Summer Music: Best Of The Fests
May 23, 2008
Some look at Summer as a time to mow the lawn, sip on lemonade, swing gently in a hammock and listen to the play by play of the local nine working their way through a lengthy season. Others look at it as a time to be seductively crushed by sweaty slabs of booty boppin’ funk, rock, hip-hop and more. If you’re of the latter half then you’d probably be down for braving the hot summer sun and the teeming, unwashed crowds to boogie down to the sounds of some the plethora of diverse music festivals popping up around the country this summer. Here’s Hey! Nielsen’s rundown of the biggest and baddest of the summer music festival behemoths.
We were feeling pretty good about hitting 100,000K members this week until we learned from our friends at Billboard that 97.5 Million votes were cast for last night’s American Idol finale, won by David Cook. The former bartender from Missouri captured 56% of the votes… almost exactly the same percentage predicted in a recent poll of Hey! Nielsen members who went for Cook 57% to 43% over his competition, 17-year-old David Archuleta.
In the month leading up to the finals, the buzz on Cook (tracked by Nielsen Online’s BlogPulse) was consistently edging out Archuleta’s — and then spiked last night for the finale, accounting for nearly .5% of all blog posts tracked by Nielsen.
After the announcement that he had won, Cook, despite claiming he was at a loss for words, was able to tell host Ryan Seacrest: “I am absolutely at a loss for words.” Bravo.
The Download on MySpace, iTunes, AmazonMP3… and eMusic
April 3, 2008
A giant social network and two of the largest online music retailers had some big news recently. Three of the four major record labels, Sony-BMG, Warner Bros., Universal (EMI is not on board, yet), have teamed up with MySpace to launch a music site later this year. With millions of built-in users, this alliance could be a major force in the download space.
In the current download market, newcomer AmazonMP3 claimed that in just six short months, it had become the #2 online music retailer behind iTunes, who with their estimated 80% share of the digital market, apparently just eclipsed WalMart as the #1 music retailer, period. Some possible reasons for Amazon’s growth is that their download catalog features no DRM (Digital Rights Management – meaning no copying, sharing, or fingerprinting strings attached) and the bulk of their a la carte songs are 10 cents cheaper than Apple’s, who have just a portion of their catalog available (at a premium) with no DRM. In the middle of all of this is another online retailer, eMusic, who sell only DRM-free music from independent artists. eMusic recently disputed the claims in the USA Today article regarding Amazon’s #2 position, long held by eMusic.
update: Billboard provided me with this bit of info: Year to date digital music sales are up 28.7% in 2008.
Take Our Member Quick Poll On Music Purchasing
To Grammy’s House We Go
December 6, 2007
The 50th annual Grammy nominations were announced this morning in LA and six-time Grammy award winner Kanye West is leading this year’s group with eight nominations. The Recording Academy also gave a big “yes, yes, yes” to Amy Winehouse, presenting her with six Grammy nods including one in each of The Big Four categories (Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best New Artist). Justin Timberlake, Jay-Z, Timbaland, Justin Timberlake and T-Pain are also nominated for five awards each.
Whether your motto is “Grammys-schmammys” or you sit mesmerized in front of the television like I do hoping for either a surprise win or a wardrobe malfunction, let us know what you think of the nominees by clicking on the links below. Also, be sure to check out our friends at The Hollywood Reporter, Billboard.com, and all of the blogs on our music blog list to see what the pros are saying.
Record of the Year
Irreplaceable – Beyonce
The Pretender – Foo Fighters
Umbrella – Rihanna, featuring Jay-Z
What Goes Around … Comes Around – Justin Timberlake
Rehab – Amy Winehouse
Album of the Year
Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace – Foo Fighters
These Days – Vince Gill
River: The Joni Letters – Herbie Hancock
Graduation – Kanye West
Back to Black – Amy Winehouse
Song of the Year
Before He Cheats – Josh Kear, Chris Tompkins (Carrie Underwood)
Hey There Delilah – Tom Higgenson (Plain White T’s)
Like a Star – Corinne Bailey Rae
Rehab – Amy Winehouse
Umbrella – Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter, Kuk Harrell, Terius “The-Dream” Nash, Christopher Stewart (Rihanna, featuring Jay-Z)
Best New Artist
Feist
Ledisi
Paramore
Taylor Swift
Amy Winehouse
For the complete list of nominees, click here.
Hey! Nielsen & Billboard.com Best Music Blog Contest
November 7, 2007
(UPDATED 12/13)
Following the success (good for us, good for bloggers)
of our First Annual TV Blog Contest, we’re launching our First Annual Music
Blog Contest on Monday, November 12. With the help of our friends at
Billboard.com, we’ve nominated a heap of U.S. blogs that serve up reviews, features, downloads, and more. Check out the complete list of blogs after the jump and the rules here.
You must be a member to vote. Membership is free!
A big thanks to Billboard.com’s Jaded Insider Blog for their help and to our newest H!N teammate Sarah Epler who researched all of the sites and stats, and has not taken her headphones off in a week.
Hey! Nielsen & Billboard.com Best Music Blog Contest
November 7, 2007
(UPDATED 12/13)
Following the success (good for us, good for bloggers)
of our First Annual TV Blog Contest, we’re launching our First Annual Music
Blog Contest on Monday, November 12. With the help of our friends at
Billboard.com, we’ve nominated a heap of U.S. blogs that serve up reviews, features, downloads, and more. Check out the complete list of blogs after the jump and the rules here.
You must be a member to vote. Membership is free!
A big thanks to Billboard.com’s Jaded Insider Blog for their help and to our newest H!N teammate Sarah Epler who researched all of the sites and stats, and has not taken her headphones off in a week.
