INDUSTRY MONETISING And the brand played on

No alternative: how brands bought out underground music 

Timberland hosts rap gigs. Princess Nokia makes films for Maybelline. And Red Bull is the new school of rock. Have brand partnerships destroyed counterculture? Or are they all that’s keeping it alive?

Is it possible, in 2017, to sell out? Not so long ago, cosying up to big business was considered the gravest sin an underground artist could commit – but these days new and leftfield musicians seem to spend their days hoovering up cash provided by brands while fans barely bat an eyelid. It’s not simply a case of moral bankruptcy, but rather literal bankruptcy: new and independent artists have had their potential income slashed by streaming and have been forced to mine money from an alternative source. But what’s in it for the brands – why have massive companies like Budweiser, Versace and Adidas invaded the alternative music scene? And can an underground even exist when so many of its artists are in cahoots with multinationals?

PLAY ALONG VID No Obituary for vid variety yet

A useful reminder of the versatility of the music video format:

Death metal godfathers Obituary won a synergistic cross-promotion through Guitar World magazine (also a website of course), creating a split-screen video to enable fans to play along with the guitar on their new release. 

They are also booked on a branded tour which will benefit from a major push through the magazine, and offer the chance to attract new fans as the publication has a multi-genre readership. Moreover, it's a neat way for a 1980s band to attract younger fans, kids and teens starting out on developing guitar skills.

So, add this to the lyric video, unwrapping video, album preview/promo video, tour announcement or localised tour shout out, single shot, live performance, fan footage, interactive, 3D, virtual reality (VR), teaser, tie-ins with console games like Guitar Hero ...

It also gets Obituary further publicity through stories on popular e-zines such as MetalSucks.

Good tune to boot, even if not up to the standard of their early classics, Slowly We Rot and Cause of Death!

http://www.metalsucks.net/2017/03/01/sentence-day-obituary-release-new-song-via-guitar-playthrough-video/

INDUSTRY How Rihanna represents digitised disrupted new norm

Lengthy feature, packed with highly quotable lines (music video has displaced audio for current generation, Rihanna makes money from social media driven sponsor/endorsement contracts than music sales...)

ARTICLE: Up the Anti: how Rihanna rewrote the rules of pop.

INDUSTRY Spotify moving into video?

One of the basic issues you have to address if you're making music videos is the perception that they're so, like, 90s, they're just over aren't they?

Ignoring my painful effort at teen skatz, in the era of UGC, where anyone can have a go at a music video with a phone or tablet, never mind a Mac, does the vid retain real cultural cachet? [zeitgeisty?] Is it still the centrepiece of marketing campaigns?

There's no definite answer ..  but I'd offer yes and no. The phenomenon of Gangnam Style is a YouTube video phenomenon; the cheesiness of the video, not the song, made it huge, and its monetisation was primarily through the billion+ YouTube hits and all those cover videos. No, because for all the hype Wrecking Ball's nude antics got Mikey Cyrus, its just part of a marketing mix that includes snogging Madonna and anything else that makes her Daily Mail clickbait. At that end of the market, as Elberse's case studies of Lady Gaga and Jay Z (yay, clickbait ahoy!) shows, tie-ins and distribution (often linked) are key, but so is audience engagement, some degree of interactivity with a campaign.

The humble QR code would have had Dennis McQuail, or Blumler and Katz, originators of the uses and gratifications theory, nodding to themselves, thinking just how right they were!

Where I've used the INDUSTRY heading, I'm often reflecting, quite indirectly at times, on the position of video in the marketing mix, and this post, marking the news that Spotify is set to (I'll try to update once news is out) move into video in a big way, is no exception.

By the way, given the apparent shocking outcome of the UK general election (voting count continues today), bear in mind the noise the Tories made about censoring and age rating music video, could develop into rather a major story for the music industry and even prosumers such as yourselves...

DIFFUSER.FM ARTICLE link.

UGC Azealia Banks Google tie-in stars audience

Its something I'll say frequently, and design 'spin-off' exercises around, because it is simply so important to the music industry's modern approach to promotion in the web 2.0 era: involving the 'audience' in the promo materials, and blurring the audience/producer line.

Details/link below

Customised ads within vids: Universal tech deal

More on this shortly: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2014/sep/30/universal-deal-adverts-mirriad-existing-music-videos.

...Quick summary of key points:

Director's Cut/Anniversary as promo tool: Nirvana

Picked this up from the Mojo website: Nirvana are issuing the 'director's cut' of Heart Shaped Box, borrowing a standard tool from the film toolkit to promote back catalogue sales:

An extended version of the Anton Corbijn-directed video for Nirvana’s Heart-Shaped Box has appeared online ahead of the release of the 20th Anniversary edition of In Utero (due out on September 24).
We’ve called on MOJO’s forensic unit to compare this Director’s Cut with the original film. Their analysis suggests three key areas where this new version differs, namely, more appearances from the small girl in the robe, more of the fleshy-body-suit woman and more Nirvana at their visceral best. 

[source: http://www.mojo4music.com/5909/nirvana-heart-shaped-box-directors-cut/]

The magazine is running its own tie-in, using the 20th anniversary of its release as a hook too:

And if that’s not enough of a Nirvana rarity for you, you can always check out the band’s original 1988 recording contract with Sub Pop. As the label says, “Six hundred bucks well spent. Not that we had it at the time.”
And don’t forget – you can read Jon Savage’s mammoth 1993 interview with Kurt Cobain in the current issue of MOJO magazine – on sale now. 

[ibid.]

THE POINT IS...
Good example of another strategy used by record co's/bands to promote back catalogue, but also a good idea for you to consider making a vid for a track released 10/20/25 (etc) years ago, as there is likely to be increased media attention and possibly a re-release/re-packaging/compilation to go with it.
You can look for inspiration by viewing past charts (eg at http://www.officialcharts.com/archive/music/). Another great site, which features all the vids (with iTunes purchase links) for top 20s of each year in the 70s/80s/90s (US charts) is http://www.songs-old.com/Top-20-Songs-Billboard-Charts.html.

Here's the vid cited:

GENRE/AUD/NEW MEDIA: Pomo/Hybridity: the Re:Generation project

Here's a project that puts hybridity at the centre, bringing togther 5 DJs with a range of genres (eg dubstep's Skrillex with classic rock band The Doors):

Visit the website at http://www.regenerationmusicproject.com/

You should swiftly notice the Hyundai branding; music + vids are increasingly used for branding exercises which are much more subtle than straight ads. The brand message is that Hyundai is cutting edge, defies barriers and categories; is timeless.

Here's how the Music Guardian reported the story:

Skrillex to reopen the Doors

Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek says the divisive dubstep star will work with the band as part of a new music documentary

• Sean Michaels
• guardian.co.uk, Friday 14 October 2011 10.55 BST
• Article history



Break on through … Skrillex teams up with the Doors




The "most hated man in dubstep" is helping to reopen the Doors. Skrillex will produce "the first new Doors track of the 21st century", according to keyboardist Ray Manzarek, as part of a new documentary.
"Basically, it's a variation on Milestones by Miles Davis," Manzarek told Rolling Stone magazine. "If I do say so myself, sounds fucking great, hot as hell." Forty years after the death of Jim Morrison, Manzarek returned to the studio with Robby Krieger and John Densmore. The Doors had been assigned to work with Skrillex, real name Sonny Moore, as part of the forthcoming documentary RE:GENERATION. "[Sonny] plays his beat, all he had to do was play the one thing," Manzarek said. "I listened to it and I said, 'Holy shit, that's strong.'"
RE:GENERATION is directed by Amir Bar-Lev, who helmed 2007's My Kid Could Paint That and a 2010 documentary on Pat Tillman. Produced in association with the Grammys, it unites artists with unexpected producers: Crystal Method recorded with Martha Reeves, Erykah Badu with Mark Ronson, while Nas and DJ Premier teamed up with the Berklee College of Music Orchestra.
Not every team-up went smoothly. Eectronic act Pretty Lights were sent to Nashville to work with country artists LeAnn Rimes and Ralph Stanley. "When Ralph showed up, I tried to tell him what I wanted to do and his response was, 'I think we'll just do it my way,'" said Pretty Lights' Derek Vincent Smith.
RE:GENERATION will be released to coincide with the 2012 Grammy awards on 12 February.

Kronenberg lager rapped for viral promo

This is as useful for the exam topic of Media Regulation - you could be reading up about the ongoing, intensifying scandal over phone hacking right now! - as Music Vids...

NB: The article cites a notorious song title that contains a swear word. (That very notoriety is part of the appeal to a drinks brand that appeared to be trying to circumvent legal restrictions on marketing alcohol to young people with this campaign)

Had any of you come across this marketing campaign - or perhaps the music without realising it was a subtle ad campaign?
Article link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/jul/05/heineken-campaign-banned-binge-drinking

Dead Kennedys cover pulled from lager campaign over binge-drinking fears

Campaign on Spotify for Kronenbourg 1664 banned by alcohol industry watchdog

• Mark Sweney
• guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 5 July 2011 07.21 BST


Dead Kennedys: promoting 'irresponsible drinking'? Photograph: Peter Noble/Redferns
Heineken has been forced to drop a cover of the US punk band Dead Kennedys' song Too Drunk to Fuck that featured in a Kronenbourg 1664 online promotion, after a complaint to the alcohol industry marketing watchdog that it encouraged binge drinking. Heineken's Kronenbourg 1664 campaign featured banner advertisements on popular music site Spotify. The ads directed music lovers to a special Kronenbourg "slowed down" playlist as part of a campaign by the beer brand called "Slow the Pace". Heineken's aim was to link the idea of "relaxed consumption" of beer with music that had been "uncharacteristically slowed down" from the original track. One of the tracks on the playlist was the Dead Kennedys' Too Drunk to Fuck, originally a thrashy ode to a misspent evening, as covered by the band Nouvelle Vague in an ironic easy-listening style. Drinks industry marketing watchdog the Portman Group, which operates a self-regulatory code of practice, received a complaint about the promotion and the use of the track. The Portman Group's independent complaints panel said that while Kronenbourg had not "set out to promote irresponsible drinking", nevertheless the "track name and lyrics referenced drinking to excess, thereby associating the brand with immoderate consumption". It added that this represented a breach of its industry code, which bans alcohol promotions from "encouraging irresponsible or immoderate drinking". "This demonstrates just how careful companies have to be when marketing alcohol," said David Poley, chief executive of the Portman Group. "We were pleased that the company took immediate action to remove the track from the playlist. As soon as the complaint was brought to its attention Heineken has also introduced more rigorous approval procedures as a result."