Etta James Album Sales Leap 378% Following Death

Sometimes you don’t know what you have until it slips away. That seems to be the case with the late Etta James’ soulful songs. As reported by Billboard, James scored her highest-charting album ever on the Billboard 200 chart this past week with The Best of Etta James – 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection, which rose from #162 to #46 with 8,000 copies sold, as reported by Nielsen SoundScan. That’s up 149% over the preceding week. Until now, the R&B/blues crooner had never surpassed #68 on the pop album charts, when At Last hit that spot in 1961.

According to Billboard, for the week ending Sunday (January 22), James’ total catalog of albums moved 30,000 units. That’s a 378% increase over the week before, when her albums sold just over 6,000. James also entered the Billboard 200 chart at #59 with her 1997 greatest hits set, Her Best, selling 7,000 copies, which is up 4,226% from the week before. At Last! the album hit #96 on the chart with 5,000 units sold, up 907%.

“At Last” is likely James’ signature tune, although she wasn’t the original singer. That song was James’ highest-charting of the week, pushing 63,000 downloads, with a weekly gain of 1,361%. For the week, James' catalog of songs sold a total of 118,000 downloads – with over half of those “At Last's” numbers – for an overall gain of 1,091%.

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Etta James Dies from Leukemia

Singing great Etta James, famous for “At Last” and many other hits, has died, CNN reports. She was 73.

Her long-running friend and manager Lupe De Leon said she died from complications from leukemia and had her husband and sons by her side in Riverside, California. She would have turned 74 next Wednesday. The singer had been battling a number of health issues in recent years, including dementia and hepatitis C.

“This is a tremendous loss for the family, her friends and fans around the world,
De Leon said. “She was a true original who could sing it all – her music defied category. I worked with Etta for over 30 years. She was my friend and I will miss her always.”

James was discovered by Johnny Otis (who also died recently), and had her first hit in the ’50s as a teenager. She later joined the iconic Chess label and scored a string of pop and R&B hits, including “Stormy Weather” and “At Last.” She won six Grammys, was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and continued to tour and record until recent years.

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My Morning Jacket’s Jim James Shows Love for Mike & The Mechanics

My Morning Jacket may be known for their perfectly distilled blend of southern rock, soul and a dash of the avant garde, but that doesn’t mean all of singer-guitarist Jim James’ influences are hipster-approved. James recently listed his influences for Spin.com and one entry, in particular, stood out from the bunch: the Genesis/Squeeze offshoot, Mike & The Mechanics and their 1985 hit, “Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground).”

“Some say there is a massive astrological shift taking place right now as dictatorships topple in Egypt and people rise up in mass numbers in places like Wisconsin and Ohio to fight for what they believe is right,” James said. “We are seeing large sections of the population fundamentally questioning their experience and existence, perhaps spurred on by this new revolutionary spirit of longing for real freedom… or perhaps spurred on by this Mike + the Mechanics song, which somehow speaks to me about all that is going on in the world right now. Somehow. It spoke to me once as a child. And it found me again the other day in the freezer section at Whole Foods. 'Can you hear me running?' Yes, Mike. I can.”

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