I’ve talked about Neil Young’s hi-res music player Pono plenty of times on this site. I was looking at the Pono Kickstarter page today, and I find it interesting to see which “Artist Signature Series” Pono players have sold, and which were flops. These are special Pono players bearing an artist’s logo and/or signature. Pono offered 500 of each, at a cost of $400.
Sold out
- Metallica
- Pearl Jam
- Neil Young
- Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
- Neil Young with Crazy Horse
Sold more than 200 units
- The Eagles
- Tom Petty
- Patti Smith
- Buffalo Springfield
- Grateful Dead
- Red Hot Chili Peppers
- Arcade Fire
- Beck
- Crosby, Stills & Nash
- Dave Matthews Band
- Herbie Hancock
- Norah Jones
Sold fewer than 200 units
- Kings of Leon (34)
- ZZ Top (72)
- My Morning Jacket (96)
- Elton John (111)
- Lyle Lovett (55)
- Emmylou Harris (44)
- Jackson Browne (193)
- Portugal the Man (7)
- Lenny Kravitz (126)
- Tegan and Sara (57)
- Kenny Rogers (7)
I wonder how the artists whose numbers are low feel about this.
These numbers don’t suggest that Pono purchasers are interested in specific types of music, but a few of those artists on the bottom end are pretty unknown. And poor Kenny Rogers; I have nothing against him, but I can’t see him being the object of major fandom. Given that he’s been around a lot longer than the other red lantern – Portugal the Man; I had to look them up to see who they were – I guess not many people like him.
None of this means anything, of course. I was just curious, and had a few minutes of free time…