New Susan Boyle album defies accepted consumer laws

September 15, 8:27 PMNewark Pop Culture ExaminerJeff Luppino-Esposito

Susan Boyle showing off her skills on Britain's Got Talent

When you find yourself acknowledging that Susan Boyle served up a solid cover of the Rolling Stones' classic 'Wild Horses' you know something is off. Yes, Boyle, the old woman in the shoe from Britain's Got Talent who, as Columbia records puts it ever so tersely, "was plucked from obscurity" after her show stopping performance of 'I Dreamed a Dream'. After you recover from your state of disarray, grooving along to Boyle's crooning vocals pouring out from your laptop speakers in some inappropriate location thanks to the power of wifi, you come to realize that you're not alone. And this-- this scares you.

In a Columbia records press release today, the label announced that pre-orders of Susan Boyle's new album 'I Dreamed a Dream' due out November 24 have "topped Jay-Z, Whitney Houston, and even The Beatles' remastered CDs, making Boyle #1 on the Amazon.com's best-sellers list."

This scares you even more.

But today we must not let our internal pretentious artist get the better of us and merely be disgusted by this apparent travesty. On the contrary now is the time to take a step back, pick up a wooden baseball bat, and shatter everything we ever thought was inherently true about consumer patterns.

Ostensibly the quantitative success of this album seems appropriate when considering the tens of millions of views that her Britain's Got Talent YouTube video has garnered, but then again, there is one key factor that doesn't make sense. Time.

Boyle's big debut occurred on April 11, 2009 -- yes, this is the longest 15 minutes of fame known to man. Most chalked up the uncontrollable outpouring of love for the affectionately nicknamed SuBo as a spur of the moment thing that follows the basic process of consumer thought-- 1.) 'look at that old ugly woman, she can't be talented!' 2.) 'wait, she is talented' 3.) 'bring on the pendulum effect!'

Yet at step 4 things go wrong. Of course, step 4 is 'realize that our love for this cultural phenomenon has been taken to an unreasonable extreme and go back to loving externally attractive/obviously talented people'. Somehow this has failed. The love continues to pour in as will the dollars.

Say what you will about the artistic integrity of Susan Boyle's upcoming album, say that it will be terrible, say that she is overrated, say that you still think she's just an unattractive old chick, but take that extra second and muse over the fact that your fellow man apparently disagrees. For an extended period of time.
Jeff Luppino-Esposito is the Founder of the pop culture website PopSense.com