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| MickChick |
PEOPLE: MICK JOKE
OJagger's new single sells just 1,100 copies OHe's been dropped by his record label It's time sad rocker finally called it a day
WRINKLY rocker MICK JAGGER is being dropped by his record label after selling just 1,143 copies of his new single, I can reveal.
Despite an expensive ad campaign, Visions Of Paradise has limped into the charts at an embarrassing No 43.
The Rolling Stone is giving Virgin so little Satisfaction they're pulling the plug on his solo deal.
So I say it's about time he realised he's well past his sell-by date and got out the pipe and slippers.
It wouldn't have been so bad for Mick, 58, but his album Goddess In The Doorway was a flop too before Christmas.
And he even had a Channel 4 documentary to help plug that.
The sad fact is that after 40 years in the business, fans aren't buying his records and radio stations aren't playing them.
A Virgin insider told me: "At the end of the day we have lost money doing both the Jagger album and single.
"In years gone by the men upstairs might have written that off for the prestige of having a name like Jagger on the roster.
"But with the current recession we can't afford to release another solo record."
The Rolling Stones will continue to be signed to Virgin but even their track record hasn't been good for many years.
They may make money from tours but their new records just don't sell.
He may still be able to talk young women into bed but he can't persuade them to buy his records.
Come to think of it, it's not such a bad deal...
SOPH, LET'S SPEND THE AFTERNOON TOGETHER
Jagger rekindles romance at model's granny's flat
GRANNY'S flat is hardly the ideal place to rekindle a romance - but that didn't seem to matter to Mick Jagger and Sophie Dahl.
They resumed their on-off relationship with a liaison at the London home of Sophie's grandmother Felicity Dahl.
And Mick clearly can't get enough of Sophie - within seconds of leaving the Chelsea flat he was on his mobile phone to his young lover.
Sophie appeared at the window as Mick stood below while the couple chatted for several minutes. Then Mick gave her a farewell wave and jumped into a limo waiting outside nearby Blakes Hotel. Three hours later Sophie emerged clutching her mobile phone.
The couple split up last November after a year-long relationship. Friends say Mick has since bombarded her with presents and phone calls to woo her back.
One person who won't be pleased at news of their reunion is Mick's daughter Jade, who famously begged her father in the recent documentary Being Mick: "Nobody younger then me, please..." Jade is 30 while Sophie is only 24 - 34 years younger than Mick. Mick tried to convince Sophie to come back to him by dedicating his solo album, Goddess In The Doorway, to her.
It obviously worked. A friend said: "Mick has put loads of effort into getting Sophie back. She was wary of him because she feared he wasn't faithful. But she was eventually convinced of his feelings for her and let him back in her life.
"It is all very cloak and dagger at the moment and Mick likes to sneak round to her grandmother's flat whenever he can."
While Sophie's grandmother Felicity hasn't expressed an opinion about her granddaughter's relationship with Mick, her other grandmother, Oscar-winning actress Patricia Neal, most certainly has.
"I hope she stays away from that bastard," she told one interviewer.
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| Jaxx |
bummer on both counts...devestating to be a rock icon and fail as a solo artist. maybe a bit of a blow, considering those that have been able to carve out extremely successful solo careers-- all the beatles, jerry garcia, remaining dead members, neil young, peter townsend, nils lofgren, sting, phil collins, diana ross, natalie merchant, frank sinatra ditched his orchestra. the list goes on, the spectrum is wide. why not jagger too? after all he writes music, sings/phrases/arranges music beautifully, he plays instruments--harmonica, guitar (do i see him credited for keyboards too on hide your love?)can dance circles around madonna, britney, nsuck, backstreetbabies, and the like, it makes you wonder.
yeah. disappointing and probably embarrassing. he ought to just focus on writing/collaborating new stones music with his band and move on. as a diversion he can focus on his recently successful film career which is getting kudos for acting as well as producing. here is yet another stellar review for his performance in Man from Elysian Fields:
Evening Standard
3/15/02
JAGGER Mick Jagger may have proved himself an able producer with his excellent film Enigma but as an actor he seemed overwhelmed by Ned Kelly and Freejack. Well, now he's bagged a role in The Man From Elysian Fields. Jagger's saturnine performance as Luther Fox, the decadent owner of a male escort service designed for rich, lonely women, is quite brilliant. Consider the ghosts of Ned and Co finally laid to rest.
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| robbluedog |
Virgin dropped David Bowie recently too....
I knew that this album must have been a make or break venture for Mick by the commercial angle of the music and by the manner it was pushed.
This whole scenario embodies the dilema The Stones themselves face with each new release - do they go for a commercial, 'contemporary' sounding album which they hope to pitch to the biggest market of the mainstream rock buying age group, that is the under 25's - or do they stick to their more traditional sounds and go for their established audience who are sadly up to their necks in families, mortgages and various other distractions?
It's a hard call but for my money I would go for making an album that is pure Stones and forget about trying to appease the Britney crowd. The crowds at the tours come to hear the band that made 'Exile', not the band that made 'Godess'.
If they did tour behind a great new album it'd sell enough copies over time. But we're not talking a great new Stones album here anyway. We're talking a box set of oldies and outakes. Virgin are nervous.
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| Maxlugar |
They should just set up a website and say fuck the record companies and release any new stuff via the web. Touring will always be profitable for them but releasing new material will not be a big sell. Feel bad for Mick but shit, he's in the biz for 40 years. Fuck trying for the hit record. I say release all the vault stuff via the web too.
Yeah!
Maxy! |
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| Cardinal Ximinez |
I hate to sound like a broken record...The Stones need to make a Rock and Roll record...a Rolling Stones record...if they do that, the sales will follow. Look at Bob Dylan...the last 2 albums that he made are about as uncommercial as it gets...yet they both have sold well. The Stones need to take a page from Bob, and make music that they enjoy...if they do that, I'm betting that WE will all enjoy it as well. Fuck the critics, and fuck the pr people who push demographics...just make some rock n roll! |
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| Maxlugar |
Are you sure Dylan's last two sold a lot? Critically they were praised but I'm not sure they sold so much.
A lot for Bob lately but....
I'm not sure anything the Stones do will bust the sales charts wide open but yes, the closer they get to making a "Stones" album the better it will sell. But then you wonder just what is a Stones album these days. Voodoo was closer than B2B and it sold more. But I'm sure most of us would say Exile is closer than Some Girls but I don't think IT sold more.
Hey I'm not hung up on sales either. I'm just talking about this in relation to the story about Mick getting dropped. I wish to hell that we would get a fan album.
But who knows. I was listening to Could You Walk on Water yesterday and I'm thinking "This thing is a massive hit album" if they rerecord it and finish it up.
Maxy!
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| nankerphelge |
I don't feel bad for Mick at all.
He as much as anyone must know that it is not the music alone that sells but the image that goes with it. Christ the Stones patented the image of a bad boy band, and the industry has only gotten more image conscious (as evidenced by the tremendous lack of talent in many of the biggest sellers).
So when 58 year old Mick tries to look 24, he natually fails -- computer enhancement and all.
He needs to recognize that the people that are "sadly" (? why sadly?) up to their ears in mortgages, families, and other distractions are the ones that ultimately bring in the money for him and the Stones. They may not have the blockbuster release that was Some Girls or Tattoo You, but they will certainly do as good as can be expected if they stick to what they are good at. Hopefully Mick's little experiment will solidify that. |
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| KeepRigid |
"But then you wonder just what is a Stones album these days."
This is a good point. The Stones have always kept up with the times just as much as they have been a rock or blues band. An album of blues songs and covers would thrill the older crowd, but to fans that liked the cocky edge of the Some Girls era, it might sound like a retread.
I think GITD was mostly an honest effort by Mick, but the PR campaign came across as so manufactured and soulless that it turned people off. I mean, even I thought it was a little dodgy when Mick was trying to feign interest in Monday Night Football!
My advice for the Stones this year would be to create whatever the hell they want on record, but respect the audience when it comes time to promote it. |
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| L&A |
"I think GITD was mostly an honest effort by Mick"
I'm not sure, KeepRigid, that the effort was really honest. I think that intellectual honesty always pays...
If you work in a "creative" branch, each time you try to sell something you've prepared without a certain "passion" (hard to find my words in English, sorry), you will not really succeed.
Maybe you can make money if you have a good commercial strategy (listen to MTV), but real "connoisseur" (fans as we are) will discover the subterfuge. And in the case of GITD, there were no "passion" and no good commercial strategy (who was the target ? Teenagers, oldies, RS fans ...?).
The only "honest" think he did was "Blue", and the stupid PR of Virgin didn't believe in that song... Sad-sad-sad... |
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| KeepRigid |
"real "connoisseur" (fans as we are) will discover the subterfuge. And in the case of GITD, there were no "passion"
Sure, Mick was attempting to reach a younger audience with the album, but I hear passion in it, the ballads especially (well, except VOP). I think a more laid-back approach to marketing it would've served him better...perhaps he should talk to Ronnie! (BTW, I don't hear anymore passion in Blue than something like Don't Call Me Up.)
But I'm closer to the demographic Mick was trying to reach than I am to being one of the "mortgage fans", so I'm sure that's a factor as well. Interestingly, most of the older fans I played it for thought Mick was trying too hard, while my younger friends (who don't like the Stones) enjoyed it.
"and no good commercial strategy (who was the target ? Teenagers, oldies, RS fans ...?)"
This is spot on. Mick didn't really commit either way (ie. Rob Thomas sings on VOP...but you can't really hear him), and didn't really capture his fanbase or the younger crowd as a result. |
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| The Worst |
The Rolling Stones' new records just don't sell? Steel Wheels and Voodoo Lounge have been their most-sold records ever. I also think, that over 3 millions (more than Bridges)is not bad for Stripped, a live-album almost only consisting of 60ies and 70ies-tunes.
Apart from the rap part on Anybody Seen My Baby? and the techno stuff on Juiced, Bridges sounds like a Stones album and not utterly commercial at all. And I like, that they have taken risks. Otherwise, people would have said: "Oh no, the same old stuff again". So you can't please all the people all the time.
To the rock'n'rolling songs: I like Flip The Switch, Low Down, Gunface or Too Tight more than Sparks Will Fly, I Go Wild, Baby Break It Down or Mean Disposition. Bridges had the better, more groovy and classic songwriting than Voodoo.
Somebody, who had never listened to a Stones-song after 1973 before, listened to Bridges and said, that it sounded like the old stuff. All in all, I think, that Bridges was the best since Tattoo You.
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| yellow1 |
Is it official news or friggin' tabloid gossip ?!
It doesn't seem to make much sense to dump him when he's just released his first solo record in 8 years ! It's not like he's got another one cooking is it ? I'm pretty sure they had only signed him up for one album anyway...
They also run the risk of making him very upset by going public with the news, just as he's putting together a new CD for The Stones...
I'd also be VERY surprised if Virgin had lost any money on that Stones deal they signed in 1991, very surprised...
Show me the link ! |
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| Gazza |
>Are you sure Dylan's last two sold a lot? Critically they were praised but I'm not sure they sold so much.
A lot for Bob lately but....
As far as I recall,Time Out Of Mind went triple platinum (unheard of for Dylan) and L&T,having gone top three in most of the main markets would be well on its way to matching that. The Grammy's didnt do him any harm,let alone the reviews and the constant touring to keep his work in the public eye.
Dylan's classic albums may have been critically acclaimed but generally they never sold in those quantities and so fast.
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| Cardinal Ximinez |
Yellow1...if my memory serves me correct, Mick had a 3 album deal... |
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