samedi 16 février 2008

Quentin : Winner of Star Academy 7


I spent yesterday's evening waiting (and fearing) the Star Academy 7's final results 'cos Mathieu had previously been saved 6 times by people voting and I didn't know if Quentin's professionalism on screen could not be a bad thing after all for the people spending away their phone credits for TF1...
The results were tight but Quentin (Mosimann) won and has become the 7th winner of french leading real TV programm. Now the future is in his hands ...and in Pascal Nègre's (PDG of Universal).
After the bad sales results of the latest winners, Magalie Vaé & Cyril Cinelu, Quentin must face the challenge to reboost CD sales and his charisma may not be enough... His victory means a 1 million euros contract with universal for future CD sales and the fact is only Jenifer has gained her million for now on ; Star Academy means more success on TV than in CD stores ...but hasn't the CD market regressed too?

Some figures first :
Jenifer : 3 albums + 1 live for 2 millions copies sold,
Nolwenn Leroy : 2 albums + 1 live for nearly 1 million copies,
Elodie Frégé : 2 albums for nearly 300 000 copies
(but she gave half her millions to finalist Michal, 2 albums with less copies and his contract recently just given back),
Gregory Lemarchal : 2 albums + 1 live for over 1 million copies
(but his death from mucioviscidose boosted sales last year),
Magalie Vaé : 1 album for 33 000 copies (and we wonder uf Universal is gonna spend more on her (Michell McManus twin girl!),
Cyril Cinélu : 1 album (released a couple of weeks ago) for just 7000 copies sold.
Add to these that Star Academy 7 has only released one single compilation album of students when best years gave us 4 CDs that sold well, a mega Star Ac' tour that has become more than a karaoke party doin' little cities' tour and you've understand that the golden years are all over... The future may not be so bright for the new Star Ac' winner but he has a million to think about it at last...

What shall we hope for then?
Quentin, as for his MySpace profiles, is dual :
- Quentin Mosimann likes his piano, acoustic jazzy balladery and his recognizable voice fits in well like on his beautiful self composed "Il y a Je t'aime et Je t'aime" he sang on TV and that is featured on his MySpace page.
- clubby Quentin (aka John Louly) likes his DJ's turntable and likes his music electro clubby like when he covered "Tainted love" or Prince. He's already got a single available on download legal sites under this pseudo : John Revox & Christian Sims feat. John Louly "Hot vocation (Sex is my vocation)".

And Quentin perfectly matched the two sides of his musical personality yesterday night covered along US crooner Peter Cincotti David Guetta's "Love is gone". Starting stripped to the bone acapella with only piano, the song muted after a long slow intro into the electro piece of dance anthem we all know with Chris Willis on vocals before ending up back in an accoustic jazzy mood.
That's what I want on his first CD album !
That's what can be the next french summer hit !
And that would be ideal to launch his album & career... (do you hear me Pascal?)
Take some wellknown song and strip it to piano only to make it start like a jazzy number (Listeners will recall Nouvelle Star winners Christophe Willem or Julien Doré for their re-invention abilities) then make it start with first chorus with some David Guetta/Joachim Garraud electro noizy production and you've got what it takes to be the perfect club/radio anthem of Summer 2008 in France.
Leave space on CD single on track 2 for just an accoustic version and add as bonus a full on technoïd remix on track 3 and you've got a big seller !
Record a full album of new material with the previously talked about producers,
Add to the whole package some more bonus tracks in piano accoustic lounge versions like Quentin slow compositions to test them too and sure you'll give the people who appreciates Quentin on TV what they would want to give their money for !
And to help it sell more, re-release the whole package 3 months later (like Universal know how it can be done) with an extra CD with all songs recorded unplugged and you'll sell it even more...
Now all they have to do is rush some recording sessions before Quentin goes on tour, just to be sure to have his first single ready for release while they're self-promoting on tour and before the potential summer hits' rush, film a festive video for it that will occupy big TV times on TF1 from May to September and could become the next opening theme of Star Academy 8, and cut the timing right to be ready for a September/October album release at the very last, before everyone had forgotten how good a show man Quentin was/is/will be !

Please someone somewhere, make these lines a reality soon...