Tuesday morning began pretty rough. I looked at the numbers and we were down 20. I slammed my fist on my desk with every disheartening chart I got in knowing my window was closing on me. I talked to the Boston Pirate office telling them they were fired and were awful at their jobs and we should close down if we can't get Neko Case #1.
To catch you up, going into this week I knew it would be a battle. You had the feeling that Ty Segall had run his course and would drop off a bit ( he did going from #1 to #7) It would come down to 3 records Neko Case ( #2 the last 2 weeks) Arctic Monkeys ( charging up the charts) and Franz Ferdinand hanging around in the #3 spot.
All three had a legit shot at #1. Franz is the only one of the three with 2 indies on it and that could be enough to take it over the edge. Arctic Monkeys seems to have the most hype of the three and as I mentioned has been charging up the charts. Neko Case has been owning the AAA charts the last 2 weeks and that is usually a sign of larger station dominance. I checked the charts every hour starting at 8 am on Monday morning.
Here is Monday. PST I stopped checking regularly at 5 but did check one more time before calling it a night.
8AM--9AM--10AM--11AM--12PM--1PM--2PM--3PM--4PM--5PM--10PM
Arctic-----18------20------24-------29--------33------37-----46-----52-----54-----66------87
Ty---------13------14------17-------21--------27------28-----34-----39-----40-----48------61
Franz-----14------16------18-------24--------27------32-----38-----42-----44-----54------73
Neko -----15------16------17-------23--------29------29-----38-----43-----45-----55------72
So not exactly what I was going for when we set off to get #1 with Neko Case. In a perfect world we would be tied or have a lead. Being down so many sucked but the thing with monitoring stations this way is it does not tell you the whole story. For all I know these could be all the very small stations have have very little impact on the actual charts or they could be all the big ones and I could be screwed.
When I woke up on Tuesday I thought I was screwed.
Overnight Arctic had jumped to 105 stations while Neko had only jumped to 87. Ty was starting to show he would not be a factor and Franz, like Franz does, was sticking around with 89 stations.
The next time I checked Neko case was down 124 to 109 but she had passed Franz. It was at this point that I fired everyone. We had 2 and a half hours until the charts closed. You can't really give up at this point but I really thought we were done for. I started to look at the numbers for something to hold on to and noticed we were ahead on some of the bigger stations and some I had just talked to said we were great on their charts so I thought we could have a chance and for the next few hours I stopped going after new stations and focused on those stations that had already been reporting trying to get a little forward movement. I was feeling good until I saw KCRW report and thought the dream was over. They had Arctic Monkeys on there but no Neko Case. I was crushed. My whole plan of attack the last few hours was to narrow the gap, keep it within 10 and hopefully pull out a miracle with the larger core stations. Seeing KCRW I was certain I had failed.
Just as certain as I was earlier this year when I thought 100% that Vampire Weekend was going to be #1. I had never wanted to be wrong more in my life I tweeted. Sure there was a chance. We had more CORE stations but it is so hard to know how much you need to make up the difference of volume.
When the charts came out and Neko Case was #1 I really did not know what to think. On one hand I was overjoyed that we got to #1 on the other hand how the hell did that just happen. Do I keep on underestimating the power of core stations? The difference between one level of core and another is something else I don't ever really grasp but I know this time it was enough.
Of course there were other things that happened on the charts this week. I did not have a horse in the top ADDS race this week but Thought it would come down to Yuck or Moby and in the end Yuck took #1 most added and Moby #2. I hear next week is shaping up to be a crazy week as well, thats to be expected the week before CMJ everyone wants a big record out.
On the charts aside from the race to #1 we have returned to over 300 stations reporting! Give yourself a round of applause. Pretty great to see. I hope we continue more reporters as the CMJ charts are better with the more people reporting.
Lets look at some of the bigger movers. MGMT comes in at #8 from #16, The last record went to #2 but they seem to have faded from being the next it CMJ band but should have a nice chance at top 5 still I think. Chvrches comes in at #9 after being #2 most added last week and jumping up from #78 this is one of the next contenders for #1 for sure. Last weeks #1 most added Dr. Dog comes in at #13 and these two should battle for #1 in a few weeks I think. They are currently only 10 stations apart so the gap is pretty small. I would be surprised if both jumped into the top 5 next week but each should be on the cusp for sure.
The number one debut of the week comes in from Those Darlins at #41 we had 35 debuts this week a pretty high number. Still feel there are a lot of people coming back and would expect that to mean records that were big over the summer to hang out for a bit longer. Taking a look there are, not counting the current #1, 8 former #1s on the chart. Most seem to be maintaining pretty well with a few even moving back up on the charts.
What are you guys looking forward to seeing at CMJ? What are you listening to lately? Let me know! If you want to have a discussion about this lets do it on twitter @theanimalarrg
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