Following the epic flop that has been Leona Lewis’ sophomore LP ‘Echo’ in the US, one of the album’s main collaborators, hitmaker Ryan Tedder, has given his 2 cents on why he feels the record has underperformed Stateside – poor promotion and…Lady GaGa. Speaking in an interview with Digital Spy, the producer (the creative force behind Lewis’ ‘Bleeding Love’ and ‘Happy’) said:
“In the US, unless you’re Justin Timberlake or Beyoncé, you cannot put out a song and not be in the country when it comes out.
Leona was gone for six weeks when ‘Happy’ came out because she was promoting the record in other countries – it wasn’t her fault; she couldn’t be two places in once.
I had radio stations telling me that they thought ‘Happy’ was the single biggest ballad they’d come across in ten years, but that if Leona didn’t come over here and promote it, it was going to fall.”
However, Tedder also admitted that the impact of Lady GaGa – who has notched up five US top ten hits in the last 12 months – might have adversely affected the single’s chances.
“On top of that, America’s consumed with Lady GaGa and dance music right now, so it’s not the best time for ballads anyway”, he said. “When everything on the radio is blasting out at 120 bpm, a song like ‘Happy’ almost sounds out-of-place.”
Though I commend Tedder for trying to help Leona save face, let’s be real…’Happy’ and ‘Echo’ were both sleeping pills on a disc. At the end of the day, with the amount of marketing push and budget put up for artists of Leona’s magnitude, if the album ended up tanking it’s usually the material that is at fault. I mean, folks knew it was out, yet didn’t buy it because they didn’t gravitate toward the sub-par single (which is always supposed to act as an advertisement of sorts for the actual album). For all Lady GaGa’s success, her case is still an anomaly, yet is a testament to the fact that ‘good’ music will find a way to get its shine, somehow, some way.
Still, on the one hand, the whole situation is actually quite unfortunate, as Leona has been blessed with a level of talent and skill the music industry has not seen since Whitney and Mariah hit the scene all those decades ago. However, in today’s uber competitive climate, it’s imperative that artists consistently serve up that good-good with the music, as we’re unfortunately at that stage where they are only as hot as their last hit.
Yet on the other hand, it’s slightly annoying; I can actually remember reading and watching interviews about Leona’s sophomore LP (many of which were given by her), talking about how she was experimenting with new sounds and how it’d be markedly different to her debut, only to hear the finished product and -save for a couple of tracks-having to endure ballad after dry ballad.
In any case, I’m sure Leona will be fine in the long run. Her team just need to switch things up. Ballads are understandably her mainstay, with good reason; however delivering half-decent ones would be a good starting point. Sigh…
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GIMMICKY BLOG
WITHOUT RIHANNA YOU WOULD BE NOTHING
^^ B**** will you shut the f*** up? We heard you the first time…
Anyway, Leona needs to pull a “Christina” and start making some more upbeat stuff that’ll get those of us who are not a fan of ballads interested. I use Xtina as an example because she also has an amazing voice, and doesn’t confine it to just slow songs. In order to survive in the US market, chick needs to hit up a dance studio, learn how to move and reinvent her image and her sound, because it almost always takes more than a great voice to make it here. Class examples are RiRi and Gaga, who can’t sing for s*** (compared to REAL vocalists), but are nevertheless leading the pack because they have the “entire” package.
Leona’s pure talent, but the package is incomplete.
I like Leona and by your definition she can sing right????? But It proves the ponit that singing is but just one part of making hits AND it has always been like that. Check the supremes then Diana Ross and the supremes the Diana Ross who by your definition is not an amazing singer ( at least not compared to people lie Mary Wilson, Aretha etc).
So you need to buying an promoting Leona instaed of hating on others.
Let Leona cut loose dance and sing at the same time her fans willl be back but she has to bring something new and fresh.The old ballads are not working.
@youputthelimeinthecocunut I agree w/ you on all that you said except for Gaga not being able to sing. I hate seeing stuff like this bc if you see her live you know shes an amazing singer.
I embedded the link and it didn’t post, so heres a link, you might be surprised esp the 2nd song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NM51qOpwcIM
“At the end of the day, with the amount of marketing push and budget put up for artists of Leona’s magnitude, if the album ended up tanking it’s usually the material that is at faul”
Poor choice of lead single which wasn’t radio friendly in today’s BPM dominated market totally killed any launch momentum for the album. Have to disagree with Sam though, the album itself has some superb tracks on it.
On marketing push and budget – lost count of the number of people who didn’t even know she had an album out. The whole campaign seems to have been very poorly organised with little promo in the US, a video delivered 6-7 weeks later than it needed to be by which time radio had already decided not to play the single. No coincidence that sales of Happy and the Billboard position shot up when the video started playing.
Sam – on the album being different to the first one and Leona’s interviews on this, sh *always* focussed on it being a more organic sound. And clearly it does have that. Also by veering away from a more RnB sound and more towards pop-rock-country it hasn’t exactly endeered itself to many of the urban blogs such as yourself.
LMAO @ “sleeping pills on a disc” – you are such a bitchy/facety blogger
I’m calling Bullsh*t! Leona promoted her song andalbum very well in the US starting from Divas live. She has been on just about every late night talk show, dancing with the stars, presenting at the amas, fall, letterman, ellen, at alot of premieres in Hollywood and son on.
tedder is just making up excuses. people just wasn’t feeling her and it’s not jsut in the states, her album is close to the 60s in her home country after 2 mths and it didn’t do that well in europe so across the board except england, echo hasn’t done well.
THIS THAT PERSON WHO KEEPS SAYING:
“GIMMICKY BLOG
WITHOUT RIHANNA YOU WOULD BE NOTHING”
HAS A TIMER OR SOMETHING ? LIKE REALLY WTF, STFU, NOONE GIVES A F*** ABOUT RIHANNA.
____
BACK TO THE TOPIC, YES IF YOUR NAME ISNT JUSTIN, BEYONCE OR GAGA YOU AINT SELLING S*** WITH OUT MAJOR PROMO !!!!
You can’t blame anyone for not succeeding. You can only blame yourself. If you wanna go places in life, you gotta put in the work and you’ll get there. end of story!
How do you blame another artist for the reason why someones album didn’t sell? You must not be a very good artist if you have to do that. Besides I really didn’t like that “I see you” avatar theme. She can’t really sing live and the only song I really liked by her was “Bleed Love” and I just got into that song a few weeks ago..haha.
US IS ALL DANCE CLUB CRAZE. WITHOUT 2-3 SOLID DANCE TRACKS ON THE ALBUM IT WILL FIZZLE FOR SURE. LEONA CANT REALLY SEE HER DOING UPTEMPOS, MORE A BALLADEER. MAYBE SHE SHUD GO WAY OF SUBO IN THE AC MARKET, HAHA. THE 60+ DEMOGRAPHICS LIKE THAT S***. DAMN, EVEN WHITNEY HAD A #1 BB DANCE CHARTS WITH MDB. NOW IF THEY RELEASE WI REMIX, FTL, AND DO A HIP HOP REMIX OF SALUT IT WILL TAKE OFF IN THE US. IF WHITNEY CAN DO IT WHY CANT LEONA? SHE CANT DANCE THO.. EVEN WHITNEY CAN DO A 2 STEP AND LOOK GOOD WITH DANCERS. LEONA IS DONE IN THE US!
I like “Happy”
headline. “tedder blames gaga for leone fail” NO, he didn’t blame lady gaga alone, he blamed DANCE MUSIC, and how the world is loving it at the moment. other than that, love leona and gaga!!
She and Lady Gaga put out different types of music. Susan Boyle and Alicia Keys seem to be doing just fine with their ballads. I agree with another poster, it’s the material because she’s had promotion.
oh and to the person that said gaga cannot sing, i know rihanna can’t but she has something about her which still makes you like her. watch gaga singin live and you will change your mind, just because you may not like gaga, don’t diss her singing ability!
I love Leona but Happy was the wrong single choice. Her album isn’t a sleeping pill on a disc, it is very good musically. If only people can get past the oh ‘it’s LeLe singing yet another ballad” and listen to the actual songs, they would realise that.
I’m glad she isn’t waving her c****** all over the place to some ‘hot beat’. Without even looking, I guarentee her songs are better than the top 20 songs on the BB100 combined. At least she is singing something that has meaning.
As for the person saying Leona can’t sing live, please SFHU! You don’t know what you are talking about.
Leona >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> TO all ur favs 😀
@Ian – most of that promo came way after the song had been released. You have to coordinate radio and TV promo together. Leona did two TV slots in early September in the US and that was it for 8 weeks. No radio promo tour, no late night show follow ups etc and no video for the single for 6 more weeks after the Diva slot. The talk show appearances you mention came atfer the album had been released by which stage the single had already been discarded by radio.
The whole campaign has been a very badly coordinated mess with the UK and US sides getting in each others way. And it’s unforgivable the number of basic errors they’ve made like releasing and deleting three slightly different versions of the video on YouTube, slashing it’s hits, and country restricting the video so it couldn’t be watched or embedded in some countries the week the single was released there. I know French music websites complained about this for one.
dont blame being a flop on anybody she’s a boring biatch.
still she CAN sing.
He’s talking out of his a*** because GaGa managed to be absolutely everywhere all the time, and definitely experienced Stateside success while being out of her home country.
‘Happy’ was shite and any radio pluggers who told him otherwise were lying (or had terrible taste).
Bottom line Leona is a poor man’s Whitney or Mariah. She seem to believe the hype but never delivered on it. Leona is a very boring artist being promoted like a diva. This aint the 80’s an artist like Whitney and Mariah would have to be promoted different today even though music is in a very whack state with GaGa and RiRi at the forefront. Music needs a Motown. Leona needs to cut the diva posture, get on a new grind, change her boring ass image, hit the gym and act like she wants to win.
mUSIC IS MOVING TO DANCE NOW. MUSIC ALWAYS CHANCES IT’S NOW BACK TO THE POP DANCE SOUND LIKE IN THE 80’S THAT MICHAEL, MADONNA AND WHINTEY ALL DID. IF YOU DON’T MOVE WITH THE TIME YOUR GOING TO BE LEFT BEHIND
They should have released “Outta My Head” first. It’s the most uptempo song on the album and it stands out because of how different it sounds for her. I fault the label for trying to play it safe with “Happy” as opposed to taking a chance on ” outta my head”, giving Leona more range.
It seems like they are repeating the same mistake twice with the choice of the second single, “I got You”. Great song, but not what top 40 radio is trying add these days unfortunately.
TO SOME DEGREE THIS IS TRUE.
IF YOU CHECK OUT THE TOP 10 ON THE US CHARTS, THEY ARE ALL UPTEMPO.
RIHANNA IS THE ONLY EXCEPTION WHEN RUSSIAN ROULETTE WENT TOP 10. BUT DIDNT LAST THAT LONG. HOWEVER, EUROPE IS STILL EATING UP THAT SONG.
HARD IS HAVING MUCH MORE SUCCESS BECAUSE ITS MORE AMERICAN.
I like Happy and her album Echo. They should have gone with Outta My Head or I Got You as the lead single though. It’s a shame because her album was good
she is boring
Blaming Lady Gaga is the last thing he should be doing. Don’t be mad cause Lady Gaga doesn’t actually put people to sleep when she performs. Leona is a very, very, very, pretty girl with a soothing voice, but that is it. It is almost one of those things where she is a little too pretty to be taken seriously. She is just too safe, she had her peak with the first album, “Happy” was a moderate hit, too bad. She needs to stop singing lullabies if she wants to get further, cause Alexandra Burke is steadfast on her heels and she ain’t showing no signs of slowing down.
caca
Leona songs just don’t cross over well in America
Cuz here u really gotta bring it dance/pop is what’s hot now Leona is going to have to do more upbeat music or stop putting out music in the u.s
lady gaga is hot because her songs r catchy and she is extremely creative and always give a good elaborate performance.
Leona performances r boring and dry she needs a sexier image and faster songs to keep up in the u.s music industry
what!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!????????????
i love love her album! ballads from her rocks big time!