Has the damage been done?

[RobB]

The gap between the issuing of 'People Are Strange' and 'This Is Stina Nordenstam' was almost exactly three years to the day.

The gap between 'This Is Stina Nordenstam' and 'The World Is Saved' was just a few weeks shy of another three years.

The gap between 'The World Is Saved' and the "Coming Soon" (sic) album now looks very likely to be around the five year mark.

In Pink Floyd terms or Kate Bush terms five years would be seen as a fairly quick turnaround but for a less popular,less known artist like Stina I wonder how much commercial damage has been done by allowing such a relatively long period between releases to pass by?

Any thoughts?

[blue]

I don't think the length of time between albums will do a cult artist like Stina any harm at all, really, considering she has no commercial profile anyway. [b)]

What's done the harm to her commercially is her unwillingness to tour and talk to the media. Playing live is one of the principal ways for an artist to keep their work in the spotlight between records - without that, the album is released, there's a bit of press, then it immediately dies away.

On the other hand, maybe touring and having to talk to the media would have affected the quality of her work. I get the feeling from some of her comments that she thinks so. I'd rather have a really good piece of studio work from her after five years, than something released too quickly that's not worthy of her talent. I actually wish my favourite singer-songwriter would take a leaf out of Stina's book!

[RobB]

How about sales wise though?

What inpired this topic was when I glanced down the members list and saw so many familiar names who five years ago were so enthused about Stina and her music but now no longer post or even visit Stina message boards.

If Stina's fan-base has deminished over the years through lack of news and recording activity,will it impact on less sales for the next album? Has the damage already been done?

[sound world]

Welll...how's about this-I don't think the fanbase hereabouts was very significant until Stina released 'This Is',which for Stina had quite a high profile marketwise,big record company,film to promote it,etc etc.
So the Barbieboard/CQD era was largely a result of 'This Is'-lots of people started out listening to Stina around then and posting on those forums (fora?). Who's to say all those old fans (and lots of new ones) won't creep out of the woodwork with a new release?
Granted,TWIS didn't make much of a change,but it received minimal promotion and Stina's official website went arse over tit immediately afterwards,so any new fans would have had a hard job finding this Forum.

Actually I couldn't really give a damn about Stina's visibility in the marketplace-it means very little in terms of quality of music,which is what interests me.As long as she's able to make music and distribute it (pretty straightforward nowadays),the number of fans she has is immaterial.

I'm more interested to know whether or not she has the urge to make music any more. That's much more of a concern.

[paul-pgss]

I think it is very questionable wether there is a release coming soon. I seriously doubt that Stina made enough profits on The World Is Saved to finance a new album including artwork and videos. I agree with Beth that Stina would seriously be more highprofile when she would start touring. On the other hand: she's turning 40 this year. She won't become the next big thing on that age.

[RobB]

From the replies so far,there seems to be two main issues here which are playing against each other.

On the one hand there is the quality of the work being more important than its commercial impact (ie sales).......and on the hand,unless the work is commercially successful there is then potentially a lack of finance to fund the next project.

I'm hopeful that 'Coming Soon' will be coming soon-ish. The project appears to be at least 75% completed and I can't imagine Stina allowing the money and time already invested in the album to be wasted.

The problem is that once people start to lose interest and get out of the habit of looking for info on a new album (in other words,they no longer have any expectations and stop waiting),when it does finally gets released,a lot of the original fans simply won't know anything about it.

And nowadays,there isn't even the luxury of being able to stumble across a new album in the records stores.
For Stina fans,unless you're actively looking for a new album,they won't know about it and that situation can only allow sales to suffer.

And after five years,will the original fans remember to look?

[paul-pgss]

And nowadays,there isn't even the luxury of being able to stumble across a new album in the records stores.
For Stina fans,unless you're actively looking for a new album,they won't know about it and that situation can only allow sales to suffer.

And after five years,will the original fans remember to look?

Personally I frequently search for what old favourite artists of mine have been up to. Shara Nelson hasn't released an album in a decade but I do check every now and then wether she's released new material. That's exactly the way I discovered that Tanita Tikaram made her beautiful album Sentimental and Tasmin Archer released an album called "On".

I really think that people who liked Stina in the past will play those old records and wonder what she's been up to. With the lovely internet you're up to date in no time, new songs are being previewed on myspace and the new album has been ordered within a couple of minutes. So through the lack of new material a new album will only sell a bit slower.

Even if stina choose to keep releasing new albums without doing interviews and playing live, she could regain her fanbase just by keeping them up to date (yes, here I am suggesting that an official website would be good) and by releasing new material regularly (every two years).

[RobB]

Paul,
lets hope the future turns out as to be as positive for Stina as you make it sound.

Its a pity Stina doesn't start developing her website even if the new album is still many months away.

[kuhn]

[b)]

[RobB]

Well,the damage has certainly been done to Kuhn's left eye !

[kuhn]

Well,the damage has certainly been done to Kuhn's left eye !

both of them suffer permanent damage

[RobB]

Re:
Is that your Marty Feldman impression?

[kuhn]

Re:
Is that your Marty Feldman impression?

It's never too early. It's never too late.

[junebug]

If I may de-lurk for a minute, there's a very interesting and I think insightful blog piece by John Mellencamp here, which delves into the current state of the music business, and which is potentially relevant to the position of any "small" artist like Stina. It's worth just reading, rather than reading my thoughts on it (horse and carriage and all that)... but I will quote this:

Nora Guthrie, Woody's daughter, once told me a story about a reception she was at where Bob Dylan was in attendance. The business people there were quietly commenting on how unsociable Dylan seemed to them, not what they imagined an encounter with Dylan would be like. When that observation about Dylan's behavior and disposition were mentioned to Nora, the response was very profound. She said that Bob Dylan was not put on this earth to participate in cocktail chatter with strangers. Bob Dylan's purpose in life is to write great songs like "Blowin' in the Wind" and "The Times They Are A' Changin'." This sort of sums it all up for me. The artist is here to give the listener the opportunity to dream, a very profound and special gift even if he's minimally successful. If the artist only entertains you for three and a half minutes, it's something for which thanks should be given. Consider how enriched all of our lives are made by songs from "Like A Rolling Stone," a masterpiece, to "The Monster Mash," a trifle by comparison.

[d.a.walker]

Most of my favourite artists have vanished into the ether now and only hard hunting reveals their work!

Still going and very much alive are:

Katell Keineg (last major label release 1997, Jet, but has self released her 3rd and about to release a 4th)
The Paradise Motel (last album 1998's Flight Paths, now about to release a 3rd album 11 years later!)
Frente (They haven't released anything in 13 years but still tour Australia regularly)
Melanie Garside (Released one album, Fossil in the mid 1990's and then seemingly buggered off, I discovered yesterday she's released at least 2 more solo albums under the name Honey Bee!)

It always pays to search, cos very few artists truly disappear. The odds on a new album from Stina are still high but it's now totally on her terms. So in other words, when it's ready hehe!