ADKOT Should Go Gold In The US Soon.....

[DLR Bridge]

True. I'm by no means holding my breath, but still think it's possible that he'll cave and do it. Ed had mentioned in an interview about 5 years ago that they had some great rarities including his high school talent show performance that they might get around to releasing. He just needs to be badgered by the right people. I predict we'll have some officially released live shows by 2033, which is just around the corner.

[minkahed]

According to the wikipedia page for the album, ADKOT sold over 410,000 copies by the end of 2012.

So by now you can reasonably add several tens of thousands.....only needs to get to 500k....

There have been many different sources and I don't doubt "Wikipedia", (although they have been proven to be wrong in the past), truth is, this Disc should have had those sales in the first week of release !!!

The fact of the matter is, the album's sales started to taper off right around 225,000, then straight out of the charts and selling very quietly for the remainder of time.

There also are a lot of factors as to why I feel, personally, why it didn't do much better than it should have.

I get hammered by friends, my musician friends, and some of the younger kids that I know, that the fact of the matter is simply because it's NOT the "Original" line up and that seemed to be a turn off right there. I didn't realize Michael Anthony had such a huge impact on this band, even in modern times with Dave being back, people who are casual fans seemed to care and there are some hardcore fans that boycotted the album just for that simple reason.

Anyhow, there was hardly any promo for the damn album, only in selective markets did I hear or see that people were getting that Van Halen commercial about the upcoming tour, but other than that, hardly any radio, whether it be Pandora, SiriusXM, Magazines, newspapers and corporate radio, I didn't see squat concerning this release.

And of course, NO INTERVIEWS !!!! David Lee Roth, Toastmaster general, the whore of all whores with "LSD", gives no interviews or insights as to what's happening.

In '06, Diamond Dave was heavily promoting, "Strumming With Devil", to be honest, (another sidebar/project and major FLOP) and people were cringing at that whole embarrassing situation, yet, he's back in the pilot seat, fronting Van Halen, and nothing, Zilch !

In today's world of downloading, social media and the timespan of most people under the age of 30, this was a major part of the "hype" that Van Halen missed out on. Today's number one, will not even be tomorrow's forgotten "oldie" !!!

It appears to me, and many other fans and musical scholars who still care enough, that the music industry is all about the entertaining facet, it's all plastic and shallow and everything that's "Hot" now, will not even be remembered in five years. Yeh, it's all about, "Glee" .... right.

Then, of course, the first single and video. Enough said.

A huge, big disservice to the guys since their first record since 1998 is spectacular, in terms of musically, lyrically and artisitic expression, plus the fact their finest singer was that familiar voice that could compete with the McDonald's arch and the Nike swoosh ... People were saying the record sucked before they even heard it based on "Tattoo" !?!? Whatever ...

One more thing that was another major factor, for any of us approaching 40, or over, people were probably just tired of this band's rep, constant drama and sporadic behavior's, (2004 re-union with Hagar=BOMB), not to mention the "Eddie Van Halen Cancer revelation about drinking drano and still smoking ciggs), yadda yadda ...

I know some people in radio that had sound bites of that interview and just beating Eddie down saying stuff like, "just go away or die already" ... I heard some brutal stuff coming from people when they got wind of that nutty story.

Just my opinion as to why this record had no chance, or given no room for growth, to get the motor running, grow some legs and kick some ass!!!

"A Different Kind Of Truth" should have, and could have, sold a hell of a lot more unit sales than what it actually did and completely deserved.

"As Is ..."

[Hardrock69]

If it had been released in the mid-80s it would have done bazillion-platinum, as kickass as it is.

Anyone got some real current sales figures? Anyone got access to SoundScan or some shit that tracks sales?

Hey YOU....RECORD LABEL GUY! YES YOU! Why not call up your pal at Interscope and ask him what the numbers are and then post them here. We won't tell anyone who gave them to us.

Seriously though....I had to dig a little just to find the random number in the Wikipedia article......if anyone has some real numbers, it would be nice to have some facts instead of guessing.....

[Terry]

Even taking into account the changes in how rock music is broadcast, listened to and purchased now vs. a quarter century ago (along with the 2012 tour being cut short), it's kind of surprising to me that ADKOT is still struggling to go gold in the US.

[IceCreamBlondie]

410,000 copies?

I can't help but think of the 10 million people that bought & loved VHI or 1984, and think to myself....fuck, there's 9,590,000 Van Halen fans totally missing out on a kick ass album.
!

Well stated, Sadaist. I made sure to get my (digital and vinyl) copies of ADKOT! Totally kick ass!

[IceCreamBlondie]

What makes you think Ed is sorry?

If Ed was sorry we would have live DVDs from the Fair Warning, Diver Down, 1984, and ADKOT tours.

Agreed...and don't forget the Livel DVD of the 2007 tour, either. Better luck next decade, maybe!

[VHscraps]

If it had been released in the mid-80s it would have done bazillion-platinum, as kickass as it is.

Anyone got some real current sales figures? Anyone got access to SoundScan or some shit that tracks sales?

Hey YOU....RECORD LABEL GUY! YES YOU! Why not call up your pal at Interscope and ask him what the numbers are and then post them here. We won't tell anyone who gave them to us.

Seriously though....I had to dig a little just to find the random number in the Wikipedia article......if anyone has some real numbers, it would be nice to have some facts instead of guessing.....

I was keeping tabs on sales figures that were being posted in a thread at vhlinks - titled "ADKOT weekly sales summary". It's easy to check in there without joining up, via Tapatalk. A user there had access to weekly Soundscan figures, which he was posting until a month or so ago - but since the album dropped off the Top 100 or 200 (can't remember which) he's got no data on sales. It was up to 400k+ sales, and that is actual sales and excludes discounted sales (e.g., I think there was at some point a special discount on Amazon for a few days that boosted the chart position of ADKOT, but those don't count as sales towards certifications ... anymore).

It has gone gold in Japan (and Canada, I think), and world wide ACTUAL verified (and not guestimate) sales are 900k+.

It has probably SHIPPED 500k units in the US, but gold / platinum certs are based only on actual sales now. Apparently the first Chickenfoot album (spit!) got a gold cert, but has only actually sold something like 360k (and was selling for a while at less than, e.g., a dollar on Amazon, before those kinds of sales-massaging techniques were banned in 2011). I think back then shipping gold could get you a certification - which means they shipped 500k units, but something like 140k of those were either returned or are sitting in stores unsold (similar deal with the last GnR album).

Somebody at Interscope needs to ask the RIAA to do an audit. That's the only way to find out for sure.

I think that somewhere in that very long thread at vhlinks the user - 75kl is his name - produced some stat to the effect that VH had sold close to a million units in 2012 in the US - but that was ADKOT and back catalog sales. VH1 and 1984, in partic., are still shifting units every year in the tens of thousands.

[ThatArtGuy]

And if what we were told is true, if 1984 sells 10,000 units this year, David gets $300. That's insane.

[VHscraps]

He'll earn more on royalties from radio play of tunes on that record, but the sales royalty is - as you say - pitiful.

The thread I mentioned on vhlinks shows that VH catalog albums pop in and out of the Top 200 albums. Soundscan gives total sales of albums since they started collecting point-of-sale data in 1990-91. I dunno when 1984 was certified for 10m (in the 90s?) but since the inception of Soundscan - roughly 1991 - there have been circa 1.6m sales. That's about an average of 73k copies a year, in the US. 1984 appeard in the chart in May and, for some reason (possibly special discount on iTunes etc) sold about a thousand in one week.

Who knows what the total sales of that album are. Warners haven't done an audit probably since the diamond certification in the 90s. I'd wager it is about 16-18m worldwide. In the year 1984, it's rest of the world sales were near equal to US sales - i.e., 5m (RIAA certified by Jan 85 in US) and similar for rest of world.

The Jump single sold a million in the US, and I think it was also a Top 10 hit in the rest of the world.

Meaning ... VH's record sales are probably significantly underestimated, and the quoted figures are always based on US RIAA certifications. My guess is that total rest of world sales are maybe 75-80% of their KNOWN US sales - so, 110 million or thereabouts.

[Va Beach VH Fan]

I wouldn't get too hyped up about sales, though...

Millions of people don't buy ANY CD's nor download ANYTHING from iTunes, etc.....

Everything's available eventually via bootleg sites....

[flappo]

the sound quality was pretty awful too ( cd and download ) all compressed and shitty , i heard the vinyl is actually the best sounding version

thing is - do you know anyone who still has a fucking lp player ?

that couldn't have helped sales

odd as the ted templeman stuff from the grate old daze was always stunningly well recorded and demo worthy

[twonabomber]

It's not as bad as the DLR Band mix, but yeah, something is off.

[Seshmeister]

I don't buy many albums nowadays, the producer has sold a lot so I assumed that this was the latest fashion production wise.

I think the problem is maybe that they are mixing for phones rather than decent audio equipment.

Someone needs to develop a electronic format that detects what kind of device you are using and then automatically plays the most appropriate mix.

[flappo]

i've heard of going for a niche , but this is crazy

maybe they should release the next album on minidisc only ?

[DLR Bridge]

I think the problem is maybe that they are mixing for phones rather than decent audio equipment.

That's what Ross Hogarth said.

Unfortunately, there are more people (present party included) trashing their hearing with "ear buds" than people cranking car stereos.

Damn, I miss driving to work. I honestly miss sitting in traffic. More time to crank tunes!