How many albums have you sold?

[abt]

I know some would consider this private information, I respect that, but I'm hoping that some of you might share some stats on how many albums have you sold? Singles? Signed or unsigned?

I'd also like to hear how many you've given away. While were at it feel free to include YouTube views and any other on-line plays.

 

[amarshism]

Probably a few tens of thousands all up

 

[ArnaudM]

With ALKEMYST, maybe 7000 copies of "Meeting in the Mist", I mean the label told us. In South America and Russia, it is impossible to know.
And maybe 2500/3000 copies for "Through Painful Lanes". The label was smaller.

But, anyway, you don't have so much control. It's easy to cheat, I mean.

 

[Sloan]

Prob only a few hundred if I include all my projects in which I've sold albums.

 

[Terminus]

According to bandcamp my first two The Tide releases have 99 full album downloads and 45 single song dl's all free of charge. Haven't released a metal album yet, although I have two EPs, one melodeath and one melodic doom project that are done, just awaiting vocals.

Had a band about 12 years ago that sold quite a few demos at our shows but I never counted those and wasn't a part of the transactions, all the $$$ went to rehearsal room rent.

 

[Melb_shredder]

Eh. There's no harm in being honest with this stuff ^_^ just cracked 500 on our first album physically, 200+ digitally and got a vid with 80,000+ views

 

[Skinny Viking]

about 600 of the 1st Shadowdance album (physical copies)

about 300 or so of the 4 song sampler EP we did for one of our tours

All in all about 100 of the new one (digital album only)

maybe about 25 or so single song downloads from the new one

given away, out of the 2 albums and EP, total of about 500

youtube haven't been tracking but I know the one song has about close to 1000 views ... can't say about the others though


Oh yeah, no label for any of these ... although something is in the works for the new one

 

[abt]

Thanks for sharing. Very interesting. I'm impressed by all of you. You guys are fucking rad!

 

[TravisW]

175-200, unsigned. That was mostly at shows and through a couple of stores.

 

[Pardi666]

For my debut album:

150 physical CD's
200+ paid for downloads (ranging from $3 to $10 each)
20,000-40,000 times pirated off Torrents, Megaupload, rapidshare, media fire and so on. (Rough estimate based upon some investigating i did)

Moral of the story is; If your a black metal act that doesn't tour, don't expect to make any money. My debut album was actually nominated for a San Diego Grammy
in best new Hard Rock Act. I didnt win, but it pissed me off that the judges for that event had pirated my album!!! Fuckers where not in my spreadsheet of purchases.

 

[Skinny Viking]

20,000-40,000 times pirated off Torrents, Megaupload, rapidshare, media fire and so on. (Rough estimate based upon some investigating i did)

Same here

 

[Skaldir]

My main bands did 8 full albums and together they sold around 12000 - 14000 physical copies.
Physical sales decreased though in the last years. :/ We don't play live a lot or at all, so I'm pretty happy with it.
I don't even wanna know how many illegal downloads there were :S

 

[drew_drummer]

We're unsigned.

We've sold 300 of our first album Collapse. We've sold approximately 260 of our second album Exegesis. We've sold about the same in downloads for each.

As I said, we're unsigned. We've kept 100% of the profits. A bunch of videos that other people have uploaded on Youtube - one has almost 3000 views, some others have about 200-400 each.

We couldn't support ourselves from the band, but it's not like we're some shite pub rock band doing AC/DC covers. I'm pretty proud of what we've managed to do so far.

 

[abt]

^ you should be proud dude. You all should be. It's a pretty sad landscape out there, it's great to see musicians out there fighting the good fight.

Getting usable statistics from illegal download sites is almost impossible. They all connect to each other and download each others content. Then you've got users with software that just grabs any mp3 it can find or based on certain criteria such as genre. There's lots of ways a hits made in lots of ways against your track that would constitute a download. Eventually you get to the use that wants your music but only wants it if he steals it. That's the statistic that you want. As you can see that's impossible to pull that from the whole big mess.

One thing I will add to this thread is don't be afraid to plug your work while you at it. Keep them coming.