Proving that old adage that sometimes death is good for one’s career…
Lou Reed famously didn’t sell many records during his five decades in the music business, but after he died Sunday at age 71, sales increased significantly. So did radio play of “Walk On the Wild Side,” “Sweet Jane,” “Perfect Day” and “Dirty Blvd.” Reed’s album catalog sold 3,000 copies on Sunday alone, compared to fewer than 1,000 the previous week, an increase of 607 percent, and his solo digital-song sales jumped from 2,000 to 17,000, a 590 percent bump, according to Nielsen SoundScan. His Spotify streams increased 3,000 percent in the first day after his death, radio spins went up 140 percent, and Transformer and Rock N’ Roll Animal hit Amazon’s Top 25.
(click here to continue reading Lou Reed Record Sales Spike After Death | Music News | Rolling Stone.)
I noticed on Monday that most of the Lou Reed albums were back-ordered at Amazon, with the exception of Lulu…
…notice that Amazon is “temporarily out of stock” of most Lou Reed albums. Not Lulu though…
— Seth Anderson (@swanksalot) October 28, 2013
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Lou Reed Sold Out 2013-10-27 at 10.13.40 PM.PNG
and this is good news for crotchety rock snobs like myself, even though White Light White Heat is my 3rd favorite Velvet Underground record, ahead of Loaded, and behind the other two…
Reed’s best-selling posthumous titles, according to SoundScan, were Transformer, the Velvet Underground & Nico and tracks “Walk On the Wild Side” and “Sweet Jane.” But it’s unlikely that demand will lead to a wave of new box sets.
A 45th-anniversary edition of the Velvet Underground’s classic White Light White Heat, which Reed helped compile, will come out December 3rd as scheduled, according to a Universal Music spokesperson.