"Clear As Day" Drops Out of Top 50 -- Blame Whitney!

BillBoard rank (orange= "Clear As Day", blue= "Stronger")

After 20 impressive weeks, Scotty McCreery's debut album "Clear As Day" has finally fallen out of the BillBoard Top 50, ending at a still solid #52 with 9,000 in sales to push his total to 948K. However, if Whitney Houston had not died a few weeks ago, Scotty would still be in the Top 50 since there are four Whitney albums this week in the Top 20 ("Whitney: the Greatest Hits", "The Bodyguard", "Whitney Houston", "I Look To You") So if those were removed from the list Scotty would still be at #48. Those albums have also pushed Kelly Clarkson's "Stronger" to #15 this week, whereas she would be at #11 without them (HDD has "I Look To You" outselling "Stronger" by about 2,000 units). Nevertheless, Kelly remains in the Top 20 as her sales fell to a still solid 20K and put her total to 617K. Daughtry is still in the Top 100 at #90 with 6K more sales (391K total) and Kellie Pickler barely hangs into the Top 200 at #197 with 3K more in sales (55K total). It appears that Lauren Alaina's "Wildflower" has dropped out of the Top 200 for now after 19 solid weeks in sales totaling about 250K.

Note that at the start of the voting rounds last year, Lee DeWyze's "Live It Up" album (released Nov 16, 2010) had been off the BillBoard 200 for a number of weeks and Crystal Bowersox's "Farmer's Daughter" (released Dec 14, 2010) was selling about 5K a week with total sales of about 160K. So for "Clear As Day" (released Oct 4) to still be around the Top 50 after 21 weeks (and pushing toward sales of a million) and for "Wildflower" (released Oct 11) to have just dropped off the Top 200 (after 20 weeks and sales of about 250K) shows how well Season 10 marketed their young country winners. Hopefully with Season 11 the Idol machine can continue with their Season 10 success.

Season 11 Top 13 guys - Could DialIdol be Right?

Last night I checked DialIdol before going to bed and saw that for some strange reason Jermaine Jones was at the top of the DialIdol rankings for the Top 13 guys and I thought something must be amiss there. But then I woke up this morning and came into the office to see Jermaine still green, but with Eben, Chase and Adam in front of him. What? I had expected more popular seeming guys like Phillip or Colton to perhaps end up on top, but Eben? I was curious how well last year's DialIdol for the Top 12 guys looked so I pulled those numbers out:

Sure enough, DialIdol accurately predicted 4 out of the Top 5 correctly and their top 3 last year were all among the top 5 vote receivers (only Casey Abrams was not in their top 6.) I could not fathom a Top 5 guys this year including all 4 of Eben, Chase, Adam and Jermaine. I remember last year, though, that for the Top 12 girls DialIdol incorrectly pegged Tatynisa Wilson on top when she had very few raw votes (only 167), so I thought I would look at the totals raw votes from last night (and compare them to the guys totals from Season 10):

First off, it appears the total number of votes cast using DialIdol from last night was only about 73% of the DialIdol votes cast last season at this point (28,548 vs 39,077). I am sure if more people actually used DialIdol to vote it would give much more accurate results. And two of the guys picked "green" (safe) this year received less than 1,000 total votes via DialIdol (Chase and Adam) so you wonder how accurate their prediction is. Even the top rated Eben only had 1800 votes cast for him via DialIdol and only 19 busy signals. Last year on Top 12 guys night Scotty McCreery received 334 busy signals with 4869 total votes and James Durbin received 608 busy signals with 5406 votes so their predictions may have been more valid. The most busy signals that anyone received this year was 131 for Jermaine, and I am guessing those all came quite early on since I saw him as the only safely "green" contestant when I first checked shortly after the telecast ended.

In fact now that I look at the total raw scores from last year, I noticed the Top 5 in total raw votes for Season 10 were exactly the top 5 vote getters at that point. If you look at the top 5 raw vote getters from last night: (Phillip, Colton, Jermaine, Reed, Heejun) they sound more like the expected top 5 vote getters than the ones selected using the busy signal criteria. We will have to wait until Thursday to know for sure.

American Idol Season 11 - Top 24 (Plus 1?) Demographics

I really do not understand why American Idol must change their stupid rules every year. This year has been no exception, when their Top 40 was really 42 and now their top 12 is really 13. Why do we need an extra guy? I must admit the 12 guys they currently have does not include any obvious standouts who could actually sell records (no Scotty McCreery this year), but if they were really looking for a winner who could sell, I am curious at the four options they picked. With some grooming and growth David Leathers and Johnny Keyser may be able to become legitimate recording stars, but I cannot imagine Jermaine Jones or Richie Law actually winning and becoming stars. American Idol could NEVER want Richie to win the year after Scotty won. Two deep voiced country teen guys in a row? They may as well cancel themselves. And whereas I do find Jermaine a likable character (when he is not crying), I do not think he could ever gather enough votes to win, and could never sell records as well as James Durbin, let alone more easily promotable country artists like Lauren or Scotty. However, if David Leathers wins, that would make two teen boys from North Carolina in a row, and that would look bad for Idol too. So the obvious person to add back would be Johnny Keyser, but he did not even make the original Top 42, and he also lost a lot of popularity when he kept singing when that one girl fainted on stage. So I question why they picked these four at all if they insisted on being unfair and adding a 13th guy.

The problem I see with the Top 12 girls are they are too difficult to tell apart. Too many blondes with similar names (Haley/Hollie/Hallie) and too many country singers (none of which sound as good as Lauren Alaina). The only female that stands out for me right now is Jessica Sanchez, and I still think she needs some polish to become a "star". I also noticed that Jessica is now the only girl in the Top 12 who is not Caucasian. I found out she is actually half Filipino and half Mexican, so that helps cover two demographics, but still I am surprised there are no other non-Caucasian females who made it, especially after last year when there were two African-Americans (Ashton & Naomi), a Hispanic American (Karen) and an Asian American (Thia) female in the Top 7 ladies. I wonder if the fact that all 4 of them were the very first contestants eliminated had anything to do with it! The guys are a bit more ethnically diverse with 2.5 remaining African-Americans (Aaron, Joshua and Deandre who is biracial), a Hispanic (Jeremy) and an Asian (Heejun). David or Jermaine would increase their diversity even more, but I do not think we can include the "large black woman" hiding inside Adam Brock!

The age distribution of the Top 24 is interesting as well. There are 5 minors under 18 right now, 3 gals (Brielle, Jessica, Shannon) and 2 guys (Deandre, Eben), which sounds like a good mix, but if you look for the next oldest ladies, there are two right at 18 (Hollie, Skylar), but then there are none until you reach 22 (Baylie). There is also an age gap for the guys, where there are none who are 23 to 25, but there are four who are 26 or older (Aaron 27, Adam 27, Creighton 28, Reed 26). The oldest ladies are Elise at 28, Erika at 26 and Jen at 25. It is not surprising that the 25 and older group tend to have the most mature voices, and I will be curious to see how well they can get votes. I know last year the older contestants were eliminated quickly (Ashton, Naima, Paul) so lets see if these older contestants can survive.

Adele and Whitney Hog the Top 50, but Two Idols Still Remain

For the first full week of sales after the Grammy's and Whitney Houston's death, 5 out of the Top 50 albums on the BillBoard chart (10%) are from either the queen of the current charts (Adele) or the queen of the charts in the late 1980's through mid 1990's (Whitney Houston). Six time Grammy winner Adele leads the chart with a massive 730K in sales for '21' and who's debut '19' sold an impressive 87K to come in at #4. A multi-Grammy winner herself, Whitney Houston actually had 3 albums in the Top 50, with her "Greatest Hits" compilation coming in at #2 with an impressive 175K in sales, and her debut simply called "Whitney Houston" sneaking into the Top 50 along with "The Bodyguard" (both Grammy winners themselves, I believe).

BillBoard rank (orange= "Clear as Day", blue= "Stronger")

But this is about the American Idols sales and from the HitsDailyDouble estimates only two Idols remain in the Top 50, Kelly Clarkson's "Stronger" which ended up again at #13 with sales of about 29K, and Scotty McCreery's "Clear As Day" which ended up at #45 with another steady week sales of about 13K. That puts Kelly's total at 597K and Scotty's at 939K. "Clear As Day" has now been released for a full 20 weeks, and so far 2012 is looking very steady for Scotty and his sales:

"Clear As Day" sales in Thousands (weekly)

Daughtry's "Break the Spell" also had a good week with 10K more in sales (#63) to put his total at 385K, and Lauren Alaina's "Wildflower" is still creeping closer to a quarter million with 4K in sales (248K total at #174.) Kellie Pickler's sales dropped off a bit this week so she is no longer tracking James Durbin's early sales. Her 6K in sales puts her at #118 with 52K in total sales.

American Idol Season 11 Top 42 - Demographical Breakdown

Well, I finally found a completed list of the Top 42, since I was wondering why it was a Top 42 and not a 40. It seems like the Top 42 contains 22 guys and 20 gals, which seems a little odd. It is like the Top 40 plus 2 guys. I do not know why, but that is what I came up with from the list at TheIdolPad. Note that the site I used also already has the Top 24, so do not look there if you do not want to see which 18 of the 42 were cut to make 24 (there it definitely is 12 guys and 12 gals!)

I was also trying to guess the ethnicity of all the contestants based on their look, so I hope I did not get it incorrect, and especially since these days there are a lot of mixed raced people out there. One thing is for sure, though, and that is we are unlikely to see another African-American female winner this year, since there are only 3 remaining in the Top 42, Ariel Sprague, Aubrey Cleland and Latia Lee. I hope at least one of them makes it to the Top 12 gals, and the most likely of those three is Ariel since she has had more air time than the other two. There are 7 African-American males remaining: Aaron Sanders, Cortez Shaw, David Leathers, DeAndre Brackensick, Deneco "Neco Star" Pittman, Jermaine Jones amd Joshua Ledet. That makes for a total of 10 African-Americans out of 42 for a total representaion of 23.8%.

Other ethnicities are not as well represented on American Idol this year. The Hispanic population is represented by only two contestants, one male and one female, Jeremy Rosado and Jessica Sanchez. The Hispanic population has never been well represented on Idol, although Karen Rodriguez was a finalist last year (and she did not make it to the tour.) And this year we again have one Asian contestant, this time a guy, Heejun Han, whereas we had one finalist last year (Thia Megia) and one guy in the Top 12 on Season 9 (John Park).

As for the Caucasian members of the Top 42, they consist of 29 contestants: 16 female and 13 male. So 38% of the Top 42 are white females. So even though there are more total males in the Top 42, there are more white females than any other demographic.

Grammy Week Kind to Idol Sales, Especially if Your Name Is Kelly Clarkson

The Grammy weekend is over, and after performing on the big stage, Kelly Clarkson sees sales of her "Stronger" album increasing 51% with 31K in sales to put her total at 568K. Her strong sales were able to keep her at #13 on the BillBoard chart despite strong sales by debuts, Grammy winners and the late Whitney Houston as well. The other Idol in the Top 50, just barely hangs in there, as despite having very steady sales of 12K this week, Scotty McCreery's "Clear As Day" falls to #47 on the BilBoard chart due to strong sales of the other albums. He should be able to stay at #6 or #7 on the Country chart. Looking at Kelly and Scotty's overlaid together, it is interesting to note that if you shift Kelly's BillBoard rank so that it chronologically lines up with Scotty's, there is no time since Scotty's release when one of them was not in the Top 20. When Kelly fell out of the Top 20, Scotty was still there and when Scotty fell out of the Top 20 Kelly moved back into it:

Weird, isn't it? It is like the Idol gods doing their magic to make sure an American Idol winner remains in the Top 20. Scotty's sales since 2012 started have been incredibly consistent too, as shown in my graph below. They are nothing like his incredible 2011 numbers, but they have not been dropping off at all.

Another eerie sign is that Kellie Pickler's sales of "100 Proof" continue to track James Durbin's sales for a third straight week. They both started with 28K their first week, then 39K their second week and in Kellie's third week she has 46K compared to James' 47K for his third week. These are two Idols from completely different seasons, completely different genres, released at two very different times of the year.

The other neat numbers this week is that now the first Idol sees her latest album has been certified gold and has two platinum singles from that album. The most recent Idol winner sees his album has been certified platinum and now has two gold singles from that album. Coincidence? I think not!

Kelly Clarkson proves the first American Idol is still one of the Best Selling!

Other American Idols had good sales this week, but Kelly Clarkson shows why she was the first one to win big. This week her "Stronger" album sales jumped 26% to 21K for the week putting her at #13 on the BillBoard 200 and bringing her total sales to 537K. There is a big discrepancy this week in BillBoard rankings for Scotty McCreery's "Clear As Day" album as Idol Chatter ranks it at #35 and RoughStock ranks it as #32 (and #6 Country). For my chart here I will use #32 just because I think it makes prettier graphs:

BB 200 Rank: orange = "Clear As Day", blue = "Stronger"

Both give 12K for the weekly sales number which brings his total up to 914K. Scotty was able to outsell Kellie Picker on her second week as "100 Proof" sold 11K more copies to bring her 2 week total to 39K. Next up is Daughtry's "Break the Spell" with 9K more (367K total) and Lauren Alaina's "Wildflower" keeps reaching closer to a quarter million with 241K (4K more in sales.) Coincidentally Kellie Pickler and James Durbin's albums both had exactly the same sales for their first two weeks. There is no reason why this should happen -- but it did!

"Clear As Day" Officially Breaks 900K, Kellie Pickler #7 on BillBoard

 With the official SoundScan numbers being published, Scotty McCreery's "Clear As Day" has officially broken the 900K plateau on its way to hitting the full million sold. Kellie Pickler's "100 Proof" kept the #7 placement from yesterday's HitsDailyDouble to give Kellie her highest placement on the BillBoard chart to date. She debuted at the exact same number as James Durbin did, but since they are in two completely different genres released at two very different times of the year (James released on Black Friday week), they really should not be compared. I am guessing since Kellie has a stronger single in a larger radio market her sales should increase faster than James' did.

I checked RoughStock to see where they Scotty placed on the country chart, but they sure are bad at just listing the chart! From HDD yesterday, I knew Scotty, The Band Perry and Toby Keith would all be very close on the chart, but RoughStock does not spell out exactly what position The Band Perry ended up. I am assuming since they listed Toby at #31 and Scotty at #33 (slightly different from #34 on Idol Chatter) that The Band Perry is not right there between them, but since both TBP and CAD are listed at 11K you never know which is higher. So I am guessing Scotty ended up at #7 Country so that is where I am putting him on my chart, but he may actually be at #8. I do not know why they list Hunter Hayes' album as being "Notable" but not The Band Perry! If Blake Shelton is at #35 with 9K, TBP is either #32 or #34, but they do not say which one!!