Everything good must come to an end, the saying goes. Dutch artist Gordon knows this better than anyone else, following the latest dramatic turn in his career. Following a triumphant apperance as part of Gerard Joling’s sellout Lekker concerts and his first Dutch number one single, the singer is now in the middle of a controversy brewing in his homeland.
Only last weekend Gordon stood on the stage alongside duo Maywood as part of the sellout Lekker concerts given by Gerard Joling at Amersterdam’s Ziggo Dome. It was another highlight of his career, following the news earlier in the month that he had scored his first ever number one hit with his latest single, Kom Eens Dichterbij. This was one of the three singles he released simultaneously, the other two being Liefde Overwint Alles and So This Is Me. News of the feat made Gordon weep tears of joy, but his bubble seems to have burst when serious allegations surfaced yesterday.
Erik de Zwart, a Dutch radio and TV personality and chairman of the Stichting Nederlandse Top 40, the body that compiles and publishes the Dutch top 40 singles charts, recently made remarks concerning the success of Kom Eens Dichterbij where he certainly didn’t mince his words. Whereas Gordon claims his success comes from the many thousands who have downloaded his single, de Zwart claims that Gordon’s recent tears of joy were more like tears of pain brought about by the cost of downloading his own singles, thus manipulating the charts.
The reason de Zwart has reacted so strongly is because Gordon’s latest single is sitting pretty atop the top 40, but is seeing very little action in other charts, something de Zwart considers extremely suspicious. He goes on to explain that Kom Eens Dichterbij is at number 27 on the Dutch iTunes chart and is only topping the Single Top 100 GfK Dutch Charts as a result of blatant manipulation.
The single was released on the Berk Music label, and CEO of the label, Adrie van den Berk seems to be taking the allegations all in his stride, rebuffing the controversial claims of de Zwart by stating: "Is the success of a single really dependant on airplay? Gordon’s single is being played everywhere, and he’s performed his latest hit on so many TV shows recently. In a mere matter of weeks, the music video has been watched 122.000 times online. Those figures are pretty substantial." He goes on to say that "The single is possibly the biggest success we’ve had in the download age so far and I’d like to thank Erik de Zwart for the additional publicity." Gordon has yet to comment on the claims made by de Zwart.
This is the second scandal to hit the Dutch charts within the last two months. Jeroen van der Boom‘s single Beter Laat Dan Nooit was removed from the charts in September, after it had been made available as a free download for fans paid by a company, which breached chart rules. Is the song worth all the fuss? Judge for yourself, by watching the music video of Kom Eens Dichterbij below.
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