American Idol Statistics and Numbers Blog

American Idol Finale Ratings - Season 15 almost matches Season 12!

2016-04-12T10:30:00.000-07:00

American Idol is now a distant memory, so I will end Season 15 with the numbers of viewers for the finale over the past 15 years. Due to the very poor ratings for the last two years, they can now claim Season 15 ended with a victory since they reached about 13 million viewers, the most since Season 12, and a significant increase over the less than 8 million viewers from last year. In the world of broadcast television these days, 13 million is a pretty large audience, and it is not surprising Ryan Seacrest said it was "good night, America... for now". It sounds like Idol will likely return in some form in the future.

Odds the American Idol Season 15 Winner is from the South: 100%!!

2016-03-28T08:34:00.000-07:00

American Idol Hometown visits: Seasons 13, 14 & 15

This past weekend was the infamous "hometown visits" of the four remaining American Idol contestants for Season 15, and after realizing the four cities that are being visited, we definitely know that the winner this year will be from the South. With two contestants from Mississippi (La'Porsha Renae and Trent Harmon), one from neighboring Louisiana (Mackenzie Bourg) and one not much further in Texas (Dalton Rapattoni) the four contestants' visits are all incredibly close to one another. They are lucky Sonika Vaid is gone since she was from way up in Massachusetts! I actually made a road trip map from Dalton's home in Sunnyvale, TX to Trent's in Amory, MS with stops in Lafayette, LA (Mackenzie) and McComb MS (La'Porsha). The total highway miles for the trip ended up being less than 800 miles through only three states:

That is not much geographical diversity for the final four contestants in the final season of American Idol. Last season was a little better with the Top 4 coming from Connecticut (Nick), Tennessee (Clark), New Jersey (Jax), and Virginia (Rayvon). Season 13 had an even better spread with the winner from North Carolina (Caleb), and the other two hometown visits in Michigan (Jena Irene) and New Hampshire (Alex). The winners from Seasons 10, 11 and 12 were all from the South: Scotty (NC), Phillip (GA), and Candice (SC), so there is definitely a strong preference for Southern winners.

So it seems that the final season of American Idol has now become "Southern American Idol", even with four contestants still remaining. May the best Southerner win!

American Idol Season 15 - Top 4: The Pattern Continues...

2016-03-25T11:16:00.001-07:00

Goodbye, Tristan and Sonika, Young ladies be gone!

The last two weeks of American Idol have been fairly predictable, since I believe most of America realized that Tristan McIntosh and Sonika Vaid were going home over the next two weeks. After Tristan was eliminated last week and Sonika was "saved", how many folks actually believed she would last more then this week? I do not believe Sonika did herself.

But this is where the more difficult guessing begins between LaPorsha Renae, Trent Harmon, Dalton Rapattoni and Mackenzie Bourg. It is interesting that the final 6 were 3 white guys and 3 ethnically diverse ladies, but now we are down to three of the infamous "WGWG" (white guys with guitars) and just one African-American female. And since Trent and Dalton have not been performing so much lately with a guitar, here is a montage of their three original auditions to help remind you:

WGWG x 3

So LaPorsha has the odds stacked against her, even if she is the one with the strongest voice. Since when does the strongest voice have anything to do with winning American Idol?

I thought it was time to check the latest betting odds after Sonika's not so shocking exit last night:

So it appears that LaPorsha is still the favorite, and Mackenzie now has the longest odds. It appears that the odds between Trent and Dalton are pretty close. I checked the voting on MJ's BigBlog and folks there are overwhelmingly predicting Mackenzie being eliminated next week as well.

Wow, only two more weeks and the show is over. It is hard to believe the end is so near.

American Idol Season 15 Top 6: One Teen Remains!

2016-03-11T10:05:00.000-08:00

I remember just a few weeks ago Jennifer Lopez mentioning how many young 15 year old contestants there were on the show, and now there is just one! With the elimination of fellow 15 year old, Lee Jean, now Tristan McIntosh is the last remaining teen, as the median age of the contestant increases again, now to 21 (ironically the age of the other eliminated contestant, Avalon Young.) Let's look at the age distribution of the Top 14 again from a few weeks ago:

That sure has changed, has it not? The younger guys are all gone, and 3 of the 4 young ladies as well. Who would have thought that Tristan would be the last teen remaining (besides Scott Borchetta of course)?

I was excited to actually find betting odds for American Idol this year, since I had thought nobody really cared anymore! But there are some numbers from OSGA out there:

These numbers show how much you would earn on a $100 bet on each contestant before last night's show. Interestingly Sonika had the third lowest payout (i.e. the third favored to win) but ended up being in the Bottom 3 last night. I graphed the consensus OSGA odds to see the trend better:

So the odds makers successfully picked two of the Bottom 3, and also the two eliminated contestants, but Tristan must obviously have a bigger more supportive voting fanbase than Sonika for her not to land in the Bottom 3. With Sonika now having been in the Bottom 3, I am guessing her odds should shift quite a bit for next week.

Median Contestant Age RIses, but not Enough!

2016-03-04T07:22:00.001-08:00

I was expecting two teenage American Idol contestants to be leaving this week, but one of them was not the one I (or most people) expected. Nevertheless, with Gianna and Olivia gone there are only two minors remaining in the Top 8 and the median age of the contestants rises to 20.5. Everyone except the two remaining 15 year-old youths (Lee and Tristan) are 20 or older, making for a much more experienced group.

With Avalon being voted into the Bottom 3 this week, it will be interesting to see who the Bottom 3 will be next week. If Avalon is not among the bottom vote receivers, that will only leave 4 remaining contestants who have never been in the Bottom 3. I bet the final winner will be among those final four, and that Avalon herself will only last another week or two. With this short season and two more leaving next week, nobody will be staying on the show very long!

If we look at this weeks preliminary What Not To Sing ratings, Avalon and La'Porsha are sitting at the top, and Gianna is way down at the bottom (like she was last week), and Lee is not much higher with Dalton just barely better. Lee should be in trouble next week, but he should have been in trouble this week. And somehow I do not think that Dalton has to worry about not receiving enough votes. It will be very interesting to see who the bottom vote receivers will be next week.

The Winner of the American Idol Top 10 Performance Night is... Kelly Clarkson!

2016-02-27T06:11:00.001-08:00

Wow, after the elimination of four of the lesser Top 14 contestants, The Top 10 performance night for American Idol Season 15 actually ended up overall quite promising. While I was voting, however, I was very sad that I could not vote Jennifer Lopez off the judges panel and replace her with Kelly Clarkson. Kelly was a very entertaining and honest judge, quite a breath of fresh air from the same old messages we hear week after week from J-Lo, Keith and Harry. The most unexpected performance of the night, by far, was Sonika Vaid who started off looking like she was going to perform another pageant worthy pretty version of "Bring Me To Life", but turned it into her best performance of the season, showing emotion and stage presence we had never seen from her before.

The true "loser" of the evening is someone who is not receiving a whole lot of buzz and who actually performed reasonably well, Trent Harmon. Why is he the loser? Normally, he would have performed last for the evening, receiving the coveted "pimp spot" before the voting began. However, with Kelly's very emotional and powerful performance of "Piece by Piece" closing the show, Trent was almost forgotten. When you think back over the evening's performances you are more likely to remember La'Porsha and Sonika's deliveries, and Trent's capable but not overly exceptional performance becomes less memorable. He becomes just a decent singer sandwiched between La'Porsha/Sonika and Kelly Clarkson instead of being the final act of the show.

Most likely we will see two of the lesser three 15 year old disappear next week who landed on the bottom of the "What Not To Sing" rankings for the week (Lee, Tristan, Gianna.) But that would be something if Trent left as a "shock" boot because he had to be the contestant performing before Kelly Clarkson. I was curious why he was one of the four "Fast Pass" contestants, and maybe he was saved to be placed as the decent singer performing before Kelly so he could become a shock boot next week.

American Idol Season 15 - Top 14 Ages and Gender

2016-02-19T06:50:00.001-08:00

MJ'sBigBlog actually covers all the numbers specifically, but I, of course, had to make it into a bar graph. The American Idol Season 15 Top 14 consists of 8 gals and 6 guys, including 4 female teens aged 15 or 16, two male teens (15 & 17), and nobody over the age of 24. This officially makes me practically ancient, since my daughter is now as old or older than every single remaining contestant, and my son the freshman in college is older than 6 of them. Of the six minors, the only one I would guess having a good shot of ending up in the final 3 is Olivia Rox, with Thomas or Lee possibly sneaking in there if they can develop a big enough voting fan base. It will be very telling next week to see who the "Top 8" are that the "judges" decide upon, and who the six are that the voters will get to select among for the last two spots. I wonder if they have already decided who the pre-selected Top 8 will be.

Unlike last week, this week one of the mentors actually saw both of their duet partners go home - poor Haley Reinhart! She was paired with two of the older guys, Kory, 27, and Adam, 28, neither of which had a prayer of staying around very long. Both Jordin Sparks and Chris Daughtry saw both of their partners continue on, and David Cook, Constantine Maroulis and Kellie Pickler each saw one stay and one go. Even though there were only two "winners" as mentors this week, I thought they all did a good job. Interestingly, Haley was the youngest mentor this week at 25 (a year younger then Jordin Sparks who turned 26 in December) but she is actually older than all the remaining 14 contestants. Last week's youngest mentor, Lauren Alaina, at 21 is the same age as Avalon and older than the nine youngest remaining contestants. Interestingly both Haley and Lauren were on Season 10 and neither "won" but they both sounded great these past two weeks. It is amazing what five extra years of performance experience can do, since these Season 15 contestants sure need it!

Uneven Top 24 Semifinals Weeks

2016-02-12T10:56:00.000-08:00

There was a lot of unevenness in the American Idol top 24 this week and next week, and part of it comes down to the numbers. I noticed among this week's 12 contestants there were 8 (of the 13) ladies and only 4 (of the 11) guys. And of those contestants we see only two guys made it through and five gals to the Top 14. So for the Top 14 to be 7 of each gender, that means next week 2 of 5 ladies and 5 of 7 guys make it through. I am guessing the Top 14 will end up being more female heavy, but that is just a guess.

I also noticed that this first week, 5 of the 6 Idol duet partners were actual American Idol winners, with the only exception being Lauren Alaina who was the Season 10 runner-up. However, next week there are only two actual winners, David Cook and Jordin Sparks, and none of the other former Idols appearing are runners up. In terms of name recognition and experience, however, both Chris Daughtry and Kellie Pickler are far more well known and successful than either Nick or Caleb, and much more experienced on stage. It will be interesting to see how they get paired up with remaining contestants.

Interestingly this week while the contestants were a female heavy 8F/4M, the duet Idols were 75% male (2F/4M). With those gender splits it is not surprising that 8 of the 12 duets were a male/female couple, with 2 being M/M and the last 2 being F/F. Next week with the 5F/7M contestant split there will be 3F/3M in the gender split of Idol duet partners which should again make mixed gender duets easier to match up.

It was also amazing that all but one of the former Idols saw one of their partners stay in the competition, and one of them leave. The only exception was Nick Fradiani who was the only one to have both of his duet partners make it to the Top 14 (Thomas & Gianna.) Luckily none of the former Idols had to see both of their partners not make it. Scotty and Ruben had both their duets with ladies, but the other four Idols all had one male and one female partner.

After next week we will finally have our Top 14 so we the viewers can vote the following week, even if it is just to pick the last two of the Top 10 (after the "judges" fill the first 8 slots.) It will be interesting to see who all we will get to choose among, and which of the 8 will be the "chosen" contestants.

American Idol Season 15 - Top 24: Another Year of Disappearing Young Girls

2016-02-05T10:48:00.000-08:00

I am not sure who actually selected the Top 24 on American Idol Season 15, but once again they are picking a bunch of young teen females who will never make it to the final. Last year and years before, it always begins the same with a bunch of starry eyes teen ladies who all get to see their hopes dashed as random dudes gather all the votes to win the season. Since Season 6 the only exception has been Season 12 which was obviously stacked with some very weak guys, and even then the winner was a more seasoned woman (Candice Glover who was 23 at the beginning of that season). The amazing thing is, compared to even last year's distribution, this year's Top 24 is skewed even younger than last year. The histogram above is this year broken up by 2 year increments, and below is a similar graph for Season 14:

This year, there are six young ladies aged 15 or 16, or a quarter of all the contestants, and all 13 ladies are 23 or younger. This makes the second year in a row with no ladies 25 or older, whereas there have always been older guys (like last year's winner... what's his name again?) Does anyone think of any the six teen ladies has a prayer of actually receiving enough votes to win?

1) Amelia Eisenhauer: who? Nope, I barely remember her either
2) Emily Brooke: she can actually sing and she is country so she may last a while, but can she win?
3) Gianna Isabella: people will want her gone just so we can stop watching her mom torment her
4) Jeneve Rose Mitchell: no, just no
5) Olivia Rox: talented, but does she stand out enough to be noticed?
6) Tristan McIntosh: also talented, but her often retold sob filled back story is making her unlikable
(note to producers, stop it!!!)

Jordin Sparks and Scotty McCreery have been the only teen winners of American Idol and I believe they will end up being the only ones. The two underage teen guys this year are unlikely winners too:

1) Lee Jean: cute and somewhat talented, but I cannot see him winning
2) Thomas Stringfellow: his annoying singing style will not last him long

Dalton Rapattoni is listed as 19 but actually turns 20 on Feb 6 (tomorrow!) so he is no longer a teen.

As the final season rolls on, I may actually continue watching it this year. It will be the last time I will be able to do so!

Male vs Female Idol Album Sales, Seasons 1-14

2016-01-22T11:12:00.001-08:00

Yes, believe it or not I am actually watching the last season of American Idol after all, and I noticed how Jennifer Lopez singled out Phillip Phillips and Scotty McCreery at the end of last night's episode. That made me think how those two Idol winners she mentioned are the only two in the last several seasons to still have an impact on album sales and radio play, everyone else from Seasons 8 to 14 have very little album or radio activity, and the only other Season 8 to 14 alum still making news for himself is doing so headlining concerts (Adam Lambert, fronting Queen.)

So this made me think the only Idols who have been selling any albums who appeared on seasons 7 or later have all been male. In Season 7 there were David Cook (1.52M) and Archuleta (1.1M), in Season 8 it was Adam Lambert (1.11M) and Kris Allen (390K), and in 10 there was Scotty (1.82M) and in 11 there was Phillip (1.16M). The last female Idol to sell more than a million albums was Jordin Sparks (1.25M) in Season 6, and the only female Idols since then to break 100K were Lauren Alaina (S10 300K), Crystal Bowersox (S9 210K) and Allison Iraheta (S8 100K). From the Wikipedia page of Idol album sales, there have been 35 Idols to sell more than 100K albums, and of them 21 are male and 14 are female, but if we break it down between seasons, we see even more. From Seasons 1 to 6 there were 11 females and 11 males to break 100K in sales (quite even), but from Seasons 7 to 14 there were 3 females and 10 males.

Above I have placed a graph of the total album sales for all 35 Idols who have sold over 100K albums, with them broken up by season and gender. I chopped Kelly and Carrie's bars at 10M so we can see the other much smaller bars better. After Season 6 there is hardly any pink afterwards, with only the small bars for Allison, Crystal and Lauren. Besides the winners (David C., Kris, Lee, Scotty, Phillip) and runners up (David A., Adam), there are actually other guys contributing to the later seasons, with Danny Gokey in (S8 200K), Colton Dixon (S11 130K) and James Durbin (S10 120K.) Or course, it does not help that there are no Idols from Seasons 12, 13 or 14 to sell 100K albums.

So how is Idol going to try to end their run? Are they going to do a Season 12, where they stacked the "Top 24" with a bunch of weak guys so that a woman could win? I sure hope they do not try that again.

American Idol Season 14: And the Winner Is... FOX but just barely!

2015-05-14T09:13:00.003-07:00

Today I was curious to see what the results were for American Idol Season 14. Last night I already learned that Nick Fradiani beat Clark Beckham for the title, but I was curious how many people would show up for the occasion. The preliminary number is pretty much as expected, 7.74 million, with FOX just barely beating both CBS and ABC for the evening. You would hope a two hour "star studded" music filled finale would help FOX win for all time slots, but more people aged 18 to 49 wanted to watch "Survivor" and "Modern Family" than "American Idol" during those times. I grabbed the finale viewership numbers from the BillBoard article I referenced yesterday and added the Season 14 number to the end. If you remove the 3 upward aberrations that were Seasons 2, 5 and 10 there is actually a fairly steady ascent and descent for the other 11 seasons. For fun I pulled those three seasons out and then the graph looks like:

Ah, that is smooth and regular indeed! So what caused the extra spikes in Seasons 2, 5 and 10? I think it was added "buzz" that caused the not so die hard to tune in for those particular finales. Season 2 was the first full season after Kelly Clarkson became a big star from the first season, and the Ruben versus Clay competition was pretty fierce. Season 5 had a very polarizing front runner in the person of Taylor Hicks which everyone either loved or hated, so that created extra buzz. And Season 10, was the first revamped "post-Simon" season with Steve Tyler and Jennifer Lopez as judges, featuring the two teenage country finalists of Scotty McCreery and Lauren Alaina. Also not surprisingly, McCreery is and will probably continue to be the top album selling Idol finalist from the final 7 seasons. Those three seasons seem to be spikes, and once they are removed it is easy to see how Idol has progressed in its popularity.

This means unless the producers can do something to spark interest in the show, Season 15 will end up with a finale viewed by maybe 5 or 6 million people at the most. Add in the fact that less and less people in general are watching broadcast television, and the chances that they break 10 million are pretty slim. Those days of 20 or 30 million viewers are gone forever for American Idol or any other reality show for that matter. Unless it is the Super Bowl, some other highly contested sporting event or maybe an Award Show, nobody feels compelled to watch live broadcast television anymore.

The final number for American Idol: 15, as in 15 Seasons

2015-05-13T06:16:00.000-07:00

Yes, all good things must come to an end, and it appears American Idol will be ending its 15 year run next year with a final season 15. I think what will be most interesting in its final season is if the ratings actually go up during its last hurrah, or if they will continue to sink.

(from: billboard.com)

BillBoard has a nice graphic which I have shamelessly stolen which shows how the number of viewers of the finale shows has changed over the years. The first season had 22.8 million people viewing the finale, and at least that many continued to watch the finale until Season 11, when slightly less (21.4 million) watched Phillip Phillips win over Jessica Sanchez. But the last two years have seen huge viewership plunges with 14.3 million for Season 12 (Candice Glover over Kree Harrison) and 10.2 million for Season 13 (Caleb Johnson over Jena Irene.) So the big question for me for the finale tonight is not Clark or Nick, but 8 million, 6 million or how many? Does anybody really care any more?

Okay, Maybe I WIll Post on Season 14....

2015-03-03T08:56:00.000-08:00

I know that I said I was not going to post, but one day last week I had to see who ended up in the Top 24, and when I gazed at the Top 24 list posted on MJ's, I noticed how young all the ladies seemed to be, so I had to chart it. Yes, 9 out of the 12 ladies are 16 to 19, and the oldest ladies are two who are 22 years old and one at 23 years old. The guys are much more spread out with half being 20 to 23, and four under 20 and two that are 29 years old. The four male "teens" are spread out as well, with one 15 year old, a 17 year old, one at 18 and one at 19.

That is a lot of youngsters in the group. It appears that on Wednesday (tomorrow, March 4) we will hear who the Top 16 are and then by next week we will be down to the Top 12. Will anybody still be watching the show? Does anybody care? Now that the live shows have begun, it will be interesting to see how the ratings hold up as well.

My final post - American Idol it has been fun, but I just do not care any more!

2014-12-22T09:09:00.002-08:00

I knew it was a sign and a signal that is was time for me to end my run on a high note. With the release of Carrie Underwood's "Greatest Hits: Decade #1" album at #4 on the chart there are finally again two American Idols on the BillBoard 200. But who are they? They are the two superstar winners from Seasons 1 and 4 who made it huge. The other Idol on the charts with Carrie is Kelly Clarkson with her "Wrapped in Red" album from last year! That album is over a year old but it is still the second highest charting American Idol album at #47.

Yesterday as I was watching the Rams lose to the Giants on TV, there would occasionally be American Idol commercials played on FOX. I realize that I just do not care any more. Seasons 10 and 11 gave me hope that there might still be life in the franchise, but after two very boring Seasons 12 and 13, I am not going to waste my time. During the holiday seasons after Scotty and Phillip's wins I could at least track their album sales, but for the last two years there has not been too much to track except for releases from previous, more successful Idols (Carrie, Kelly, Daughtry, Phillip, Scotty, etc.) If something exciting happens this season I may come back and start re-posting, but for now I am going to concentrate on some of my other web activities.

JHUD gets company on the BillBoard 200 Album Chart

2014-10-24T14:09:00.001-07:00

JHUD BillBoard 200 chart position history

It is almost the end of October and I was guessing for sure JHUD would be the only album from an American Idol on the BillBoard 200 album chart. Jennifer Hudson's album stays in the Top 100 at #70 for its fourth week out, but now another former Idol sees their album land again on the chart. Who is it? Well, it it none other than Mandisa whose Grammy winning "Overcomer" album for some reason popped back onto the chart at #190, probably just for a week. So there are currently two non-winners on the chart, both African-American women who were on the show years ago. Who says minority women who were on American Idol cannot sell records?

JHUD debuts #10 on the Billboard chart with sales of 24K

2014-10-03T13:59:00.001-07:00

It has been a few weeks since I have posted since there have been NO American Idols on the album chart in a while ... until now! Jennifer Hudson sees her third album , JHUD debut at #10 with 24,000 in sales for the first week. That number is well down from the sales numbers from her first two albums, but since she does not have a bit hit single released from the album yet, that is still a respectable number in these days of lower album sales. That is still better then the debut sales numbers for the album from the last two Idol winners, Candice Glover and Caleb Johnson. That also gives Hudson her third top 10 album, something Glover and Johnson would need three more albums to possibly achieve!

Other Idols are actually doing much better with singles right now. Danny Gokey and Colton Dixon still have Top 20 Christian hits ("Hope in Front of Me" and "More of You"), Carrie Underwood ("Something in the Water" w/ Miranda Lambert) and Scotty McCreery ("Feelin It") have Top 20 Country hits, and Phillip Phillips ("Unpack Your Heart") and Daughtry ("Battleships") have Top 30 HAC hits. Jennifer does have a single, "It's Your World", at #13 on the Urban AC chart, and hopefully that will continue to improve and help her album sales. It is a tough world out there to try to sell albums these days!

Caleb's album off album chart in two weeks, Colton's hangs on for Week #2

2014-09-08T08:05:00.000-07:00

blue = Phillip, orange= Danny, yellow = Caleb, green = Kris, burgundy = Colton

This week, there is only one American Idol album on the BillBoard 200, Colton Dixon's "Anchor" sitting at #99 on its second week. Season 13 winner, Caleb Johnson's "Testify" dropped off the chart after only two weeks, and Kris Allen's independent release, "Horizons", only lasted one week. Luckily Jennifer Hudson is releasing a new album, "JHUD" to be released on September 23. I guess she thought these other idols with one word album titles were using two many characters so her album title is even shorter! Just 4 characters! Since Colton's album title is only 6 characters and is charting slightly better than Caleb's (7 characters) which charted better than Kris' (8 characters), making an even shorter album title seems to be the way to go!

Caleb Johnson and Kris Allen hit Billboard Album chart, Colton Dixon's numbers out this week

2014-08-26T06:28:00.000-07:00

blue = Phillip, yellow = Caleb, green = Kris, orange = Danny

With sales numbers for Caleb Johnson's "Testify" and Kris Allen's "Horizons" being released last week, and with Phillip Phillip's "Behind the Light" popping back into the Top 200, there are currently three American Idols on the Billboard 200 album chart. After two weeks with no Idols on the main album chart, Caleb leads at #24, Kris is at #80 and Phillip re-enters at #138. With Colton Dixon's release last week of "Anchor" he should chart well this week so we may have four Idols on the chart this week if Phillip can hold on the chart another week. This is not to say all is well for the Idols' albums sales since Caleb's 11K for his debut and #24 chart placement are not that great, but it will be even more telling to see how far he drops on his second week. I could analyze Caleb's poor sales numbers to death (Phillip and Scotty's sophomore albums each sell four or five times as much as his debut?), but that seems like kicking a wounded puppy or something. Since the poorly attended summer Idol tour is now over, what little buzz Caleb had (which was pretty small) may drop to nothing and his album sales may disappear all together.

It will be more interesting to see what happens to Colton Dixon who actually has a single on Christian radio that is doing pretty well. His first album "A Messenger" was a pretty strong hit in the Christian market, selling over 100K units (and debuting at #15 with sales of 22K, yes, considerably better than Caleb.) Albums on the Christian market also tend to have longer life spans as Mandisa has showed with her album "Overcomer" popping on and off the BillBoard 200 for over a year (winning a Grammy does not hurt either.) The moral to the story? It may well be better to place #7 on American Idol and demonstrate a marketable, current sound and style targeted at a niche market that is buying music and will play your music on their niche radio segment. That is better than winning by demonstrating an old fashioned, but entertaining sound and style that targets a market that existed 20 or 30 years ago that will never get any current radio play.

Caleb Johnson Losing the "Battle for the Bottom" with Candice Glover

2014-08-13T14:02:00.000-07:00

Caleb Johnson's debut album, "Testify" was released yesterday and it was going to be curious to see how it compared to Candice Glover's first week sales for "Music Speaks". Candice opened up with 19K in her first week back in February, and it looks like Caleb will most likely not match her numbers for his first week. HitsDailyDouble's "Rumor Mill" is estimating 9-11K for Caleb's debut and even with some substantial error on the positive side, it is doubtful to hit Candice's number. Kris Allen also released a third album yesterday, "Horizons", which as an smaller release will probably sell even less than Caleb. They should both chart on the BillBoard 200, but it will be interesting to see where they place.

Just Phillip Phillips on the BillBoard 200 Album Chart... Again...

2014-08-01T10:46:00.001-07:00

blue = Phillip, orange = Danny

This has been a very quiet summer on the BillBoard 200 Album chart for the American Idol artists. The only Idol artist with a presence on the chart this week is Phillip Phillips, whose "Behind the Light" album holds pretty steady in its tenth week at #129. Now that is is August, we will see Caleb Johnson's "Testify" appear on the 12th and Colton Dixon's "Anchor" drop on the 19th. This must be the month for single word album titles by American Idols. A year ago what Idol had the top selling album? Yup, it was still Phillip Phillips, but with his debut album with a much longer name. But at least last summer Phillip had three female former winners on the album charts with him, Carrie Underwood, Kelly Clarkson and Fantasia.

I also noticed my post from last year was mentioning the poor attendance at the Season 12 Idol Live Tour, but it may be even worse this year. This year they had a concert in Fort Lauderdale, Florida where they only sold 38% of the tickets to have a total "crowd" of 964 people. Yikes! That is a pretty small number.

Interestingly, however, there is a crowd of Idols somewhere, and that is in the Christian singles chart, where there are currently three former Idols with singles in the Top 20 of the Christian song chart, Danny Gokey with "Hope in Front of Me", Mandisa with "Back To You" and Colton Dixon with "More of You", three song titles with a preposition followed by a pronoun (all too common in Christian Music these days.) The only other Idol with a song in the Top 20 is Phillip with "Raging Fire" on the AC chart, although Daughtry has a Top 30 HAC single with "Battleships" and Scotty McCreery has a Top 30 country single with "Feelin' It". In reality, though, Phillip, Daughtry and Scotty are the only Idols to be getting much radio play in the past several months outside of Christian radio except for Carrie and Kelly (and perhaps Fantasia and Jennifer Hudson on the R&B/Urban charts - I don't follow those much). None of the Christian artists with current Top 20 singles were winners or even runners up, yet all three of them are doing pretty well years after their Idol seasons. I an guessing "Anchor" will give Colton his second #1 Christian album, which may not be that huge of a chart to top (Danny also topped the chart with "Hope Inside of Me"), but it still looks good on a press release!

Danny Gokey hangs on BillBoard 200 to Keep Phillip Phillips Company

2014-07-12T05:10:00.000-07:00

blue = Phillip, orange = Danny

After his release of "Hope In Front of Me", Danny Gokey saw an expected drop off in his second week album sales, sliding from #40 to #158 this week. He will likely drop off the chart next week. The amazing thing is his #40 last week is about the same as the #41 this week for the debut week of Voice winner Tessanne Chin. When the third place American Idol finalist from five years ago can place about the same as the winner from the latest season of the Voice, that tells you something. Of course, the Idol winner from two years ago, Phillip Phillips, continues to hold strong at #68 this week (from #57 last week.)

August brings "Testify", the debut from Caleb Johnson, as well as the sophomore effort from Season 11's Colton Dixon, "Anchor". I am not sure which will have the stronger opening, but I am guessing Colton's album may be able to stay on the charts longer. We will have to wait and see.

Finally, another American Idol on the BillBoard Album Chart

2014-07-07T07:04:00.001-07:00

blue = Phillip, orange = Danny Gokey

Phillip Phillips has had a lonely time of late on the BillBoard 200 Album chart representing American Idol, but he finally gets some company. Danny Gokey has released a new album titled "Hope In Front of Me" that landed at #40 on the BillBoard 200 chart (and #1 on the Christian chart) showing again the strength of the American Idols in the Christian genre. Mandisa's "Overcomer" album has remained on the Top 25 of the Christian album chart seemingly forever, and Colton Dixon has also had a lot of success in the Christian music scene.

Now in its sixth week, Phillip's "Behind the Light" holds very steady on the chart, improving slightly from #59 to #57. We will see how long Gokey's album can remain on the BillBoard 200 chart, but I am sure it will remain on the Christian album chart for a while.

On completely unrelated news, it sounds like Dexter Roberts has disappeared from the American Idol Live Tour. What sounds even worse is that nobody even seems to care or notice. Season 13 winner, Caleb Johnson's album, "Testify", is supposed to be released in about a month on August 12, and hopefully it will have some buzz surrounding it when it releases or his sales may not even come close to Candice's initial sales. We will have to see in August.

My "American Idol" BillBoard Album Chart becomes the Phillip Phillips Album Chart

2014-06-16T07:13:00.001-07:00

Okay, now that Daughtry and Scotty McCreery's latest albums are both over six months old (as well as Mandisa's, Colton Dixon's, Carrie Underwood's and Kelly Clarkson's) and more recent albums like Candice Glover's "Music Speaks" and James Durbin's "Celebrate" barely made a blip on the charts, the only American Idol album on the chart remains Phillip Phillips with "Behind the Light" at #32 this week. In its third week it has moved from #7 to #20 to #32 which is almost a perfectly straight line, making for a very boring looking line, but which does show a nice solid trajectory for him where he should remain in the Top 200 for quite a while longer. Without any new major releases from Idols in the next few months, I do not see him having much company on the charts. Last summer, Fantasia's "Side Effects of You" kept the Idols in the album chart along with Phillips' debut, and Carrie and Kelly's efforts from last year. This year Phillip may have the chart to himself!

Finally! An American Idol back on the BillBoard Album Chart!

2014-05-30T11:27:00.000-07:00

It has been a few weeks since there has been an American Idol alumni on the BillBoard 200 album chart which is a rarity over the past 4 years I have been writing this blog. I started in January 2011 when Crystal Bowersox and Lee DeWyze still had their debut albums on the Top 200 album chart. Back then people were thinking their albums were low selling albums, but compared to Season 12 and likely Season 13 winners and runners up, they may look like album selling superstars. But the good news this week is there is an Idol album not only in the Top 200, but actually in the Top 10, as Phillip Phillips "Behind The Light" opens at #7 with sales of 41,000 units sold. He should remain in the Top 200 for a while so I can resurrect my graph which has been dormant for a few weeks. His sophomore album sales actually beats the sales of 2 of the last 4 winners' debuts (Lee at 39K and Candice Glover at 19K.) Since I always love a graph, I graphed the first week sales numbers for the last six winners who released sophomore studio albums:

Season 10: Scotty McCreery "See You Tonight" 52,000
Season 6: Jordin Sparks "Battlefield" 48,000
Season 7: David Cook "This Loud Morning" 46,000
Season 11: Phillip Phillips "Behind The Light" 41,000
Season 8: Kris Allen "Thank You Camellia" 16,000
Season 9: Lee DeWyze "Frames" 3,000

This puts Phillip on par with the other three latest Idol winners that have sold platinum selling debut albums (Scotty, Jordin & David Cook.) They have all sold 40K+ on their sophomore albums which is pretty good these days.

Of course, there was one non-winner during that time frame whose sophomore album sold more than any of these winners (Adam Lambert's "Trespassing" with 77,000 at #1 on the chart.) But since we are only comparing winners, that does not matter!

As for recent American Idol winner and runner up, Caleb Johnson and Jena Irene, their first week download numbers are pretty dismal. Caleb's "As Long As You Love Me" came in with 10K downloads its first week, which makes Candice Glover's 54K number look fantastic. I added Caleb to the chart I made last year of winner singles downloads and his column is barely a column at all.

American Idol Winner on iTunes Top 50 Singles Chart -- Too Bad It Is the Wrong Winner!

2014-05-22T08:58:00.000-07:00

Well, as some folks had expected the guy beat the gal in American Idol last night, and there sits the white guy winner sitting with a single sitting in the Top 50 of iTunes. The problem? It was the winner from two years ago, Phillip Phillips who has his latest single "Raging Fire" sitting in the Top 50, whereas last night's winner, Caleb Johnson, sees his lead single, "As Long As You Love Me" sitting well out of the Top 100. Phillip performed the single last night with his opening act and backup singer. Sam Woolf, along with his first big hit "Home" (which Sam at least was able to start on his own.) So now "Raging Fire", "Home" and even "Gone, Gone, Gone" are all still charting in the iTunes Top 200 ahead of Caleb's single.

Last year people were concerned about Candice Glover's "I Am Beautiful" only selling about 54,000 downloads on its first week, but it at least hit the Top 20 on iTunes where Caleb's song has not even come close. I cannot imagine what his first week downloads will be, but I believe Candice will soon lose the title of having the "least downloaded winner's single". Kree Harrison's "All Cried Out" peaked in the 20's on iTunes and ended up selling 24,000 its first week, so Caleb's final number should be well under Kree's. Yikes!

As for Phillip, his sophomore album "Behind the Light" is expected to sell between 35-40K on its first week, a respectable number these days for albums in general, but still far from the 169K he sold with his debut album. That is an expected drop off from his first album, but his second week sales should not fall as much as usual with his Idol performance this week. I bet that is still a lot higher than the first week sales will be for Caleb's debut album in August.