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Spike Lee announces Off The Wall Documentary - Estate Announcement Page 66

barbee0715 said:
But wasn't it good for casual fans too-because they also offered a set of the reissued album and demos only-and they also offered Wembley totally separate.
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A lot of people already had the original album, especially since 2009 and demos and unfinished material is not something that is interesting outside hardcore fan base which is small percentage of all fan base. I think the concept of Bad 25 was missed opportunity to introduce some of those incredible outtakes to the world. Just putting unfinished material on CD 2 won't make the product more interesting to casual fans and especially to the wider audience and the sale numbers proved that. At least one song (if not more or all of them) should have been finished and sent to radio stations. There's not radio station in the world that would play Don't Be Messin' Around and I'm So Blue in the state they were sent to radio stations in some parts of the world, not even in China or South Korea and especially in US, UK or Europe. If Timbaland did wonders with Loving You, just imagine what he could have done with I'm So Blue and how it would sound. Ideal thing would be if they approached Quincy Jones with those 6 songs to finish them and if he accepted. He would of course said no for whatever reason. And then they should have approached some other producer, preferably just one producer so that all 6 songs have the same cohesive sound. And then release CD 1 with 3 previously released outtakes from Special Edition and CD 2 with 6 new songs and 6 demos of those same songs + French version of IJCSLY. That would be perfect in my opinion.

Live CD should have been released as separate 2 discs project with full concert. No VHS and no remixes on the main CDs. If they had any show in DVD or higher quality with multitracks, then release that show instead, for example Japan Tour 1987. Remixes could have been released on Promo Pepsi CD with Pepsi cans and as digital promo singles.
 
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OnirMJ said:
I don't know what is your problem. I just said that Bad 25 is not "exactly what (all) fans wanted". It is exactly what some fans wanted. It's not an opinion. I don't see why or how anyone can have problem with what I replied to Always There. You are the one who is trying to start an argument, not me.
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It really just seems to me there was no reason for that comment on what AlwaysThere said. Not everything everyone says is to be taken literally, it was pretty clear AlwaysThere wasn't declaring he thought every single fan was happy with B25.
 
SmoothGangsta said:
It really just seems to me there was no reason for that comment on what AlwaysThere said. Not everything everyone says is to be taken literally, it was pretty clear AlwaysThere wasn't declaring he thought every single fan was happy with B25.
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And I think there was no reason for your comment on what I said. It wasn't clear to me and that's why I said what I think about that.
 
respect77 said:
Who said the documentary had no visible effect on album sales? Five MJ albums in the top 200 on pure album sales. OTW #30!
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But only #61 on overall chart. That's not so good. I expected much better results given the good reviews and critics love for this album. Too bad that stupid streaming counts. US fans stream the album!

I doubt they are happy at Sony Music/Epic Records. Bad 25 sold 47,000 copies in the first week in the US and it peaked at #23 and #46 and they were not satisfied with the numbers.
 
OnirMJ said:
But only #61 on overall chart. That's not so good. I expected much better results given the good reviews and critics love for this album. Too bad that stupid streaming counts. US fans stream the album!

I doubt they are happy at Sony Music/Epic Records. Bad 25 sold 47,000 copies in the first week in the US and it peaked at #23 and #46 and they were not satisfied with the numbers.
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I don't know why some fans keep comparing it to projects like T25, B25. Those were anniversary releases, T25 highly promoted, this was not. They put big efforts into those but this is just a documentary on pay TV basically. No new content other than that. What did you expect? For it to go #1? Top 10? Some fans keep having unrealistic dreams about what a re-release like this is able to do on the charts.

I doubt Sony is disappointed because I doubt they had unrealistic expectations about this one. If they had they would have put a lot more effort into the release, promotion etc. This was a low key project, unlike Bad 25 or Thriller 25 and for that it's doing well.

If it will be able to keep OTW on the BB200 for a long time I will be satisfied. Constant charting is a lot more important than a high peak then disappearing from the charts.
 
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Wasn't the documentary due to air this weekend on the BBC in the UK? I see no listing for it...
 
@michaeljackson got mine today!!!👑?????? #MJOTW2016
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HMV?????? ?@HMV_Omiya
 
respect77 said:
I don't know why some fans keep comparing it to projects like T25, B25. Those were anniversary releases, T25 highly promoted, this was not. They put big efforts into those but this is just a documentary on pay TV basically. No new content other than that. What did you expect? For it to go #1? Top 10? Some fans keep having unrealistic dreams about what a re-release like this is able to do on the charts.

I doubt Sony is disappointed because I doubt they had unrealistic expectations about this one. If they had they would have put a lot more effort into the release, promotion etc. This was a low key project, unlike Bad 25 or Thriller 25 and for that it's doing well.

If it will be able to keep OTW on the BB200 for a long time I will be satisfied. Constant charting is a lot more important than a high peak then disappearing from the charts.
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I didn't compare it to Thriller 25. I compared it to Bad 25. Yeah, it's not anniversary project but it is a very similar project to Bad 25 (with less content, of course). I think they could have promoted it more. I did not expect smash #1 hit album, but at least Top 40 would be nice. #61 is not good in my opinion. And it's not just chart position. According to HDD the album sold 6,965 copies and that includes digital downloads! (do we have Billboard numbers?). It's out of Top 50 on Sales Plus Streaming Chart so I don't know the total number but it's less than 11,152. What do you think how many physical copies of the album did Sony Music pressed and stocked in various shops and online stores? With these sale numbers, I guess they'll end up with piles of this album in stock or sent back to them.
 
OnirMJ said:
I didn't compare it to Thriller 25. I compared it to Bad 25. Yeah, it's not anniversary project but it is a very similar project to Bad 25 (with less content, of course). I think they could have promoted it more. I did not expect smash #1 hit album, but at least Top 40 would be nice. #61 is not good in my opinion. And it's not just chart position. According to HDD the album sold 6,965 copies and that includes digital downloads! (do we have Billboard numbers?). It's out of Top 50 on Sales Plus Streaming Chart so I don't know the total number but it's less than 11,152. What do you think how many physical copies of the album did Sony Music pressed and stocked in various shops and online stores? With this sale numbers, I guess they'll end up with piles of this albums in stock or sent back to them.
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No, it's not like Bad 25. It's basically a documentary that aired on pay TV that we are talking about. Nothing more. I guess we have different ideas about what a documentary like this that airs on pay TV should realistically accomplish. IMO the goal was to raise awareness for the album and it did raise awareness for it. Hopefully it will be yet anoter MJ album that will regularly chart from now on.

Let's see it by the end of the year. Last year there was a much hyped documentary about Kurt Cobain (Heck of a Montage). It came out around the same time last year as this OTW docu, also premiered at Sundance etc. It made Nevermind sell 121,000 copies by the end of the year. OTW apparently sold 25,000 copies in the last four weeks, if it keeps selling a couple of thousand each week it can easily sell in that range by the end of the year or even more. I think that's the realistic thing to compare the effect of the documentary to and to measure its success.
 
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respect77 said:
No, it's not like Bad 25. It's basically a documentary that aired on pay TV that we are talking about. Nothing more. I guess we have different ideas about what a documentary like this that airs on pay TV should realistically accomplish. IMO the goal was to raise awareness for the album and it did raise awareness for it. Hopefully it will be yet anoter MJ album that will regularly chart from now on.

Let's see it by the end of the year. Last year there was a much hyped documentary about Kurt Cobain (Heck of a Montage). It came out around the same time last year as this OTW docu, also premiered at Sundance etc. It made Nevermind sell 121,000 copies by the end of the year. OTW apparently sold 25,000 copies in the last four weeks, if it keeps selling a couple of thousand each week it can easily sell in that range by the end of the year or even more. I think that's the realistic thing to compare the effect of the documentary to and to measure its success.
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That is not the case here as they are not selling the documentary here. If they released the documentary on DVD and blu-ray 6,000+ copies would be Ok. They are selling here re-release of Off The Wall album with bonus disc with Spike Lee's documentary about the album. Huge difference. And even for a re-release 6,000 copies is extremely low. Also don't forget that a lot of those 6,000 copies came from itunes and other digital download sites. I'm talking here about the actual CD/DVD and CD/blu-ray package. They sold around 4,000-5,000 copies of those newly printed albums. What do you think how many of these did they pressed and shipped to various stores? I think that they'll end up with huge number of unsold physical copies of the album+documentary combos.
 
OnirMJ said:
That is not the case here as they are not selling the documentary here. If they released the documentary on DVD and blu-ray 6,000+ copies would be Ok. They are selling here re-release of Off The Wall album with bonus disc with Spike Lee's documentary about the album. Huge difference. And even for a re-release 6,000 copies is extremely low. Also don't forget that a lot of those 6,000 copies came from itunes and other digital download sites. I'm talking here about the actual CD/DVD and CD/blu-ray package. They sold around 4,000-5,000 copies of those newly printed albums. What do you think how many of these did they pressed and shipped to various stores? I think that they'll end up with huge number of unsold physical copies of the album+documentary combos.
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It's just the same album that has already been released and re-released over and over again in the past, now put into a package with a documentary. There is nothing new. It's not even remastered now or anything. The general public hardly will go out in masses and buy a package like that for $30. What did you think? Not even hard core fans will, as many declared even on this board because (unlike in the case of Bad25 there is no new content). The film they can watch on TV or the Internet and that's the only new content.

If you want to see it as a horrible flop go on, but the fact is that the documentary gave a push to Off The Wall which will probably not be any different to how Heck of a Montage pushed the sales of Nevermind up a bit. It's what realistically can be expected from a project like this. I think Sony knew too because it's not like they put much effort into the package or the promotion - and they already knew the limits of such a project from Bad 25 (which actually did offer new things to fans, so I am pretty sure Sony knew something like this package was not going to sell even like Bad 25 did). If you had much higher expectations then maybe it's your expectations that are irrealistic.

What do you think how many of these did they pressed and shipped to various stores?
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I don't know, do you? Because you keep going on about this as if you do know that there was a huge number shipped out which will now all be returned because it's a huge flop, all doom and gloom. If you have knowledge about it or what Sony's actual expectations of this project were/are (because you love to say how disappointed they are now) please share.

BTW, I don't care if people buy digital copies or physical copies of OTW or whether they buy this new package or just buy the album alone. It's all OTW. And if people buy OTW (any version of it) then that's probably because of the documentary that they saw on TV, even if they do not want to buy the documentary just the album.

The documentary will now have to be distributed to as many TV channels as possible around the world and that will take care of constant sales of OTW throughout the year all over the world which is what the main goal should be.

I did not expect smash #1 hit album, but at least Top 40 would be nice.
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It's #30 on pure album sales this week. It's only because of streaming that it's not in the Top 40.
 
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respect77 said:
No, it's not like Bad 25. It's basically a documentary that aired on pay TV that we are talking about. Nothing more. I guess we have different ideas about what a documentary like this that airs on pay TV should realistically accomplish. IMO the goal was to raise awareness for the album and it did raise awareness for it. Hopefully it will be yet anoter MJ album that will regularly chart from now on.

Let's see it by the end of the year. Last year there was a much hyped documentary about Kurt Cobain (Heck of a Montage). It came out around the same time last year as this OTW docu, also premiered at Sundance etc. It made Nevermind sell 121,000 copies by the end of the year. OTW apparently sold 25,000 copies in the last four weeks, if it keeps selling a couple of thousand each week it can easily sell in that range by the end of the year or even more. I think that's the realistic thing to compare the effect of the documentary to and to measure its success.
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It sold 25,000 copies? WOW!
 
Psychoniff said:
It sold 25,000 copies? WOW!
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Off the Wall did in four weeks. I think all versions of OTW are counted together in that. Obviously because it sold already before the new package came out due to people watching the documentary on Showtime. OTW has been in the Top 100 on Billboard for a couple of weeks now.

I think this new package is really is just an opportunity for people who want to own the documentary to have it (which, let's be realistic, will not be many for $30 when they can watch it on TV). I don't think Sony thinks of it as some huge, major project that needs to sell big. If they do they are crazy. LOL.
 
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weLoveMJImmortal ?@mjThisisitlove
Happy Anniversary #MichaelJackson #MJOTW2016
thank you MICHAEL!!!
we miss you..
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woo hoo...Finally, @michaeljackson's #MJOTW2016 Out in Japan
 
Paris78 said:
weLoveMJImmortal ?@mjThisisitlove
Happy Anniversary #MichaelJackson #MJOTW2016
thank you MICHAEL!!!
we miss you..
CdHTCfSUsAEAdaR.jpg


CdHP20wVIAEx1VN.jpg

woo hoo...Finally, @michaeljackson's #MJOTW2016 Out in Japan
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I wish we had that display here too
 
Paris78;4140147 said:
Off the Wall is No. 1. in New Zealand. http://www.apple.com/nz/itunes/charts/albums/ …

Maria Hassell ‏@HassellMaria A 37 year album beating Adele's 25 is truly LEGENDARY - Michael Jackson #OffTheWall #iTunesNewZealand Number 1
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Unfortunately the Apple website is often out of date with it's iTunes charts. If you want accurate, up-to-the-minute charts you'll have to actually view the charts inside the iTunes Store itself, not Apple.com. Currently the iTunes Store shows OTW jumping between #3 and #4 (I saw it at #3, refreshed the page and it went to #4).

Still, pretty impressive! Keep in mind too that for some weird reason, Sony Music NZ/the Estate lists all of Michael's album at $17.99, which is about the price here for a brand new album. I reckon they should permanently drop his albums down to $9.99 or $12.99, that's how cheap the original albums are in stores here.
 
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respect77 said:
Still will be too expensive for the general public to go out in masses and buy it just for a documentary that they can watch on TV.
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True. Can't think of many releases I'd be willing to spend the money I paid for OTW for any other artists TBH.
 
respect77 said:
Still will be too expensive for the general public to go out in masses and buy it just for a documentary that they can watch on TV.
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No, not in masses, but definitely more than 6,000 copies. And it's not just for a documentary. It's for both the original album + new documentary.
 
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