Dave's Top Eight

1. Jerry Reed...Revisited by Darrell Toney (reviewed 6/07) (5 Stars)
2. Sounds Like Sunday by Janet Paschal (reviewed 5/07) (5 Stars)
3. True To The Call by Kingdom Heirs (reviewed 3/07) (4 1/2 Stars)
4. Revival by Gold City (reviewed 10/06) (4 1/2 Stars)
5. Get Away Jordan by Ernie Haase & Signature Sound (reviewed 2/07) (4 1/2 Stars)
6. Breakin' Chains by Three Bridges (reviewed 5/07) (4 1/2 Stars)
7. Big Sky by The Isaacs (reviewed 4/07)
8. Skywriting by Mercy's Well (reviewed 7/07)

Click title to purchase at CBD.com...click artist name to read Dave's Review. A CD will automatically fall out of the Top Eight after twelve months if no CD surpasses it before then.

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February 16, 2007

Typical Walmart Ignorance


If you had pulled up the Southern Gospel section of digital downloads at Walmart.com today, the image above is what you would have seen. There's not ONE Southern Gospel artist displayed in the "Hot Titles" for Southern Gospel.

If I were working for Gaither, Daywind, Crossroads, etc., I'd be calling up Walmart to ask why this is the case. By the way, I found a number of Crossroads and Gaither titles by searching on artist names, but I couldn't find any Daywind titles. This is probably the top site on the web for WMA format music with over a million songs available and an attractive price point. You'd think a major label would participate. (Of course, it's worth mentioning that many Daywind titles are available at www.emusic.com, where you can get MP3 format files rather than DRM restricted WMA format.)

But let's return to the issue of non-SG artists being promoted as SG. Fortunately, Walmart's customers are a lot smarter than the people who lay out the online storefront.

The current top Southern Gospel artists at Walmart are:
1. Bill & Gloria Gaither And Their Homecoming Friends
2. Gaither Vocal Band
3. Signature Sound Quartet
4. Ernie Haase
5. The Isaacs
6. The Statler Brothers
7. Bob Carlisle
8. Anthony Burger
9. The Bill Gaither Trio
10. Lynda Randle

Current top albums are:
1. Get Away, Jordan - Ernie Haase (This explains why "Ernie Haase" appears on the list of Top Artists as well as "Signature Sound Quartet." Walmart data entry clerks are too dumb to enter the names of artists consistently.)
2. Give It Away - Gaither Vocal Band
3. Heroes - The Isaacs
4. Amen - The Statler Brothers
5. Israel Homecoming - Bill & Gloria Gaither And Their Homecoming Friends
6. Nothing But The Hits - The Canton Spirituals
7. It's Just Like Heaven - Greater Vision
8. Power - The Hoppers
9. Southern Gospel Favorites - Various Artists
10. Glory - Joseph Spence

Top songs are:
1. "Butterfly Kisses" - Bob Carlisle
2. "God On The Mountain - Lynda Randle
3. "The Longer I Serve Him" - Bill & Gloria Gaither And Their Homecoming Friends
4. "In The Palm Of Your Hand" - Alison Krauss & The Cox Family
5. "He Made A Change - Ernie Haase
6. "Why Me" - Gaither Vocal Band
7. "I Catch 'Em, God Clean 'Em" - Gaither Vocal Band
8. "Give It Away" - Gaither Vocal Band

So generally speaking, artists whose style could be logically be called Southern Gospel are outselling mis-categorized artists (including a slate of heavily promoted non-SG artists) within the Southern Gospel category. The only exceptions are Bob Carlisle, the Canton Spirituals, and Joseph Spence.

At least there's a degree of comfort in the fact that Walmart HAS a Southern Gospel category...this contrasts with iTunes, which doesn't get any more specific than "Christian And Gospel."

However, I have to wonder if this gross mis-representation by Walmart doesn't do more harm than good.

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posted by David Bruce Murray @ 9:55:00 PM /links to this post/ permalink
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January 26, 2007

Audiobooks Anyone?

I've posted enough Southern Gospel related articles lately, so I'm due for an off-topic post.

Do any of you listen to audiobooks regularly?

Do you buy the retail version at a store, buy online, rent online, or download online?

I prefer to download. I've been shopping around. I tried Audible.com for a couple of months, but their download files aren't compatible with my iRiver. I had to burn CDs, which took longer than normal due to Audible's silly proprietary format. Then I had to rip each CD to MP3 files, which also took longer than normal for no reason I can decipher. Only then could I get Audible books on my iRiver...pretty ridiculous, when my iRiver plays WMA files just fine.

I was paying them $14.95 per month, which included 2 downloads the first month and 1 download each month thereafter, including unabridged titles. I got John Grisham's The Innocent Man and Fannie Flagg's Can't Wait To Get To Heaven in December initially. A few days ago, I got Michael Crichton's Next. It took me something like four hours after doing the initial download to get just one book moved to my iRiver. I decided that was ridiculous, and canceled my service.

Just now, I was checking out iTunes, but their prices are insanely high. You can buy the regular retail CDs from Amazon.com for the unabridged version of Crichton's Next for $32.95. iTunes wants $31.95 for the download. You save a lousy buck, and then you have to burn the CDs yourself. Also as with Audible, I'd still probably have to burn and rip CDs before I could ever move the book to my iRiver, since iTunes won't directly move files to an iRiver.

Now I've done some Googling and run across www.simplyaudiobooks.com. Are there any readers out there using this company?

It looks great on the surface, but at first glance, the selection doesn't look so hot. The price is much cheaper than Audible. It's $11.95 per month for one download per month. They only offer the abridged version of Next as a download. The files are in WMA format, which means I should be able to move them to my iRiver immediately after downloading them (in theory).

They also sell physical copies. It's higher than Amazon.com for the regular CDs of Crichton's unabridged Next at $44.96, but they also offer it in glorious, compact MP3 format burned to CDs for just $26.96. You can also sign up to rent books, including the unabridged Next, for $14.95 per month. Rentals appear to operate like NetFlix. They send you an item with no shipping charge...you keep it as long as you need to keep it...you send it back in a postage paid envelope...then they send you the next item on your rental list.

My first preference is to download and listen one time. A subscription service is great as long as the credits roll over for two or three months when I don't use them. I need WMA or MP3 format. This service appears to offer all that, BUT it looks like I'd be stuck with abridged books rather than unabridged. Any recommendations?

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posted by David Bruce Murray @ 8:19:00 PM /links to this post/ permalink

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