Originally Posted by
TheMotownManiac
I used to wide of a generality: certainly not everyone hated it, just everyone I knew hated it. I’m glad you gave Miss Ross another chance after not liking the first album that you got of hers. My point isn’t if one album is good or bad because No one even knows quite good or bad it is, my point is that Ross’ albums were going in a downward spiral sales wise after the Chic LP and when swept away came out, they reversed the trend. Part of this is due to word of mouth on the album and people hearing the album and going out and buying their own copy. This happened with the Diana album - it went charging up the charts with no single at all because word of mouth on the album is so hot. Swept away was just so much more commercial for that point in time, it happens to be my favorite of the RCA albums.
look at Supremes Agogo, and HDH:HDH had two number one singles on it, but it sold nowhere near as well and even though it was released months after a gogo, a gogo was still on the charts for months after HDH dropped off. I don’t believe this is because of the album cover, promotion or the alignment of the stars as much as I do people heard cuts at parties or were told to listen to something by friends and they liked it and bought their own copy. Word of mouth on a current act is a big help to album sales. My experience was that word of month on Silk, Ross 83 and Eaten wasn’t good and they slipped. Red hot rhythm and blues was so horrible, that I really didn’t speak about it to anybody except my very very very closest friends, but I’m guessing the same thing occurred.