As posted in Dustin's thread, TOML is back in the Top 40 at #39, moving up from 47. The reason is clear (some other threads have the stats): TOML had a big jump an sales (20%, back up near 30,000!) and continues to gain radio airplay.

It remains at #4 in Hot AC, but that's ok because once again, TOML is GREATEST GAINER! Plus, the top 5 all remained at the same number, while our other fave, Daughtry, moved UP from 7 to 6 with "Feels Like Tonight."

In Hot Adult Top 40, TOML is UP to #7 from 8! Good going!

TOML has not only proven to be a very big hit, it has staying power. I think two things are happening: David's fans are supporting it by requesting spins, and more so, recent exposure on SYTYCD got lots of new fans, and non-AI fans are hearing it on AC radio and actually liking it and buying it! My partner's 76 year old mom did just that after falling in love with it on B101 in Philly! It's in upward spiral!

That's great news! I"m pleasantly surprised to see TOML is still tearing up the charts. If a coronation song like TOML can do this well on the charts, imagine what his new album will do. BTW, does anyone know if sales for TOML have breached past 700,000 yet?

Good morning southpaw! I agree, he will be a platinum-selling chart busing recording artist! And yes, stats posted on mjsbigblog have it 717,456. Now the question is can it go platinum by the end of the year. I think it's possible if it's played on something like the Olympics in a segment (as it was on the Espys). Otherwise, the new single and album could eclipse it. Even at nearly 30,000 a week, it would take 10 more weeks which is about the time when his next single is due out. Hmmm. With sales UP 20%, I suppose it could sustain this kind of sales number until then.

I agree - I would not be surprised if TOML will be played during the Olympics especially as the U.S. Team medals and also with the tour in full motion - more and more people are hearing the song that may not be hearing it much on the radio.

I know it won't happen until the solo album comes out.....but I am eagerly waiting to hear David on WMMR.
They know about him, so I'm sure they will be waiting to find out what he comes up with. An endorsement from Preston & Steve will be awesome.
They also have something else in common. David said in one interview that he thought it would be cool to ride on the back of a trash truck. The first thing I thought of was Nicks Birthday Ride on the trash truck. Woo Hoo.

Interesting, but I wonder if TOML is not on the new album (as we've been speculating), then rather than eclipsing it, the new single and album could actually pull TOML up along with it? You know, non-AI people like the new stuff, go up to itunes to download it, and see that he's got this other little single out as well and download that. He might get enough piggy-back sales to make TOML go platinum.

Of course if TOML is on the new album even as a bonus track, that's a whole different story...

WTG Cookie!
Thanks for posting this Scott, I look forward to checking out the charts each week.

I think you make excellent points! I strongly believe that TOML won't be on the album and may not even be a bonus track. I think it will be a stand alone single. I agree with you that TOML will get a boost from NEW Cook fans who check out his music and find TOML... along with that whole other Adult Contemporary fanbase that will continue to discover it through the end of the year.

Yes, they have.

I would love to hear it on the Olympics. It would be a perfect song.

Jeannine

WMMR has played Daughtry ( It's Not Over) so it's possible David could get some airplay there, especially since P&S seemed to have liked him in the interview.

This is pretty much kewl beans! I know at work it is on the radio more and more--Yea Cookie! He's on his way UP!

Thanks again, Scott.

Great news ...TOML is still riding high. Go, magic rainbow, go

Wouldn't be surprised if TOML was used for some of Olympic coverage...especially for any of runners...afterall, it does have that "ready to run" line.

Me too!!

The lyrics are so befitting the Olympics.

The rainbow is alive!
I think the song can get 850,000 downloads

not only just 850,000... IT WILL GO PASS THE MILLION MARK!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ah ah! I'm an optimistic one... but not that optimistic. Hope i can be surprised though.

If they had released TOML as a CD single, he would have already passed the million mark and have totally creamed Clay. (No offense to Clay fans, but I sincerely believe that.)

I understand that what I call "young people music" tends to sell more downloads than CD's, but TOML is a genre that still sells more CD's than downloads, in general. In fact, all of the coronation songs sold between twice to four times as many CD's as compared to downloads - even up through Taylor which was only 2 seasons ago.

Since they stopped selling CD singles with Jordin, it is hard to tell if hers would have followed the same trend. Maybe not, because she is young and the youngsters tend to use ipods more.

But the median AI audience is 42 and AI coronation songs appeal strongly to women in that age range who don't own ipods. And we all know that Cook appeals to the cougars.

i agree about the CD thing. Especialy if it had one or two more tracks... like Always Be My Baby and Hello.
I have no doubt it would be 1 million already.

Ohhhhh, why don't you work for the company handling Cookie? THAT would be GENIUS!

Especially since I can tell that DC would prefer to not put TOML on his new album.

And I know soooo many fans who would love to buy hard copies of ABMB and Hello.

Ipod or no ipod, I want hard copies of everything. And I don't just mean burn my own disk.

I want something to hold in my hands that says what a historic moment this is.

I feel like he is like the Beatles and the decision making people are treating the first songs like throwaways - rather than collectors editions.

History needs to be preserved.

LOL! Maybe that is just me.

But I read it all over the forums. People want downloads and physical copies of these first songs / albums.

To me, TOML needs that, too.

Later in his career, it may not be like that, but it is now. I wish they would take full fiscal advantage of that.

If he is as good as I think he has the potential to be, collectors will want everything they can get their hands on.

Will all we have to collect be ipods and home made CD's?

Okay, I spent a long time tonight trolling around MJ's trying to find the link to the total ITunes DLs for S6 contestants.

And quickly discovered that I never, ever want to go to MJ's again.

But at any rate . . .

I have no proof to back this up. But the S6 Idols all got digital DLs during their season and digital EPs as well. Mostof them sold very poorly, except for Jordin and Blake. Jordin the teenage belter (only17!) and Blake the electronica rearranger are pretty much the epitome of "young people" music and they sold more DLs than anybody else that year. However, Cook sold more in one week than anybody did the season before him *combined*, including Jordin and Blake. Her single did not sell well by itself and it did pretty badly on airplay, so "young people music" has little to do with it. Our guys are just more popular this year, no matter what format they sell in.

Jordin and Blake's EP's went up first and the EP's for the rest went up later . Even Jordin and Blake's numbers sucked and only sold like 44,000 of their EP's. Jordin had the worst numbers for any coronation song to date.

Here's Ken Barne's stats with breakdowns for all of them last year
http://blogs.usatoday.com/idolchatter/2007...oads-.html#more

Thanks, Trina.

Here's the total breakdown for the S6 Idols (all season):

1. Blake: 382,000 + 41,000 for EP

2. Jordin: 344,000 + 45,000 for EP

3. Melinda: 18,000 + 2,200 for EP

4. Gina: 11,000

5. Chris R.: 10,000 + 500 for EP

6. Phil: 10,000 (slightly less unrounded) + 300 for EP

7. LaKisha: 9,700 + 400 for EP

8. Sanjaya: 4,800 + 400 for EP

9. Haley: 2,600 + 100 for EP

10. Chris S: 2,500

11. Stephanie: 900

12. Brandon: 500

Ouch.

Now here's how our guys sold in one week:

So here's the complete breakdown:

Cook: 942,000 downloads

Archuleta: 323,000 downloads

Castro: 64,000 downloads

Brooke White: 47,000 downloads

Michael Johns: 40,000 downloads

Carly Smithson: 33,000 downloads

Syesha Mercado: 18,000 downloads

Kristy Lee Cook: 10,000 downloads

Chikezie: 5,000 downloads

Ramiele Malubay: 3,000 downloads

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/extendedpl...uch-do-peo.html

No real point to all of this except to point out that being a person that puts out "young people's music" didn't help Jordin all that much around coronation single time.

YES, I totally believe that David Cook is more popular than all of last season put together.

Yes, I am sure that being a young person didn't help Jordin's coronation song sell more downloads, because that song wasn't styled toward young people. It is a million miles away from what she is doing now, which is selling really well.

The same thing may well happen for David Cook as he moves in a more rock direction.

I am mostly saying that youth tend to buy music on-line, older people often still buy CD's and the type of song that TOML is the inspirational, easily digestible song that would appeal to that older crowd.

NONE of my friends who are 40+ even own ipods versus my younger friends who nearly all do own them.

All your points are valid, but 40+ people are really getting into digitil music lately. I'm 48 and have had an ipod for at least 3 years. Same with my friend Randy who's 2 months younger than me. My sister is 52 and has had one nearly as long. My partner's mom even bought a nano a year and a half ago, and she's 76! So we're not all ludites! But you are right, youth tend to download while older adults tend to buy CDs. But that's slowly changing.

My daughters got me turned on to iPods and I have been wearing my poor nano out for a couple of years now and I'm 53. I think that, if you have kids, you get exposed to that stuff easier than if you don't. I use mine daily while working out. I can't stand the music they play at the gym where I work.

Jeannine

If my friends didn't have teens, I would never even have seen one. LOL!

But their teens do have them and use them like we used to use walkmans to shut everyone out.

None of the moms have picked one up for themselves yet.

Maybe because they hate how their teens use it to not be a part of the family.

I am sure it varies by which part of the country you live in.

Count me in as an 'older adult' who bought an ipod just to download & listen to DC's music! I'm guessing I'm not the only one. I think Cook's downloads also could have bumped up ipod sales!

I have a question -- did AI season 6 have studio versions of the songs they performed on the show available for download? And if not, were those studio versions for season 7 included inthese numbers? Just thinking we might be comparing apples and oranges?

I don't know if they were studio versions or not, but not all of the songs that sold for this year's Idols were studio versions, either. Some of the big sellers (Jason's "Hallelujah", Cook's "Hello") were not studio versions. There are some stats missing from the S6 totals, too, but probably not enough to make a difference. Also sometimes I prefer the live versions anyway - MJ's IAWBIAW sounds way better live every time he does it than his studio version does.

I find this kind of interesting because there was so much "Idol is dead" press this year: the ratings went down and the media acted as if the show was going to be canceled tomorrow. Even now they talk about the slight dip in the 18-49 rating as if it's the end of the world. Every bad tour review starts out with this and they always imply that the ratings went down because the contestants were less popular/less talented than in years past. And these kind of figures prove that ratings aren't everything.

There were studio versions for the Season 6 contestants starting from Top 12. You were able to buy them on the AI website during the season and after the season ended then they were put up on iTunes. All the stats Ken provided were numbers for the whole season iTunes+AI.com numbers.. Actually the fact that we don't even have stats for all of the weeks this season makes those numbers even more pathetic. Lord knows what kind of numbers Billie Jean, ABMB, SOTR, etc sold over the course of the whole season.

Cook's near million downloads in just one week is a staggering number. I bet Billy Jean and ABMB are both close to platinum when you add the downloads during the season. Esp. BJ 'cause it was available three weeks longer than ABMB. Then again his shattered records on Billboard that week support all this and was pretty big news in the music industry.

Thanks for the info, I really never paid any attention to whether or not anything from Season 6 was available commercially, so I didn't know if the S6 numbers were just post-idol records or not.

Since the S6 numbers do include both the studio and performance downloads, then yes, we are comparing apples to apples and that makes this season's numbers (especially Cookie's) are even more impressive.

I read tons of comments like that near the end of the season, so I am guessing that you are right.

I also read tons of comments where older adults bought phones that could text for voting.

So, yes, I do think David pulled a lot of us older folks into the modern age.



Though most of my friends still don't even know how to use computers.

Here's another Rockin' Grandma who (although I already had 2 iPods) went out and bought an iTouch after Billie Jean, cause I HAD to be able to take ALL his videos with me wherever I went (go)!! My iPod shuffle is now my CookiPod, cause it's filled with only David! (Umm, and 4 of Archie's downloads)

BTW - lilsparrow, thanks for the stats! VERY impressive. Can you get total stats for the season? Would LOVE to see those!

The S6 stats were available late July and since it's August I don't think we'll get them at this point. If they are released, I'm sure it would make headlines so we'd be one of the first to know. I did want the total stats released for Jason's sake since I think it would really help him but I would be surprised if it happened now.

hey Scott, did the billboard numbers come out for this week yet? Curious to see if there'll be an Olympic bump-up...