Domination in America, Starting from being a Boxing Champion
Chapter 303: Link’s Dark Material"Boss, these two singles from Link are too strong—they’re all championship-level hits. Combined with his huge fan base, it’s going to be extremely difficult for us to beat him on the singles charts,"
Said Alex, the assistant at SB project talent agency, standing in front of the desk.
Scooter, smoking a cigarette, squinted through the thin smoke as he browsed the data on his tablet, feeling somewhat helpless.
Link was indeed strong, churning out hits one after another, more prolific than farts.
If only I had known he was this powerful, I should have tried to sign him from the beginning.
With such a talented and capable person, paired with SB’s powerful marketing tools, Link could definitely become a cash cow for the company.
Unfortunately, Link was too ambitious; a newcomer without any connections dared to start a record company with another newcomer, Ivanka, and miraculously, they made it work.
The rise of Link Music became the most incredible news in the music industry last year.
Scooter shook his head and looked at his assistant Alex, saying,
"For now, stick to the plan. Continue with the release of Justin’s second single next week and intensify the promotional efforts, especially online. Justin is an internet sensation, and his fans are mostly online. Boosting promotion on major web platforms will yield better results.""Yes!"
Alex nodded.
"One more thing, continue to gather dirt on Link, especially rumors about him and women, the more, the merrier, and regardless of their veracity."
"Understood, boss!"
Alex nodded, and seeing that Scooter had no further instructions, he offered his farewell.
After the assistant left, Scooter stroked his chin stubble and pondered while staring at Link’s photo on the screen.
Since the beginning of the year, he had allocated one million US dollars to gather negative news about Link, ready to strike him down when necessary.
Unfortunately, Link did not behave like most in the entertainment industry; he didn’t smoke, drink excessively, do drugs, or engage with prostitutes, nor did he have any tattoos. He worked diligently, was involved in charity, and was as pure as a white lotus.
The only dirt on him had already been exposed, and recycling it to attack him would be ineffective, so to defeat him, fresh scandals were urgently needed.
Suddenly, Scooter noticed a piece of news on the internet. The Global Post reported that a politician named Michelle Gordon from Ottawa, spotted partying in a nightclub only three days after her husband’s death, dressed provocatively, then called the police. ȑ₳Νȱ₿Ɛꞩ
The police issued a statement claiming the photo had been digitally altered and was not of the politician herself.
Despite the police’s clarification, many netizens remained skeptical, arguing that the politician had a history of such behavior and the photo might be real.
Scooter tapped his chin thoughtfully as he read this news.
Ding-ding-ding!
Glancing at his phone, Scooter saw it was a call from Kunas. He sat up straight and smiled, "Good afternoon, Ryan, are you calling for a drink?"
"Scooter, it’s not time for drinks yet. Have you thought of any way to deal with Link?"
Kunas asked.
Scooter immediately restrained his smile and said, "I’m working on it. His new songs are of high quality and he has a relatively large fan base. Defeating him in sales won’t be easy, so I plan to attack him by hyping up his scandals. I’m currently gathering information in that area, and I’ll report to you as soon as there is progress."
"Great, our thoughts are perfectly aligned. I have some dirt on Link, which I’ve sent to your email. That dirt cost me one million pounds to obtain, and I hope you can make good use of it. Don’t disappoint me."
"One million pounds? Dirt on Link?"
Scooter perked up, straightened his back, and after saying okay three times, reassured Kunas and then hung up the call.
He opened his email and saw a video taken in secret. His eyes immediately lit up, shining brightly.
In the third week of February, Justin released the second promotional track from his new album, "Somebody To Love." The song achieved an impressive first-day download count of 105,000, coming on strong.
That same week, Lady Gaga released the second single "Telephone" from her album "The Fame Monster."
The song, a duet with the queen Beyonce, amassed 75,000 downloads on its first day and topped Billboard’s dance music chart, becoming Lady Gaga’s sixth single to reach the top of Billboard’s dance chart.
Following Lady Gaga’s single release, the competition for the February singles chart became even fiercer.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
At the Muscle Beach Boxing Gym, Link, dressed in a T-shirt, swung his fists vigorously. After more than two hours of training, he was dripping with sweat.
While he was training, De La Hoya came to the boxing ring to ask when he was free to fight.
Originally, he was supposed to fight in two matches during the first half of the year, the first in January against Roy Jones and the second against Hoyle in May.
However, an accident occurred on Roy Jones’ end, claiming an injury during training, which postponed the match to April, consequently delaying his match with Hoyle as well.
Besides his matches with Roy Jones and Hoyle, there were four more boxing championship challenges this year.
The continental champions from WBA, WBC, WBO, and IBF organizations had challenged him, requiring his participation in title defenses.
He had relinquished titles from the two smaller organizations, IBO and WBF, so there was no need for those challenges.
"After fighting Roy Jones, there are four more challenges, and our match probably will have to wait until the end of the year,"
Said Link, wiping sweat with a towel.
"Year end?"
Hoyle was displeased, punching the heavy bag, "I’m 37 this year, 38 by the end of the year. Is this your tactic? You know you can’t beat me now, so you plan to wait till I get old to fight me, just like you did with Tyson?"
"You’re really funny, there were issues on Roy Jones’s side, blame him if you must, it’s not related to me. If you’re up for it, we can have a match right now."
"No fight, it’s inconvenient with a suit on."
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De La Hoya waved his hand.
"Hey, boss, want me to help you with your clothes?"
Morales came over with his training bag and reached out to strip off Hoyle’s suit.
"Fuck! Morales, stay away from me!"
De La Hoya threw a punch just half a centimeter in front of Morales’s nose, startling him into stepping back quickly, raising his fists defensively.
Hoyle snorted lightly, gave Link a smug look, and walked away whistling crudely.
"This guy is 37 and still so fast."
Morales touched his nose and said with lingering fear.
Link smiled lightly, 37 or 38 was prime age for a man, the peak of physical strength, based on the speed of De La Hoya’s punch just now, he was certainly not to be underestimated.
After Morales arrived, Link began sparring with him.
Emma Roberts came by for more than half an hour then her agent called her away.
After the training session ended in the afternoon, on his drive home, Lady Gaga called asking when he would be free to record a song together.
Link remembered he had agreed last year to collaborate with Lady Gaga on a track, he had already received a pop song demo called "The Greatest Thing," which was quite good both lyrically and musically.
He thought it over and scheduled it for the weekend.
Lady Gaga also mentioned on the phone something about "Legends never die" being fantastic. She wanted to cover the song and asked if he had assigned the cover rights to any female singer.
Link said no but was a bit nervous hearing that Lady Gaga wanted to do a cover.
Lady Gaga wasn’t very tall, but her vocal range was high and her singing powerful. Her rendition would undoubtedly be stronger than Crissy Custance of the ’Against The Current’ band, who was just an amateur singer who had gained fame through YouTube.
"Link, what’s up, you worried I’ll mess it up?"
Lady Gaga asked on the phone.
"Of course not, I’m just worried about being outperformed by you; you’re too strong."
"Haha, are you joking with me? Even if I can hit the high notes of this song, I can’t bring out that fierce and grand flavor you have. I bet, no one can surpass your live version."
Lady Gaga remarked admiringly.
Link smiled as well, on February 7th, Link Music released the studio version of "Legends never die," and on February 9th, the live version was released.
After comparison, 82% of fans believed the live version was of higher quality; this led to a surge in downloads for the live version.
After listening, Link also felt the live version was better, often accompanied by the shouts of the audience and the chorus of players.
Although the background noise was a bit loud, it seemed more authentic, more vibrant, and more powerful.
Billboard commented that the live version was like a song recorded on the battlefield, majestic and grand, a song that could make its way into the history of the Football League.
Since Lady Gaga was willing to cover it, Link wasn’t going to refuse. If she could perform the song even better, that would be beneficial for him too.
Having set a time to record the song, Link hung up and drove to Universal Studios to participate in the shooting of The Expendables there.
He played the role of Roy, assistant to Stallone, the fourth male lead, who had served in the US Special Forces, possessed a strong physique and excellent combat skills, and was also proficient with firearms.
His flaw was being a playboy; while following Stallone into a South American country for operations, he almost betrayed their position due to falling for the enemy’s beauty trap.
He didn’t have many scenes, mainly following Stallone around fighting. He totalled two weeks of filming, including a trip to the rainforests of Venezuela in between.
"All of me" sold 187,000 copies in its second week of release and ranked fifth on the singles chart.
The first was "Legends never die," with cumulative sales of 487,000 in its third week.
The cumulative US sales reached 2.35 million, with global sales totaling 3.85 million, and it topped the singles chart in 16 countries including France, Belgium, Canada, Sweden, New Zealand, Australia, and made the top ten in 47 countries.
The second was Justin’s "Baby," with 425,000 copies, with a total global sales of 2.75 million.
The third was Justin’s new single "Somebody to Love," with first-week downloads of 382,000.
The fourth was the Lady Gaga and Beyonce collaborative single "Telephone," 224,000 copies.
Taylor’s "Today was a fairytale" fell to sixth.
Also this week, the war goddess’s second album "Need you now" had been out for seven weeks and officially topped 1.5 million US sales, becoming the first album in the US music scene of 2010 to do so, with expected sales exceeding three million.
Kesha’s debut album "Animal" released six weeks ago, sold 800,000 copies in the US, with projected sales above a million, making Kesha undoubtedly the new star of the year in the music scene.
In this context, albums by Link and others like Justin, Wiz Khalifa needed more promotional effort to achieve good sales results.
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