, no one else in any field has ever repeated that feat. If someone has, at least he was the first to do it.

I know plenty of others will have their own favorites and will argue the point, but this has been my experience.

Trying to compare Mariah Carey or Madonna to those earlier artists makes no sense to me, at all. Good for them. They made a fortune with their records.