Delta's going back in a week and will be there till December touring in support of a US artist Jon McLaughlin.
Hows she going? Off to a good start, I'd say.
Her album debuted at #116 and at #1 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart. The album has sold in excess of 21 000 units and the first single In This Life hit #6 on the VH1 Top 20 Countdown and #21 on the Hot Adult Contemporary Airplay Charts.
This format (Hot AC) is quite large and whilst not as big as CHR Pop, it has exposed Delta to millions [approx. 3 million weekly] where In This Life has been played on radio over 14 000 times since April. She is slowly but surely gaining more fans by doing shows sponsored by Hot AC stations and will now tour which is sure to expose her to thousands of new fans.
As ITL will be below #15 after 20 weeks on the Hot AC charts, it will go recurrent which means they will take the song off the chart. She did extremely well to get to where she has on a first release without much mass promotion. She did The View in July and Letterman in September but neither of those appearances directly increased downloads or airplay significantly. However each week that the video was shown on VH1 Top 20 Countdown, downloads rose considerably. Unfortunately it seems the song has been pulled off the VH1 playlist [where ITL was played on other shows apart from the countdown] but as fans we are hoping to get Delta continually played on the countdown for now. VH1 may decide to take Delta off the voting list next week also but its unclear yet. Delta is approaching 15 weeks and if she can stay on the countdown for 5 more weeks then she can 'retire' to the exclusive VH1 20/20 club but its unsure whether she'll get the chance to do that. It was also confirmed on the countdown, which Delta was interviewed on, that she'd be a 'You Oughta Know' artist which is great exposure but its also unclear as to whether that'll still go ahead.
So I guess your going to ask, whats ahead for Delta. Well I'm assuming that since In This Life is falling recurrent on Hot AC and has been removed off the VH1 playlist that Delta's record label will be finishing up with In This Life and moving on the second single. Just a wild guess. Alternatively they could continue to push the single, releasing it to CHR Pop radio and MTV but I highly doubt it considering its unlikely to work. CHR Pop is an extremely difficult market and considering 'Pop' plays 'popular' music then there'd have to be hype around the song for the song to get played unlike Hot AC which is more willing to get songs popular. It took ITL 5 months for it to near the Top 20 on Hot AC but now that radio stations have welcomed Delta into their studios it is assumed that the second single would get added much quicker and reach Top 20 in 2 months instead of 5. Considering the second single would get popular on Hot AC, this popularity could translate to demand on CHR Pop and the ball can start moving from there on to a CHR Pop/MTV release and so forth. So in that respect it'd probably be smarter to opt for a second single instead of trying to push ITL which has lost its power on Hot AC.
Just as a personal opinion, I dont find it necessary for Delta to be a really big star in the US. As long as she can one day headline her own tours and sell CDs in the US, I think thats great. She can do those things simply within her already established Hot AC and VH1 markets as opposed to branching out to CHR Pop and MTV which becomes a much larger market but VH1 and Hot AC are still quite popular in their own right.
Okay I think I've saved you a lot of time because you'd be searching for days through the Delta: In The USA thread. You'd pretty much have to be following it quite consistently like many forumers have to know all that but I've got you up to speed. I may add that in first post too
