 Carrie Underwood (AP Photo)
Posted: April 26, 2007
NEW YORK (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) -- American Idol has achieved success that its creators likely never imagined when first setting out and part of that successful strategy is the allure of instant fame and a music career for the average joe. The question remains however, as to how many Idol winners go on to successful careers -- in this article, we'll examine some of those stats, culled from CelebrityAccess's tour histories and other information sources:Season 1's winner Kelly Clarkson has been a success by most any standard. Since her "Idol" win, she's released three records, selling a combined total of 8.3 million units with all three being multi-platinum. She's still touring actively and still selling out, with an average box office sales in the 90% range.
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Season 2's Ruben Studdard found early success after his win, but post victory lap, last fame has been harder to hold on to. He's released three records as well, with his debut "Thankful" moving 2.5 million units. His second effort "I Need An Angel" still posting decent numbers at 430,000 and "The Return" which was released last October has shifted more than 200,000 units thus far. Ruben's tour efforts have been less fruitful. According to box office scores accumulated by CelebrityAccess, he's managed to sell about 65% of capacity on average with a recent appearance in January luring in only 600 fans in a 1600 capacity room (38%). Season 3's winner Fantasia Barrino remains popular with fans and her debut release shifted 2 million units. She's not been a slouch either, touring extensively with an average ticket-sale percentage of 92% Countrified Carrie Underwood, the victor of season 4, perhaps appealing to one of Idol's strongest demographics has been extremely successful. Her 2005 release "Some Hearts" has gone platinum 5 times over. With more than 5.25 million units sold, two Grammy awards under her belt (Best New Artist, and Best Female Country Vocal Performance) and major box office numbers, Carrie is still a force to be reckoned with. Season 5's winner Taylor Hicks, the most recent "Idol" winner isn't a neophyte in the biz but his newfound celebrity has vaulted him to success. His first post-"idol" release dropped on December 12, 2006 and has already sold more than 650,000 units and he's been following a busy tour schedule, over 98 dates since July of 2006 with an average sell-rate of 88%. Its not just "Idol" winners who are finding post-show success. Season 5 fourth place finisher Chris Daughtry has been moving records -- more than 2.3 million since his debut "Daughtry" dropped in November of 2006 and his shows are virtually all SRO so far with about 99.7 of available seats sold. "American Idol" has proven to be a powerful vehicle to launch nascent careers -- Taylor Hicks post-Idol media blitz disk selling more than 36 times the combined total of his previous two records, "In Your Time" (1997) and "Under the Radar" (2005), which moved 1,500 and 17,000 units respectively. The public though, is a fickle audience -- the formula, though successful so far, really hasn't changed significantly so the challenge for producers and advertisers will be how to keep the show from getting stale. Considering how sales are doing for recorded music in general, maybe more established artists should go on "American Idol." - CelebrityAccess Staff Writers |
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