Even if you’re like me and you don’t care for her music (can’t wait for all the hate mail about that), you have to admit that Susan Boyle is easily one of the biggest phenom’s in the music biz this year.  She didn’t do it by letting fans set their price for her album or trying new and innovative things through social media but just the ol’ fashion way- selling lots of records.  She even beat out Eminem for the best first-week sales of his year.

So how do you explain how she became such a huge star?  For one thing, there’s no denying that she has a great voice, even if you don’t care for what she’s singing.  But there’s lots of great singers out there who’ll never reach her level.  Here’s a few reasons why:

* Simon Cowell and his company deserve lots of credit for setting the whole thing up in the first place. Of course, not every singer he works with through his companies (i.e. American Idol) get to this level but having that platform in the first place was a huge boost for her.  Earlier this year, I talked about how Cowell set up the story about her in the first place.

* The Anti-model Factor. I haven’t seen any of the record buyers polled about this but I’d wager that since Boyle doesn’t look like your typical singing star, lots of people were rooting for her since they don’t have hot bods either (I sure as hell don’t).

* The story behind her. Again, I think this is another (non-musical) reason that many people were rooting for her. One day, she’s nondescript and unknown and then suddenly she becomes a star. And unlike many other instant stars who don’t deserve the fame, she actually does.

LATE THOUGHT: After Beyonce and Taylor Swift got all the Grammy nominations, it’ll be an interesting battle to see who wins next year and (at least temporarily) wears the diva crown but in the meantime, Boyle has them both beat in initial sales (Swift’s last album sold less than Boyle’s in first week sales, ditto Beyonce).

—Jason Gross

I can understand why a writer from the Washington Post was skeptical about so-called album performances where a band recreates an entire album. I agreed in theory that this seemed to kill the spontaneity of a concert and sometimes it could back-fire, not just for the audience but also for the performer(s). When Wire reformed in the mid-‘80s, they had a cover band called Ex-Lion Tamers (featuring future scribe Jim DeRogatis) perform all of “Pink Flag” in order but when Wire themselves came on afterwards, the crowd still wanted to hear the old songs. Similarly, when I’ve seen several acoustic/solo Neil Young shows, the audience would be either warned not to shout out requests or politely told “why don’t you just see what Neil has in store for you?” Of course, the crowd will still yell out requests, once causing Neil to snidely reply “Thank you for reminding me of the titles of my songs.”

—Jason Gross

People don’t listen to the radio or buy CD’s and mostly listen to music on computers now.  Or so we think.  Actually, a new Nielsen study (quoted in Billboard) says that’s bullshit.  Young people are even buying CD’s and listening them much more than iPods.  All of which doesn’t necessarily mean good news as the market for physical product is still shrinking.  But it’s nice to have a reality check like this every now and then about the state of the biz to correct some misconceptions.

—Jason Gross

One of the best recent articles I’ve seen about the future of the entertainment biz online comes from this CNET interview by Greg Sandoval with Big Champagne CEO Eric Garland, whose company tracks the unauthorized downloading that’s given the music industry so much grief.  The thing is, many of these companies also hire Garland to track which downloads are hottest (knowing that they can’t ignore this sector). 

Because of his work, Garland understands much more about the Net age and downloading that just about anyone else in the biz.  He concludes that pay-walls (for places like Hulu) and RIAA lawsuits ain’t gonna save the industry (and of course DRM was ridiculous).  Though he doesn’t have specific solutions himself, he generally sees that the labels/companies need to provide the goods in the quickest and easiest fashion possible.  And the cheapest too, so that they can compete with the free model.  As such, his thoughts should be required reading for anyone in the biz.  Whether they’ll actually listen or take to heart what he says is another matter…

—Jason Gross

A colleague of mine who works in the non-profit world made this prediction: “it’s my belief that, within the next year or two, Facebook or some other social networking service will completely replace email as a way… to reach out to our audiences.”  Mind you, he’s not saying that e-mail itself is gonna die and Facebook will replace it. But the thought that the way that non-profits plus marketers, magazines, promotion (PR), bands and all sorts of other businesses will rely on social media rather than e-mail is an interesting idea to ponder.

The whole idea of social media taking over from e-mail as a way to reach out to audiences almost makes e-mail seem like an antiquated 20th century idea that’s on the way out in this early part of the new millennium. Can we gaze into our collective crystal ball and see how this will shake out?

The rise of social media has been stunning, becoming one of the fastest-growing sectors of the Internet. MySpace (only six years old now) was once the king of the hill but has been overtaken by Facebook, which is only five years old, but Facebook itself is now being challenged by Twitter, which is only three years old now. See the pattern here? Obviously, something is overdue to come and knock down MySpace, Facebook and Twitter off their perches. And a year or two after that happens, something else will take over as the new kind of social media world.

—Jason Gross

If you’re infuriated by Bob Lefsetz, you’re not alone.  When this industry insider and now writer moons about his favorite classic rock albums, he can be pretty moving.  But when he does his all-caps rants, I just wonder why I’m wasting my time reading his childish, ill-informed B.S..  If you want to hear an ol’ guy rant ‘the music industry is dead’ 100’s of times and then show how little he knows about rap, country, metal or several other non-rock genres, then he’s your man.

If you’re a little saner and you’d rather hear someone more thoughtful and intelligence try to dissect the latest music biz news and shenanigans, then you’d be much better off with Roy Trakin.  A nice Jewish boy from Brooklyn (he was once half of the jokey Yid-rap duo M.O.T.) who’s called the other coast home for a while now, he’s senior editor at trade magazine Hits (going back to the mid-80’s).  His weekly ‘Trakin Care of Business’ column comes out on Thursday nights/Friday mornings and is definitely worth reading as he delves not only into new releases but also industry issues, TV, films and other pop culture tidbits.  You may not always agree with him (I don’t) but unlike Bobby L, you never feel like you’ve wasted your time reading him- he obviously puts a lot of time and effort into his columns and always has at least a few interesting insights into his subjects.

Please do yourself a favor and check out his work at Hits.  You can also get his ‘daily dose of Boomerangst’ at Sonic Boomers.

—Jason Gross