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Hi I was having a discussion with a friend the other day, something I have wondered about off and on for a while, and thought maybe someone here might have some insight.

What would you consider to be among the biggest selling CDs/LPs with purely rumba or afrocuban content, how many units do you think they have sold, and what do you base those numbers on?

I would have to say among the top sellers would be

Patato y Totico
Los Muñequitos Rumba Caliente 88/77
Some CD by Los Papines, not sure which.

And I have no way of knowing but I really doubt that any of them have broken 100,000 in sales. Any opinions?

Saludos!
Barry

It's a small niche market that doesn't appeal to the common ear that wants to hear more aggressive and simplistic downbeat/backbeat stuff like Rap & Rock & Roll.
I doubt that anyone'll ever get rich (monetarily) making this kind of music, only in the soul and becoming an accomplished musician..

There is no way those records sold 100,000 copies. Maybe 10,000.
-David

Wow, that's pretty damn low, even lower than I thought. I was thinking something like patato y totico or Los Papines which have been out for 40 years might have been approaching 40,000 by now...

Already the thread starter made me wonder who in this group might have the resources to provide any reliable information on this subject.

We'd have to contact Verve perhaps, for any info on "Patato y Totico".

Thanks for the tip re: Los Muñequitos Rumba Caliente 88/77. I thought Yoruba Andabo's "Callejon de los Rumberos" would have been on that list, for instance.

Thomas

Hi Thomas

Record companies don't seem to be very forthcoming with sales figures for these types of things. (Not sure why, but I have a feeling that in at least some cases it might have something to do with the deal they cut with the artists back in the day, I imagine many of them were paid a flat rate and sales figures might make things a bit "uncomfortable".)

I didn't mention "Callejón de los Rumberos" only because I remember looking high and low for it in the 1990's and never finding it, when the Muñequitos 88/77 was everywhere. (Finally found it used in a store in Austin Texas of all places, it was like striking gold! Haha)

It got reissued on another label a few years ago and since then seems to be a bit more available.

Slighty off topic but...The death of Michael Jackson has generated some interesting discussion about the accuracy of record sales reporting. See for example here:
[url]
http://www.hitsville.org/2009/07/12/eve ... -and-more/[/url]

Barry

guarachon63 wrote:Wow, that's pretty damn low, even lower than I thought. I was thinking something like patato y totico or Los Papines which have been out for 40 years might have been approaching 40,000 by now...

I should clarify that I was referring to a single company's sales. Many if not most of the popular rumba records have been released by several different companies. One company does an initial printing and if it does not sell enough to justify a second printing, it will not be available again until another company pays for the rights to release it or bootlegs it. Los Papines records have tended to be released by a variety of obscure labels over the years. "Patato y Totico" was initially released by Verve (Patato standing next to Totico on the cover), but as far as I know, Verve did not continue to re-print the record. As I understand it, that record was bootlegged (Patato sitting next to his conga on the cover) by an obscure company, which is the first version I bought. Verve has now re-released the record on CD.

As I'm thinking about this, I'm realizing that Mongo's "Afro-Roots," while not entirely consisting of rumba, could easily have sold more than 40,000 copies by now because it has consistently been available from a jazz label.
-David

Barry.. I'll tell you who absolutely knows the answer for sure.
Take the train to Times Square... go to the mezzanine landing and walk into the store 'Record Mart' (de nuevo),
ask 'Harry Sepulveda' which sold the most, I'm 100% sure he knows.

http://fidelseyeglasses.blogspot.com/2008/07/record-mart-re-opens-in-subway-nyc.html

Your "home boy",
Markito

I can tell you Mongo sold a LOT of records. and also had a Gold record(over 500,ooo units)as well as Ray Baretto who went Gold with El Watusi( the first ever crossover Latin hit in the United States).......You can sell 100,ooo in NYcity with no problem, when they were living there....many Latin artist sold a LOT of units during the 60's and 70's..it started to fade in the 80's to today...today the market is overcrowded and everyone and their mother has a Cd out...and their is a LOT of mediocrity being sold today..."JC" Johnny Conga if you would like to help me sell some of my Cd's u can purchase it at http://cdbaby.com/cd/congajohnny

guarachon63 wrote:What would you consider to be among the biggest selling CDs/LPs with purely rumba or afrocuban content, how many units do you think they have sold, and what do you base those numbers on?

JC,
As the quote above shows, the original question pertained to the number of copies sold of records with purely rumba or afrocuban content.
-David

Your absolutely right David...Thank you...JC

You are welcome Brother. Your input was interesting information none the less.
-David

I asked the head of a company that has successfully marketed rumba CDs. First he said that record companies as a rule do not disclose their sales figures. Then he said that even the major labels that produced rumba CDs in the 90s often sold less than 1,000 copies, sometimes 500 or less. Successful rumba CDs in the 90s sold in the 1,500 to 5,000 range, with 10,000 being a "solid success". He thought it was unlikely that Patato y Totico sales over the years reached 40,000 copies. Those numbers are for rumba only, not including bata, palo, and other Afrocuban religious music, and not including sales in Cuba, for which I don't think anyone in the US has reliable (or any) sales information. One caveat is that some record companies have an incentive to underreport sales because their artists are already sometimes suspecting they are getting ripped off by the record companies. Also, those numbers are from before digital CD piracy really took off and killed CD sales, so modern day numbers would be considerably lower. He said the emphasis has shifted to live performances and now selling T-shirts. Maybe a bit pessimistic. Maybe video DVDs, a dance craze, some kind of crossover fusion that preserves la clave y el sabor rumbero, or some other musical or business innovation may change things in the future. For now, get the dollar signs out of your eyes, guys, y siguen tocando por el sentimiento manana y la cultura que no hay mas na.

Hi Jorge,
Those figures sound correct to me. I'm Vice President of Bembe Records, a small label devoted to Cuban music. In the 90s there were several thriving (relatively-speaking) small companies releasing Cuban music in Europe and The US. That was the range of sales for rumba records during the historical peak of CD sales in the mid-90s. Nowadays, there's no financial incentive to put out rumba CDs. Who wants to lose money?

Ironically though, there are more rumba releases in this era than at any other time. My guess is that the appearance of most of these new releases is due more to a love of the music, rather than anybody really seeing this as a lucrative place to invest their money. At least I get to enjoy all the new rumba recordings.
-David

Thanks Jorge, honestly those numbers are much more along the lines of what I was thinking. It also kind of explains how once these things go out of print, they rarely seem to come back.