Ill Just Leave It Here.

i’ll just leave it here.

Umm I love you . That's the hint(but then again we all love you). So I'm quite new. Yayyy. That's the first hint :))) (btw I'm having waaaaay too much fun with this)

youre literally horrible at hints <3

what’s the meaning of tptb?

i see you using it a lot, i think i saw someone say it stood for ‘the powers to be’

if it’s like management or something is that a reference to something someone had said or called them?

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/tptb

Yep, It's actually a very commonly used term meaning "the powers that be!"

It's way better than using mgmt/label/[insert other authority figure here] because the reality is that there are SO MANY PEOPLE behind the scenes that we really don't know if it's management, label, or some combination of both that are causing the issue. Using tptb is a more general term that refers to whoever it was that made the decision(s) in question, without incorrectly placing blame somewhere.

I give up 😂😂 it's me

awww hi love ya

Thanks for your insightful response on playlists.

You also brought up an expense that so many miss when discussing promo - the cost of flying the artist and their band/team around for appearances and associated expenses.

The story many Louies tell is that Louis had 'no promo' for Walls and its singles because he didn't do SNL or have an Eroda/Niall Storm type campaign, but he spent Oct-mid December on a promo tour of US radio shows, playing small sets at pre Jingle Balls etc. I know he had barely anything post Walls but this kind of mini tour is surely useful in building links, is expensive to fund and yet is usually dismissed as meaningless or not even mentioned in fandom talks about his promo.

I agree that fans have a very narrow definition of what ‘promo’ is (the short version is a lot of people only count content they personally enjoy and things they see as prestigious).  

And I think your point suggests a much more useful and interesting way of looking atm promo.  Rather than asking whether there was enough - as if promo can be measured by weight - I think it’s far more interesting to ask how well spent the money was.  That accepts that labels are not going to invest unlimited resources and that a good promo campaign is one that uses money well.

So while it’s important to acknowledge that that was promo - I think it’s also worth asking whether it was a particularly good use of time and money. I’m not at all convinced that US radio play was a good use of resources for Louis’ album campaign.  Radio is costly and only delivers if you hit big, and I think the chances of that were very low. 

In general, my thoughts about Louis album campaign was that it was super disjointed.  There were good bits, mostly those directed towards the fandom (the stuff that involved collecting location data was probably particularly useful in tour planning, and the mural was great).  But there was incoherence between UK and US, and resources weren’t allocated particualrly strategically.  I think there were external factors that made things so incoherent.  Syco’s capacity was obviously very limited and any money that was spent on early singles would be counted as part of the marketing budget, even though if you were making a plan for the album as a whole you’d do it very differently.

Anyway, this is why I hope that Louis develops his plans for a second album thoroughly before looking for a label.  I think it gives him the right chance of a promo campaign that is coherent and fits his music. 

i'm depressed and it's late and i'm thinking about liam again

tw // alcohol, trauma

I'm feeling a little emo about the fact that Liam was set up to be the frontman and carried the band through the x factor because he had the most experience and the strongest voice, and his stage confidence was needed to help the rest of the boys feel comfortable onstage.

Because of this, he was expected to be the babysitter for the rest of the boys, not allowed to be a teenager with the rest of them. And when things went awry, Liam was expected to tell his friends to pull it together and keep them in line. And he was held responsible for their shenanigans. 

And then sht happened, and he was alcoholic and depressed and taking medicine to help with that, except it only made him dizzy onstage and forget his lyrics, leading him to develop stage fright that he still lives with to this day.

And then he had left the band but things hadn't gotten better, he was still forced to stunt and given his own babygate, on top of still carrying the role of the 1d-narrative-pusher, and made to lie on behalf of his friends as well as himself.

He was given an image that doesn't fit him at all, of a sex-obsessed hypermasculine Straight Guy, and that image was pressed on him so hard that he wasn't allowed to release the music that he'd wanted to and instead had an album full of songs that he didn't even write. He was made to do a photoshoot that he was uncomfortable with, so he was given tequila to calm him down despite his struggles with alcohol. He was painted as a homophobe, despite being queer himself. 

He's also been more open about his personal struggles than anyone else in the band, and has talked candidly about the challenges he's faced and the things he's been put through by tptb and even the general public, and still NO ONE talks about it. Instead, he basically has no solo fanbase and is largely ignored by ot5s who only pay attention to him when he talks about One Direction or interacts with one of the other members. And even worse, he's the subject of constant ridicule and slander by people who are fans of his band and those associated with it.

And YET he's still so pure and kind. He gives his platform to women and people of color. He made online content for his fans to enjoy while stuck at home in the pandemic. He ran FOUR online shows for charity with reasonably priced tickets and merch that he specifically designed with the fans in mind. He goes out of his way to give love to his former bandmates, despite that energy not always being matched in return. He is still silly and good and loving, despite going through so much. We don't deserve him, and I will never take Liam slander ever.