Michael Buble unleashes his latest album ‘This Is Love’ onto the musical world next week, but how exactly has the crooning Canadian charted the seas from performing Sinatra covers to becoming one of the biggest selling recording artists of the last decade?
Before we look at why Buble’s become as big as he has though, the beginnings of Buble’s career are actually rather demure, with the singer spending years doing whatever singing gigs he could get, ranging from bars and cruise liners to even becoming a singing telegram. That all changed though, with Buble getting his big break right when he was ready to throw in the towel and become a journalist.
It came when an assistant to the Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney heard him perform at a business party. From there, he was invited to perform at the wedding of the Prime Minister’s daughter, where he met Grammy award winning producer David Foster. The rest, as they say, is history.
Firstly, he’s the only major name in his field. Many other genres in music have been kickstarted by artists that have only sold a tenth of what Buble has, yet still the world of jazz and swing has only one major player. Buble is a massive shark in a small but very popular pool. The man has almost become a genre by himself.
Few artists over the last years have achieved the level of album sales that Buble’s put together, with the jazz single having been awarded an absolutely head-spinning 156 platinum records with his studio albums alone. All of this without ever recording a full album made only from original tracks, as even to this day he throws in move covers than a B&Q salesman.
It gets even more incredible though when you see that he’s only ever had a single top five hit in the UK singles chart with 2009’s ‘Haven’t Met You Yet’, a track that didn’t even break into the top twenty in America.
This shows exactly who is buy the records of Buble though, as single sales have long been largely associated to those still in the catchment bracket for Radio 1. Nick Grimshaw’s not going to be playing anything from ‘To Be Loved’ anytime soon. This is an artist whose lifeblood is the LP, with singles just acting as a way of making folks aware he has a new collection out sometime soon.
While this all might be a clever bit of tactics, it would all be for nought if Buble could actually deliver the goods when it comes time to perform vocally. There though, he excels, especially to the audience that he’s built for himself, with his rich, smooth vocals that easy on the ear they could be positively be made of velvet. It may not ever be too aurally challenging or even alter too much from track to track, but that’s not what Buble sets out to do. He can however even make the Spiderman theme sound utterly luxurious, which is one heck of a party trick.
Also, let’s be blunt here, Buble’s always looked a bit good in a suit. Or a leather jacket. The man could probably wear a hospital gown and still look alright.
While he may not be driving forward the world of music, the astronomical success of Buble is proof that with the right application and ability, just about any genre of music can be popular at any time.
Tagged in Michael Buble