Royal Trux : Classic or Dud ?

https://66.media.tumblr.com/3b75adfc25afacf8504374849a6cec6c/tumblr_pqqe78MU7T1rkya77o1_540.png

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sounds like the NYC show has been canceled too

Looks like the whole tour has been axed.

Ugh. Shouldn't be terribly surprised, but...

Definitely not surprised. Purchased the tix figuring that this would be the most likely conclusion TBH.

Still love that record tho.

hey they should have announced the tour was cancelled last june sorry they lied

— Neil Hagerty (@TheHowlingHex) April 29, 2019

Strange update. Facebook post by Jennifer

"So you wanna know....why? "TRUX BAND" Rehearsal ...waiting and on the hunt
few day ago
hit this cover in 15....obv liberties were took
"After the Fox" The Hollies / Peter Sellers"

https://www.stereogum.com/2041908/royal-trux-cancel-tour/news/

Permanent re-host of mp3: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1aCaE-IRv7I6F_SnyCESMPQXKFY8pTQOb/view

I'm going to divert my Trux tix money toward the Flipper show.

I couldn't make it too far past "Is it the same guitarist on the Black Bananas album?" but if you want to hear Jennifer Herrema interviewed by Greg Gutfeld, here you go
https://radio.foxnews.com/2019/04/03/royal-trux-black-bananas-with-jennifer-herrema/

remember when they produced that make-up album? in mass mind? that record rules

The interviewer there keeps the narrative about the '90s band's exemplary career path going. Who are we meant to compare them to, Motley Crue? There were tons of alternative aesthetic/indie bands who were in and out with major labels in the '90s; someone would have to explain to me how Royal Trux's arc was more admirable than another's

someone once said (or maybe wrote) that the Royal Trux major label deal was the only one in history in which you sympathized more in the end with the major label than with the band

wrong

(as usual)

wrong as in somebody didn't actually say that? I just mean I read that quote in a zine or something many years ago and it stuck with me. afaik the band were paid to not record a third album for Virgin and were subsequently able to buy a big house. Obviously it's probably a little more complicated than that but if you have any insider knowledge please do share, I'm just going by what I'd always heard. Seems like they did OK, even as far as ending up right back where they started on Drag City

Accelerator was the third album; Virgin declined it and Trux owned it under the deal, so were able to release it on DC.

Re: how successful they were or weren't back in the day, looks like their top-sellers were:
Cats & Dogs - just north of 10K
Royal Trux and Thank You - a lil over 8K
Accelerator - around 6500

Everything else under 5K.

To put this in perspective, all the early Smog records sold 10-15K... most Jesus Lizard records sold between 20-40K...
Heck, Steven Jesse Bernstein's Prison sold 12K!

They were way more popular than Action Swingers and Helios Creed!

What are those, like, first-week numbers?

nope.

Total US Soundscan.

As of what date? You’re telling me Accelerator has only sold 6500 copies in 20 years?

sounds about right

Wikipedia sez there are 4,360 Title IV colleges/universities in the U.S.; so only 1.5 copies has sold per college since '99?

not shocking, theyre like the definition of a band that's talked and written about disproportionately to their actual # of fans

i too find those numbers astonishing. i bought cats & dogs new, so i guess I'm included in that number! crazy.

How many copies has, like, Slanted & Enchanted sold?

wikipedia says about S&E: As of 2007, the album has sold 150,000 copies.

sooo probably at least up to 200,000 by now? maybe more?

As of 2015:

Studio albums/EPs:
Slanted and Enchanted (1992, did not chart; 2002 reissue No. 152): 292,000
Watery, Domestic EP (1992, did not chart): 38,000
Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (1994, No. 121): 357,000
Wowee Zowee (1995, No. 117): 179,000
Brighten the Corners (1997, No. 70): 190,000
Terror Twilight (1999, No. 95): 116,000

Compilations:
Westing (By Musket & Sextant) (1993, did not chart): 71,000
Quarantine the Past: The Best of Pavement (2010, No. 170): 30,000

source: https://www.npr.org/sections/therecord/2015/02/03/383507767/unfinished-business

(also includes Pixies & Sleater-Kinney)

The numbers for those other bands are pretty much what I would have expected... it's startling to me that Trux's sales are so dramatically lower.

I feel like Trux has always been way more niche than a lot of those other bands

Surprised to hear they were outsold that much by early Smog

What's astonishing to me is that anyone who's ever actually heard a Royal Trux "song" could be surprised at their sales figures.

haha i love em but yeah

Seriously, we're in "Why didn't Boredoms' Pop Tatari go platinum?!? They were on a major label!" territory here.

Royal Trux was always incredibly niche yeah, i mean even compared to some others mentioned upthread like Jesus Lizard (who appeared on some soundtracks and who certainly had a name that people were familiar with). i think their personalities are so strong and their image is so potent that they feel bigger than they actually ever were.

I never said I thought they should go platinum. I said I'm surprised that their albums only sold btw. 5k-10k copies.

Love hearing these kinds of stats. It is a surprise to me that Accelerator isn't the biggest selling Trux. The other surprise (welcome in my case)is that Slanted and Enchanted has comfortably outsold Wowee Zowee and most other later period Pavement records. I think this is for one reason. It is better.

My point was about their sales relative to early Smog. I would have assumed that Royal Trux had a higher media profile and visibility to what Bill Callahan was managing when he was putting out I Am Star Wars etc.

Does Soundscan track all sales? There may be indie store sales missing, which could be a decent additional percentage for Royal Trux but it’d be the same for other artists highlighted so all relative.

Also mail order sales via Drag City (which is how I was buying DC product for a period, though I imagine it doesn't account for a massive % of sales)

And yes, I'm also surprised specifically that Bill Calla-who? outsells RTX

I'm amazed to see Bill Callahan is playing Edinburgh's Usher Hall this year, which holds 2,200.

Soundscan, like any sales tracking in this world, is imperfect.
That said, we're comparing their Soundscan to other band's Soundscan #s, so, it's illuminating even if just in relation.

(Pop Tatari scanned around 11k btw)

For Pussy Galore related artists, they did way better than Action Swingers!
Decimation Blvd. sold less than 750.

(that record is p cuckoo - every song sounds exactly alike and they mostly start off in the exact same way)

Please look up The Red Krayola’s Amor and Language (Drag City) and Run On’s Start Packing (Matador)

Haha, pretty sure I bought "Cats & Dogs" on cassette the week it came out, and to date it's the only Royal Trux I ever owned.

I saw a crazy Run On bill c. "Start Packing." It was Elliott Smith (solo) opening for Run On opening for Will Oldham (solo). I wonder how many records Palace, etc. has sold?

I was just wondering about Palace, as a comparison point. I’m still flummoxed by those Trux numbers.

It makes it all the more remarkable that Virgin signed them for a 3-album deal... their sales leading up to that were like a rounding error to a major label.

How many copies of Bleach did Nirvana sell before they were signed to DGC?

40k acc. to SubPop

https://web.archive.org/web/20110606040005/http://www.subpop.com/channel/blog/20_year_old_bleach