clik4music :: MUSIC @ b2evo

The rapid gains for Pandora in 2009 are an indication of music-lovers embracing the new digital channels. In December alone Pandora gained 600,000 new users each week.

Also of note is that half of the December gains are from mobile users (photo). We have been praising the Pandora service for some years, especially for lovers of music who like more than the top 40.

Pandora has 10 million iPhone customers, another indication that serious music-lovers are using the service.

Pandora has also been very successful in gaining advertisers with its high listening numbers:
• 3 million average daily users in October
• 1 million daily users using mobile
• 18-24 year-olds favour Pandora, twice as many as Hulu or ESPN
• 25-34 year-olds also favour Pandora, twice as many as CNN

Advertisers are tailoring special campaigns, including Starbucks creating a branded Pandora playlist that, with one click, could be added to the consumer’s personal tuner online and on smart phones.

Twitter is the latest and another rather interesting reflection of “perceived popularity” on the web. So now we have a whole host of possible ways to imagine how people respond to news and marketing.

Some say there is no intrinsic value in Twitter popularity. Any more than there is real value in blog popularity, or even New York Times popularity. The so-called popularity of a Twitter account, a blogger or a newspaper is usually a result of marketing of some sort. As we all know, that is about quantity rather than quality. The “quantity” may be varied:
• effort in spending hours chasing followers on Twitter
• link marketing to get readers for your blog
• spending lots of money on promoting your newspaper (or tv network etc)

But when we come to some tight vertical niches, there are some direct relationships between effort and results on Twitter. According to the DJ Magazine annual poll, Armin van Buuren is the most popular Trance DJ. Going by Followers, Armin is also the most popular Tweeter.

No.1 with 13,845 followers & 70 tweets & No.1 in DJ Mag - Armin van Buuren

Places 2 and 3 in the Twitter charts also follow the DJ rankings:

No.2 with 10,331 followers & 22 tweets & No.2 in DJ Mag - Tiësto

No.3 with 8,157 followers & 113 tweets & No.3 in DJ Mag - Paul van Dyk

So far, so good. It is no surprise the most “popular” DJs (or you could say “most well known”) would also attract lots of Twitter followers. But then the picture changes and perhaps this is a clue to Follower popularity.

No.4 with 8,012 followers & 392 tweets & No.6 in DJ Mag - Ferry Corsten

No.5 with 3,790 followers & 44 tweets & No.4 in DJ Mag - Above & Beyond

The dramatic fall from 8K to 3K followers could reflect the low number of Tweets made by Above & Beyond. A&B are always high in the charts of trance and dance DJ lists, so they could be said to be as well known as Corsten. But Ferry has posted almost 10 times more Tweets and has over 4,000 more followers.

Has anyone made a survey of other specific music styles? For example, heavy metal or singer/songwiter or country & western. Let us know.

Once again we have terrible and very low-grade marketing by the UK music industry. Lily Allen has a new song on release so what do we get? Yes, you guessed it - gutter slime marketing.

First, of course, is the topless photo. You may remember the last Allen single had her sending a topless photo “by mistake” to the lead singer of a very popular group.

This time the topless photo is in a magazine and the “exclusive” marketing snippet is that Allen fancies the lead singer of Snow Patrol.

The amazing thing is the transparency of these desperate UK attempts at “marketing” and the nasty cynicism of wannabes like Allen.

The UK music scene has been a laughing stock worldwide for the past 20 years. The big-business labels and the low talent they promote are a laugh. But the last laugh is on those “experts” and their in-the-pocket UK critics.

The best singing talent in the UK in the past 20 years has come from talent shows. People like Paul Potts and Leona Lewis. People that the big labels ignored and overlooked.

A potential classic in the list of rock ‘n’ roll biopics will be The Runaways, not least because the cast has some of the hottest young stars in movies today.

The film concentrates on the time Joan Jett was the leading member of the all-girl group The Runaways. Twilight’s Kristen Stewart (photo right) plays Jett, Dakota Fanning plays lead singer Cheri Currie and Scout Taylor-Compton has recently signed on to play lead guitarist Lita Ford. Michael Shannon will play the band’s producer and manager Kim Fowley.

The Runaways formed in 1975, initially as a teen novelty act, then parted ways in 1979. Jett went on to form the Blackhearts and notch up hits with I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll and Bad Reputation.

Madonna has been named the highest-earning musician in a poll conducted by America’s Forbes magazine. The ‘Material Girl’ singer made £73 million in the past year, thanks in part to the success of her Hard Candy album and sold-out ‘Sticky & Sweet’ tour, according to Rolling Stone.

Celine Dion finished second with £66 million. Beyoncé placed third with £58 million coming from the I am…Sasha Fierce LP and thesubsequent tour, along with starring roles in movies Obssesed and Cadillac Records.