milly

I agree with you all. The song is beautiful. Is that Gary's voice on the recording?

40k more needed. If they continue to sell steadily, around 5000/week, they should reach platinum in 2 months.

They said they're doing the original Pray on tour.

It's funny how we all have different tastes. I find Westlife's single to be quite boring, but good luck to them. Not everyone has to like their music, just the right number of people.

Great, so now they should be over the 250k sales threshold. Only 45+ k more to go. That's reachable with the tour approaching fast. I wish Westlife the best with their comeback, but I doubt they're gonna make a big dent in the charts.

Oh boy, I thought the sales last week were bad, but they're abysmal this week :D

I'm completely obsessed with When I Say Goodbye, I think even more than with WYBTFM - and you all know that's my favorite TT song. It's on the same level as Dying Inside, for me - I'm pretty sure When I Say Gbye is related to Gary's dad passing away, based on what he's told us from time to time. I wish we had the full song and I wish it had been the leading single for Odyssey. I can just picture the live performances - so simple, Gary at the piano, Mark and Howard doing some beautiful harmonies on the chorus....it would have been perfect and breathtaking. OOOH is catchy and fun, but WISG is the type of song with impact on people's emotions.... I guess I'll just have to put it in the same box with Don't Say Goodbye, WYBTFM, Lie to Me.... :( - why do the best songs always get left out? Surely it can't be only the press having a go at them for doing ballads...Heck, that's all Adele does and she couldn't care less about the reviews, because she knows what fans want.

Ironically, the best track - for me, at least - on Wonderland was a bonus track, Loving or Leaving. Oh, and It's All For You was a keeper too. III had Freeze, Flaws,Amazing, Higher than Higher, These Days, the stunning Will You Be There For Me, Carry Me Home - I actually believe III is the album that's gonna age the best- again, imo. But we have to be ready to admit one thing: many of the songs most of us love have a heavy GB imprint on them. That's not to say that they should go back to the 90s and let Gary do all the writing, but the boys should encourage Gary to be "more of himself", if that makes sense, on the TT albums. Gary has a different approach when writing for TT than when he writes for himself or a musical and, unfortunately, as we see with the track above, his "solo" output is better for fans' tastes. I'm almost sure the critics would slam him for doing ballads like this one, but it's what we like and want, so....

No, it's just a song Gary used for one of his Barlow Bootcamp instagram videos. I'm dying to hear the full song, but who knows if we ever will?! I wish the boys realized this is the kind of stuff we're loving.

Is it safe to say that this is the kind of songs we are all expecting on a TT album?

Unfortunately, it's not the entire concert, it's mainly the classics.

Someone has uploaded the Wonderland tour "dvd": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mi7FkCmNpik

I still don't think that placing is correct. It's based on sales up to last Thursday included and not even then it's definite that they were behind Eminem, 400 copies more or less. Since then, till Monday, they sold plenty to gain a place in top 10. In cases like this, when the year doesn't end on the same day as the chart week, sales should be taken into consideration on a day to day basis. Besides, that's not an official placing, it's just a hierarchy made by someone on the main forum, based on sales up to last Thursday. Technically, TT should have ended the year top 10 (maybe even at 9).

I know this is a dead month sales-wise, but I was hoping the documentary would be sappy enough to attract more sales. I may have been overly optimistic, but I expected around 50k. Not even 20k is quite a let down. I wonder if it even justifies the cost of making the documentary.

Hope we get lots of performances like these on this year's tour: My all time favorite remains the Ultimate Tour one. The way Gary switches from chest voice to head voice and back is insane, in my non-expert opinion.

I'm happy with the position in the midweeks, but I'm more interested in sales. Also, I doubt they're gonna be able to hold on that no 3 till Friday. They're already started slipping down. In regards to Jason dating younger women - although I couldn't care less about his private life (as long as his private life doesn't affect TT's image/reputation/connections)-, I do believe it's morally wrong for a 40+ old man to be dating 20 year olds. No, a person doesn't have the right to date whomever they please. In some countries, it's legal for 80+ year olds to marry young girls, some are still kids - based on the mighty principle that "one can do whatever/whomever they please". Just because it's not illegal, it doesn't mean it's not wrong. Plus, it's just disturbing to see an almost 50 year old - or is he 50 already? - jumping from woman to woman - he's either interested in settling down, in which case he should be dating just one person -or he's not interested in a family life, in which case he shouldn't be dating at all. I could understand it to some extent when all the boys were teens or in their early 20s, but now it's just ridiculous. I know you all live in a "liberal" thinking country, but I have the feeling nowadays abnormalities are being perceived as normal, which is soooo wrong. It's not right that any person on this forum be made to "retract" an opinion based on a system of values, just because others' fan bias. Like dylandog said, nobody believes Jason is "a bad guy", but that doesn't mean he's a saint either- he's just showing signs of immature and questionable decisions. Every single member of this band has been criticized for various choices they've made in their lives, why would be Jason exempt from the same treatment? He actually had it pretty easy going while he was in the band. For all his questionable public appearances, he never got the 10th amount of the slagging Gary did for simply existing.

Guess we all see friendship in a different way. If I were living off the money I made with a bunch of other people, I'd at least be respectful enough to reply to their emails. But you are right, it's all speculation on our parts - what else would it be, since none of us are living with them? :P And you are right, we all have different values.

Somehow, I think Gary'd switch places with Howard in a heartbeat :) I'm sure he's happy for Howard and Katie, but, at the same time, he must be somewhat jealous or hurting. I know I would be if I lost my baby and then every single friend of mine started popping babies. It's really a messed up situation. I feel for Howard and, at the same time, I find it really funny. It was high time men and not just women were tired because of newborns or toddlers :P I was out last night with a close friend who has an almost 2 year old and another baby on her way - the poor thing hasn't had a good night sleep in ages. But it's hilarious to hear the extremes toddlers go to keep their parents up most of the night :D

:heehee: ROFL I don't think it has anything to do with the their tax scheme. I doubt he even knew what the boys did with their share. Jason's finances are managed by his brother, the boys' by someone else. I don't see them sit down and talk: "oh, did your lawyer/accountant make you sign that paper regarding that investment?". I really trust Gary when he says he had no idea what he was signing - if he had any suspicion back then that it would be something that would backfire, he'd have pulled the money out immediately and payed the tax to the State, just like he did when he found out what it was all about. BUT, in the eventuality that Gary and the others lie and they knew they were doing something morally questionable and Jason was aware of this and this is the reason he left the band, then shame on him! He isn't a saint, he's done his fair share of morally questionable things in life - at the end of the day, using fans for sex is way more wrong than making an investment that doesn't break any laws -, so he wasn't in any position to judge. Just like all the others, he did alcohol, he did drugs, he used people for his own pleasure.....he really had no foot to stand on when it came to this. He is enjoying, after all, a life of doing nothing off the back of others, limelight shy or not. I sincerely hope that is not the reason he quit the band. If it were, his mum being in the documentary would look very weird.

I actually gave it to you with the quote from Rob's autobiography. When Howard sent that email to Robbie and told him "I know it's good for you", it pretty much summed up what he believes about him in general - the truth comes out when you have these outbursts. Howard knows that Robbie is mainly after his own interests, but he's trying to give him the benefit of the doubt for the sake of the group. I wonder if the boys know that Robbie launched his new single yesterday and, if they do, it'd be interesting to know if they felt used once again.

That's exactly what I'm thinking, dylandog. Howard and Jason seemed to be very good friends during the TT years and Mark, well, he seems to be friends with everyone. I'm not including Gary on this one, although, back in the 90s, they said themselves, it was Gary-Howard-Jay, on one side, and Mark-Robbie, on the other side. I can understand - to a certain extent - Jason's decision to quit the music industry, but I don't get why he had to also quit his friendships. Howard was the one who said, during an interview, that Jason doesn't even reply to their emails anymore. I strongly believe that, if that reunion last night had been secretly filmed in a therapist's office, we'd have seen a more honest reaction from the boys. No matter how much you care about someone - or precisely because you care so much about someone -, you're bound to feel angry and frustrated and upset when that someone dismisses you from their life. I swear, the most sincere reaction was during that interview in I don't know what country - all the boys' body language, when asked about Jason, got so tense and you could read on their faces that they were done with always accounting for Jason's decision, it was unmistakable. Yes, they had good times with Jason in the band, yes, they considered him their friend, but, at the same time, they're quite pissed at him - whether it's because he left the band or because he left them to deal with the aftermath and all the questions or because he excludes them from his personal life altogether, that, I don't know. To be frank now, I wouldn't have minded Robbie's presence in the documentary if everyone in there had been honest. I get it, that, for business purposes, they have to be all sugary and lovey-dovey, but it's just too much, especially when it's fake. What Gary, Mark and Howard have is genuine, when you put Robbie and Jason in the mix, it all becomes forced.

Yeah, for me, at least, it's very obvious that what they're stating publicly and what they really feel are 2 different things. I genuinely believe Gary when he says he regards Robbie as a friend, that's why it drives me nuts when I see all the cr** Robbie is pulling on him and the others. At least Jason had the decency to never do anything like that to the boys - what's going on between them stays between them. As I've said, I agree that both Jason and Robbie's contributions had to be acknowledged, that's indisputable. What I'm saying is that Robbie's presence in the documentary wasn't necessary, given all he's done to the boys. He could have left them have their moment. I truly, truly despised him when he referred to them as "my business brothers". He's clever when it comes to distorting reality without many people noticing it. Maybe the III and Wonderland eras weren't as successful as the previous ones, but, given the context, it's no wonder. They were still successful and it was all down to Gary, Mark and Howard. 30 years of work and did anyone actually acknowledge these eras? Even Odyssey was brushed off. So, I have a problem with the program being called "We've come a long way" while we're only presented the beginning and some of the middle. Oh, and funny how Robbie uploads his new single on yt precisely the day the documentary airs! How convenient!

Well, Take That are in top 10 - you can't place them outside top 10 just because of the alphabetical order. They are gonna overtake Eminem, anyway, this week. 10th place should contain 2 artists and then put on the 11th place the one with the next sales.

PS: from Robbie's autobiography: "Rob has an idea, an idea he's gleefully excited about. He has realized that both he and GB are planning to release new solo albums towards the end of the year. He thinks they should release them on the same day and engineer a high-profile media battle, just as 50 Cent and Kanye West did a few years ago or, more combatively, like the notorious Oasis versus Blur face-off. Rob's view is that a stunt like this would be bound to raise the sales of both records. He obviously thinks it would be fun too. He emails Gary, excited. Gary answers, much less so. Rob reads out part of his reply:<<I would do anything for that not to happen. It brings up too much of the past for me.I would love after 13 years just for a record to have its own story". We all know how that turned out. Robbie couldn't give a cr** about Gary's wishes and went ahead and released his album just one week before,knowing that the media would pit them against each other, which is exactly what happened. Nice friend!!!! "After seriously considering it, Rob had told Gary that he couldn't be involved in the next TT project. There were a number of reasons, one being that it didn't seem quite so enticing without all 5 of them" So, what's changed? If the boys invited him to be a part of III and he refused, because it wasn't "enticing" - he probably didn't want to be a part of a sinking ship - why now, all of a sudden, he's doing appearances and documentaries with the boys, if not for the money? The ship isn't sinking anymore, so it's more "enticing", I guess. "In March, Gaz was on Chatty Man with Alan Carr and I DIDN"T WATCH THE INTERVIEW, but the upshot of it was: he had left the door open for me still, saying "well, it's down to Rob whether he wants to". And then it was in the newspapers and I googled myself and, in 250 news stories was: "Robbie's been given an ultimatum". Gary said: "Well, we've got to May to know what we're doing.". So, I got the hump with that, because I thought: I know where this is heading. This is heading towards: Robbie Williams spoils reunion and he's a nasty bast*rd again. That's how it felt anyway. And I DON"T WANT TO LOOK LIKE THE BAD GUY. So, I was a bit angry about that". Nice of him that he had all the time to google 250 articles about himself, but he didn't have 2 minutes to watch the yt video to see what Gary had actually said. Of course, he only cared about himself. I guess Gary wasn't entitled to be angry when Robbie ignored him and decided to release the same time as he did. Double standards and all that....The next bit is the best - Robbie in all his caring glory! Why answer a simple question, when he could throw the boys under the bus? "That's what was in his mind when The Sun came to interview him in Vienna: "I'm stressed at the start of the tour (best excuse ever, Rob!!!), and she's asking: "So, where are you with the ultimatum?"and I went: "What f***** ultimatum? I told them in December I'm not doing it. It's Jason who's not doing it, not me." Nobody knew about Jason's departure. Rob's management quickly had to let TT know what Rob had done. For a while, it was almost back to the black old days. Gary sends an email back to Josie going: "Why does he want to do something like that?It's so destructive. Does he want the band to implode?". I woke up in Austria and I'd got an email from Howard and it was really short and it just said "look, I know it's probably good for you, but that wasn't good for us, didn't like what you did!". I thought: "WTF?". Then I sent an email back that was a bit terse and angry. And Gary sent an email. Then I wrote this needlessly long email, detailing other superfluous stuff: "Well, when you did this in deh deh deh....I said deh deh deh and you said deh deh and it's because of deh deh deh." I shouldn't have sent it. (That's always his excuse -"oh, I'm impulsive, I'm childish....this is my excuse for everything; I shit on other people and then I blame them and make excuses for my behaviour). You'd have thought I'd might have learnt by now. It was an emotional response. And the foundations of it weren't built on solid ground. It was just "I don't like the fact I've been given this ultimatum (Gary had never given him any ultimatum, the media had made that u, but I guess he's too dumb to distinguish). I said that I'm not f*****doing it - just say that I'm not f***** doing it! (so, now the boys are truly given an ultimatum and an order from king Robbie, who can't stand to be associated with them when they're going down). They were "This has to be engineered in the right way". In my head (not his brain, obviously!) it was just "Why don't you just say Jason's not doing it?"...... More emails followed , with more recriminations and no solutions. Rob credits Gary with being the one who eventually calmed the waters and persuaded everyone that these fractious exchanges were going nowhere and solving nothing. "He's the bigger and better person than me", Rob says. At one point, he adds: Gary also wrote: "I hope this doesn't stop us speaking for years (again)" So, Elisabeth, this is why I don't believe Robbie deserves to be with the boys. He's sabotaged them every occasion he got and he only has his best interests at heart, damn the others! And this is the arrogant Gary that controls everyone and everything, ladies and gentlemen!

Dylandog, I agree with you, up to a point, that Jason had to be mentioned - and, if it were after me, he'd have belonged there more than Robbie -, but it irked me that they insisted so much on these topics - how wise he was, how smart he was, bla bla bla, lighting that thing for him and so on. It was just too much. It was too much emphasis on those who left and too little on those who remained. Has anyone actually heard anything positive being said about Gary, Mark and Howard? I haven't. There was not even a minimal praise for them - the only one Robbie praised was...surprise...the one who gave a blow to the group, just like himself. That's what's annoyed me so much. To be frank, I understand certain fans liked Jason and miss him, I personally don't. I'm probably one of the few people who don't acknowledge that "intelligence" and "wisdom" the others are talking about - that's probably because I saw really intelligent, academic people in the person of my professors and I know how that truly looks. I guess Jason strived to be intelligent and he probably read a lot, but, imo, he had no real in depth view of anything. I'm not saying, by any means, he was a stupid person, just that he wasn't any more intelligent than the others. I agree with you, though, about his contribution to the band - even if it was only for the moral of the group, he was good for them. But he chose to leave, he wasn't kicked out, so I don't see why the boys have to always go out of their way to acknowledge him - if "fans" attack them for this, then they're idiots. The interviews the boys did in November clearly showed they are annoyed of always being asked about Jason and Robbie - that's why I find this documentary to be more of a "guided" one - they said exactly what people expected them to say, regardless of how they actually feel. Sorry, I don't agree with you on that Robbie had to be included :) If anything, I strongly believe this was one time where his presence was not necessary. It was the boys' opportunity to show that they were able to make it even as 3, despite all odds, and to consolidate their image as a 3 person-band in people's memory. Instead, all they did was remind everyone that they're the group that Robbie and Jason left, the group that's not whole. It's not what I was expecting from this documentary. But, what is done is done. At least the album will shift more copies this week - hopefully. If they don't sell at least 50k this week, then this documentary was a waste of everything.