Shane Covers I Put A Spell On You For Haiti

[BelfastsLittlesHobo]

Its damn sinful this didnt sell well especially compared to the trash in the charts today! Whats wrong with people?!?

[NewJerseyRich]

Its damn sinful this didnt sell well especially compared to the trash in the charts today! Whats wrong with people?!?

It appears it did break the top 10 in the category of Indie singles(#8)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/chart/indiesingles/

[James]

Its damn sinful this didnt sell well especially compared to the trash in the charts today! Whats wrong with people?!?

It appears it did break the top 10 in the category of Indie singles(#8)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/chart/indiesingles/

Narrowly beaten by a song that's been out for ten months...

I've got a suspicion that a part of this was a move to drum up media interest in the new material Shane's working on. I believe he's unsigned at the moment and a high profile, high charting single would have added a notable figure to any advance that may have been forthcoming. It's a shame it's flopped like this, it could mean that there won't be much record company muscle behind future MacGowan work as a solo artist.

[moose]

Fuckin hell Smerker, thats a bit cynical......

Anyway, back to chart position, has anyone actually heard this track on any radio station......thought not, if no one knows about it who is going to buy it??

[Fr. McGreer]

Never heard it on any station and i have the radio on nearly all day. It's a shite state of affairs.

[NewJerseyRich]

Haven't even heard it on "college" radio here. All in all to start off at #8 isn't so bad, it is after all only one week since the release.

[Paddyq]

I heard it on our local statioon Six FM the morning after it was released and they talked about it for a wee minute (and about Haiti and stuff). Nothing since.

[Guest]

Its damn sinful this didnt sell well especially compared to the trash in the charts today! Whats wrong with people?!?

It appears it did break the top 10 in the category of Indie singles(#8)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio1/chart/indiesingles/

Narrowly beaten by a song that's been out for ten months...

I've got a suspicion that a part of this was a move to drum up media interest in the new material Shane's working on. I believe he's unsigned at the moment and a high profile, high charting single would have added a notable figure to any advance that may have been forthcoming. It's a shame it's flopped like this, it could mean that there won't be much record company muscle behind future MacGowan work as a solo artist.

New material smerker? whre did you hear of this?

[James]

http://www.punkglobe.com/shannebradleyi ... w0110.html

Shanne says that they've got four (I assume) demos down already. It makes sense as a reason for the Pogues to have gotten off the road for a year, otherwise I may not have read too much into it. I think there must be material dating back to the original 20th Century Paddy sessions. MacGowan's had thirteen years to get a strong set of songs together, at any rate.

[John C]

I think there must be material dating back to the original 20th Century Paddy sessions.

Nope. No such material exists.

[James]

I think there must be material dating back to the original 20th Century Paddy sessions.

Nope. No such material exists.

EVERY REPORTER EVER: Hey, Shane, how about new material? You working hard?
SHANE: Oh, yeah, 'course, yeah. Like, er, yeah. Um. Every song's gonna have "paddy" in the title. And Rick Rubin's... an okay producer, isn't he?

Do you mean it was never recorded, or that there's been no new songs since The Crock? What's your source there?

[old barney greyheron]

I gotta say I really like this...ain't bought it...I need every penny...but it's a damn fine cover.

[DzM]

I'm surprised at how quickly this has fallen off the world's radar. After the first few weeks of release the Facebook group appears to be moribund, IRL & Victoria & Siobhan seem to have stopped promoting it, etc. There's no talk of sustaining a chart position, of garnering "celebrity tweets," of a "friendly competition between the singles, with the Haitians winning," etc.

Perhaps this is just showing my lack of experience with how a single is released and promoted, but it seems really odd that a charity single would be considered exhausted and defunct after its first week. Shouldn't there be a constant ongoing effort to get this (and the other charity singles) in front of people? Shouldn't there be a small effort spent to extend the long tail as long as possible? I get the impression that this is not the case. What appears to be done is to push a release out the door with much fanfare and then immediately drop it off a cliff. Is this REALLY how the music and charity industries are run? Am I missing the constant drum-beat of promotion that is happening elsewhere in the world?

[philipchevron]

I'm surprised at how quickly this has fallen off the world's radar. After the first few weeks of release the Facebook group appears to be moribund, IRL & Victoria & Siobhan seem to have stopped promoting it, etc. There's no talk of sustaining a chart position, of garnering "celebrity tweets," of a "friendly competition between the singles, with the Haitians winning," etc.

Perhaps this is just showing my lack of experience with how a single is released and promoted, but it seems really odd that a charity single would be considered exhausted and defunct after its first week. Shouldn't there be a constant ongoing effort to get this (and the other charity singles) in front of people? Shouldn't there be a small effort spent to extend the long tail as long as possible? I get the impression that this is not the case. What appears to be done is to push a release out the door with much fanfare and then immediately drop it off a cliff. Is this REALLY how the music and charity industries are run? Am I missing the constant drum-beat of promotion that is happening elsewhere in the world?

In Britain, if a single (or download equivalent) does not have momentum in the first week, it is considered all but dead, especially if it has not been heard on the radio or found alternative promo outlets. It's a hangover from the (quite recent) phenomenon when all record company marketing effort was concentrated in the first seven days, with a high debut position - preferably number One - anticipated. Its subsequent chart career was of no further interest to anyone, Unfortunately, this grew to include record buyers and the companies' cynical view of "hit" singles resulted in a singles chart in precipitous decline, of mass interest only in Christmas Week. In an effort to rescue the very situation the record companies created in the first place, their official chart compilers changed the rules to something close to the US system, where radio performance and downloads were also taken into account. It was hoped that this would create a return to the genuine excitement of the singles charts in the 60s and 70s, when singles had actual chart arcs and the chart rundown was eagerly awaited every week on radio. But the golden goose had stopped laying.

[DzM]

That's a real shame, and not just because of this single. It really means that the Music Industry(TM) has fallen victim to the movie industry mindset of Blockbusters and has largely forgotten about how to build a loyal following with steady income and run-rates. If you cling to the idea that only a home-run (baseball analogy here) counts then you lose sight of all the smaller plays (singles, doubles, etc) without which you can't win a game.

There's a lot of other bad analogies I'm resisting using. They all basically boil down to "this industry is screwing itself." It makes me extra sad to have had the point driven home by a charity single.