Neil (skyrefuge) posted this over at PM:X. I thought it was rather interesting and perhaps will shed some light on things for those that have questions about band selections, roster slot (cough*theMichael*cough), etc. You should only look at the band comparison, not the festival comparison as both have different targets and budgets.
For the record, this is the first time I have heard of the data source.
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It's time for more charts and graphs! I selected three US metal festivals (ProgPowerUSA VIII, Heathen Crusade II, and Chicago Powerfest 2007) and collected data from last.fm for each band. The piece of data I used was "X listeners total" (under Weekly Top Listeners).
There are some sources of error. A "number of listeners this week" figure would probably be better, because would give the best picture of a band's popularity at a particular point in time, but it doesn't seem like they publish that. Next, last.fm has worldwide input, so differences between local and worldwide popularity can be a source of error. Finally, the community of last.fm users might not be perfectly representative of the community of festival attendees.
However, it's probably better than record sales figures, because it shows the number of people actually listening to the band.
I think the results are pretty interesting. Here are some highlights:
- Sonata Arctica is HUGE. They almost have more listeners than all the other bands combined.
- ProgPower's lineup has big numbers throughout. 8 of 10 bands have more than 3000 listeners, while Heathen Crusade was 3 of 18 in that category, and Chicago PowerFest is 3 of 9.
- The PPUSA running order matches the numbers perfectly. There are no less-popular bands playing after a more-popular band. That makes me wonder, does Glenn use this last.fm methodology?
- Similarly, HC was pretty well-ordered, but CPF is all over the map (perhaps Novembers Doom's draw is lower locally because they play in Chicago more often)
Here are the charts of each festival posted individually, and then one of them combined, so you can get an idea of how the scales vary between them.
Some figures for reference:
Iron Maiden - 215,114
Nightwish - 169,574
In Flames - 160,092
Wish me luck at the science fair this weekend!
Neil
For the record, this is the first time I have heard of the data source.
*****************************************
It's time for more charts and graphs! I selected three US metal festivals (ProgPowerUSA VIII, Heathen Crusade II, and Chicago Powerfest 2007) and collected data from last.fm for each band. The piece of data I used was "X listeners total" (under Weekly Top Listeners).
There are some sources of error. A "number of listeners this week" figure would probably be better, because would give the best picture of a band's popularity at a particular point in time, but it doesn't seem like they publish that. Next, last.fm has worldwide input, so differences between local and worldwide popularity can be a source of error. Finally, the community of last.fm users might not be perfectly representative of the community of festival attendees.
However, it's probably better than record sales figures, because it shows the number of people actually listening to the band.
I think the results are pretty interesting. Here are some highlights:
- Sonata Arctica is HUGE. They almost have more listeners than all the other bands combined.
- ProgPower's lineup has big numbers throughout. 8 of 10 bands have more than 3000 listeners, while Heathen Crusade was 3 of 18 in that category, and Chicago PowerFest is 3 of 9.
- The PPUSA running order matches the numbers perfectly. There are no less-popular bands playing after a more-popular band. That makes me wonder, does Glenn use this last.fm methodology?
- Similarly, HC was pretty well-ordered, but CPF is all over the map (perhaps Novembers Doom's draw is lower locally because they play in Chicago more often)
Here are the charts of each festival posted individually, and then one of them combined, so you can get an idea of how the scales vary between them.
Some figures for reference:
Iron Maiden - 215,114
Nightwish - 169,574
In Flames - 160,092




Wish me luck at the science fair this weekend!
Neil