Archive for the 'Music' Category

Bands Do It Better?

02.27.12

Ever wonder how that young, most likely un-showered, group of scruffy dudes with questionable intellect became the trendiest of-the-moment band with thousands of fans?  Well, apparently the music industry is sometimes smarter than it looks. Almost every emerging artist understands that being a social media powerhouse is synonymous with the momentum of his or her success. The music industry has come up with some of the most creative ways of digital promotion, and the most impressive performance results. Artists have always longed for a way to engage in a two-way conversation with their fans. Brands should take a cue.

Allowing people to “tag” themselves in official Facebook concert photos, having fans pay a small fee to listen in on the recording process and vote for their song picks for the album, providing rewards for “checking-in” at a concert on Foursquare, and creating new social platforms are just the start of the consumer-“brand” relationship that make bands stars. Mainstream artists are tapping into the trend too, as digital and social media investments become an integral part of their overall marketing plans. Just last month, Lady Gaga manager, Troy Carter, invested $4M in the startup tech-company, Backplane. The company is responsible for launching a self-sustaining social platform for Little Monsters. While the platform is still in beta, the investment signals big plans for the future.  Unlike other artist’s creative social efforts, this is a private “Monsters-only” community where fans can interact through an entity entirely separate from existing platforms like Twitter and Facebook.

What makes this endeavor most admirable is its departure from social media protocol that big business so heavily relies on. By choosing to operate on a separate platform, Backplane has allowed Gaga to carve out her own space in the digital landscape, and to own every aspect of the fan relationship. Giving this platform an even louder buzz is their South by Southwest Event: The SXSW Managers Hack - a launch event for the startup hosted by some of music’s biggest management professionals. This event invites developers from all over the globe to participate in an 8-hour challenge to construct a presentation of their concepts and ideas for the future of the digital music distribution. There will be a live web cast and play-by-play commentary.

Backplane reflects Carter’s belief that focusing on inventive, highly interactive social media concepts is extremely worthwhile. In an interview with AdAge this month, longtime music industry player Jeff Kempler agrees, “Foursquare, Twitter and Instagram are really good examples of platforms that enable artist-to-fan and fan-to-fan communication to occur in a way that's really very real and very humanizing.”

So, an old-school industry guy and Lady Gaga’s manager are keying into the idea that social media’s biggest selling point is its ability to make the target market feel like important, separate beings. How soon until big business follows suit?

Photo-by-Google

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Good Girl Gone Very Bad

11.4.11

What’s better than an infectious beat with a catchy chorus to kick off a Friday night? Teaming up with Scottish electro-pop producer, Calvin Harris, on the track, Rhianna’s latest video adds the edgy narrative of a toxic relationship to a beat that we can’t seem to shake. The subject matter is dark, but the track is just so damn fun that we’re hooked!

Partying in Vegas, desert dance moshes, and general debauchery are some of the more positive points of a video that screams Requiem for a Dream. Thankfully unlike Requiem, we can play this one on repeat all weekend. This good girl has gone bad and shows no signs of turning back… but we kinda love it.

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Big Bad Wolf

10.29.11

Just in time for Halloween, dance act, Duck Sauce has released the follow-up video to their hit "Barbra Streisand," and we've been dancing in our chairs ever since. As producer A-Trak puts it, the band wanted to create a narrative to the song with this video that would tell us just who the Big Bad Wolf was. We'll let you draw your own conclusions, but the video tells the story of two working-class guys out for a night on the town. Between their legs, they each sport a giant bulge that is revealed to be the head of one of the band's members.

Amidst laughing our asses off, we were simultaneously disturbed by this theme. The only thing more puzzling is the fact that the effect was achieved au naturale. According to director, Keith Schofield, the guys actually donned their best green-screen suits (so that they could be edited out afterwards) and followed the cameras around with their noggins stuck between a pair of hairy legs. That's dedication.

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CMJ Rolls Into NYC

10.25.11

This past week, we got to experience one of the perks of being based in New York in the fall. Every year, the College Music Journal (CMJ), rolls into town with a full week of indie music showcases, film premieres, and industry panel discussions. While the names involved with the festival are always interesting, and the amount of new music to-be-discovered is limitless, the number of parties and ‘unofficial’ shows tailgating off of the festival is just as impressive.

Some of the more memorable moments of the week included: any one of buzzed about alt-gothic-electronic female, Zola Jesus’s showcase performances, Neon Indian at Webster Hall, and Metronomy at the Music Hall of Williamsburg.

One of our favorite breakout bands of the blogosphere, Active Child, had a heavy CMJ Week schedule this year. While their showcase supporting, BRAIDS was noteworthy, their last-minute opening set for Cold War Kids at the Filter Magazine party was hauntingly good.

We can’t forget to mention the Windish Agency Showcase we caught on Thursday night. Penguin Prison, Brooklyn-based dance pop artist, delivered a flawless performance off the back of his album’s release earlier that week, and the supporting band, Friends, was a pleasant surprise for us and an immediate favorite.

The week ended for us at a blowout event sponsored by SPIN Magazine, featuring the likes of The Rapture, A-Trak, and Crystal Castles. The mystery surrounding this top-secret event made it well worth the wait. Like we said – the ‘unofficial’ events are often some of the best.

Now that we’ve got our indie culture fix for the fall season, we look forward to seeing what each of these new acts has to bring in the coming year. If this week’s festivities were any indicator, 2012 already has an exciting tone set on the music scene. Of course, we’ll be sure to keep you in-the-know every step of the way.

Photo-by-thezenderagenda.com

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What's in a Name?

10.20.11

With the number of digital projects we’ve been working on, our fingers are sore from endless hours of SEO meta-tagging. Everyone realizes the importance of SEO, yet despite the in-depth focus that marketers put into it, there are often some obvious oversights that go unnoticed. Take for instance, the music landscape, where the single most important asset an artist can have, now, more than ever – is a name.

From an SEO standpoint, one would think that choosing common, non-unique words would lead to tenth-page banishment on Google, which is often the case for new artists. However, if you can make your band page rank in search engines as a #1 result with a simple name like “GIRLS”, your accomplishments are all the more impressive.

What any digital marketing team behind an artist could hope for, however, is an SEO-friendly gem. A term like “Lady Gaga” was probably never entered into a search engine prior to the release of “Just Dance” – and by that point, it was a guarantee you were going to find the Gaga you were looking for.

To create a name that can navigate the metadata quagmire of the Internet requires some creativity. It’s about finding an alternative way around things. Instead of making your moniker, The Weekend, try chopping out the last “e”. By these standards, The Weeknd has become a unique, and skyrocketing Internet sensation. By doing so, The Weeknd frontman Abel Tesfaye, was not only able to carve out his own unique corner of cyberspace, but to dominate the common term as well. (Typing, “the weekend” into Google, now returns the artist’s website as the top result).

Part of the reason an artist could achieve a presence like that, has to do with the introduction of Google’s “Panda” algorithm change. Panda aims to lower the rank of “low-quality” sites, in place of high quality content. “Quality” standards were established by a series of artificially intelligent tests, applied to thousands of websites that measured design, trustworthiness, speed, and likeliness to make a return visit.

While the launch of Panda has been followed by debate amongst webmasters, it seems that the algorithm must be doing something right. The Weeknd is driving traffic, a band named GIRLS can turn a top-result ranking (as can a band name CANT), and The Gorillaz have never been mistaken for the gorillas. We therefore put the onus of quality of the artists themselves. The final test of this point will be whether the buzzworthy Lana Del Rey can successfully erase all Google evidence of a first-attempt career launch under her birth name, Lizzy Grant. Perhaps then, we will discover the true power of a name.

The-Weeknd_SEO_Searchable-Band-Names

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Foster the People Return to NYC

08.12.11

Five months ago, Foster the People played their first NYC show to an intimate crowd at The Box as part of the DeLeón Tequila LOCKED music series that RJW co-developed. Last night, they returned to New York, performing to a significantly bigger audience alongside Cut Copy at the Prospect Park Bandshell.

In the short time since RJW first recognized their talent, the band's popularity has skyrocketed, reaching #1 on the Billboard charts with their debut album, Torches. We're glad that we caught them on the way up, and look forward to seeing more great things from this band.

flickr photo by parttimemusic

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Anna Calvi takes SPINHOUSE L!VE By Storm

08.5.11

For the second installment of the SPINHOUSE L!VE series that RJW is co-producing for LACOSTE L!VE, Spin Magazine suggested an upcoming songstress named Anna Calvi. In the United States, her reach is mostly among the insider-music community, however, her popularity in the UK is undeniable, having recently been nominated for the British equivalent of a Grammy.

Calvi’s album was in steady rotation in the office leading up to the show, but when the day came, we were still blown away when she finally stepped on stage. Opening her set with a vicious guitar solo that demanded the attention of the 150 person crowd on Spin Magazine’s roof, Calvi made a strong case for the argument that she could be the next Siouxsie Sioux or Florence and the Machine.

Throughout the perfect summer night, the only time it seemed like that audience turned their eyes from the stage was to quickly shoot off a tweet telling their friends about the amazing event they were at.

To read the interview with Calvi by Andrew from RJW’s digital team, check out the LACOSTE L!VE blog.

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Locked presents Peter Bjorn and John at Rose Bar

05.5.11

Last night, Swedish Indie Rockers Peter, Bjorn, and John performed to a hand picked group of 150 tastemakers at Gramercy Park Hotel’s Rose Bar. The second performance in the DeLeón Tequila Locked series developed in conjunction with Columbia Records brought out influencers including Phillip Lim, Richard Chai, Albert Hammond Jr., Waris Ahluwalia, Mick Rock, Lissy Trullie, Charolette Ronson, Jessica Stam, Sky Ferreira and Erin Heatherton.

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LOCKED Brings Foster the People to NYC

04.15.11

Photo by Mark Squires

Last week marked the beginning of LOCKED, a collaboration developed by RJW Collective for DeLeón Tequila along with Columbia Records. The ongoing partnership will bring some of the biggest names in music to New York’s most private venues.

Foster The People started the exclusive series, playing an hour-long set at The Box, their first performance in New York City. For more details, check out the DeLeón Blog and check back to see who will be playing at the next LOCKED.

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The White Stripes Have Broken Up. Again.

02.7.11

We know, we know. We're a little behind the ball on this.

Still, it's fairly major news.

When Jack White and Meg White dissolved their marriage in 2002, many surmised that the band would not be able to make it. They proved us wrong for another 8 years, but now, at long last, it seems the iconic rock-n-roll duo will call it quits. According to their website, the duo is breaking up “to preserve What is beautiful and special about the band and have it stay that way.”

Some have quipped that the White Stripes were never worthy of the praise and attention they garnered in the first place, but that was of little importance then and is of even less importance now. Regardless of which side of the issue you fell on, they were huge successes in their heyday, with each of their final three records winning the Grammy for Best Alternative Album and their hit song “Seven Nation Army” winning the Grammy for Best Rock Song.

Personally, I was never bothered by the simplicity of their music. White’s riffs, while they never dazzled or befuddled, were always catchy. While not entirely unique--in fact, they were almost always pieced together from borrowed musical movements and icons--they still managed to capture a zeitgeist and enchant an audience. Elson’s simple drum beats were also never revered for their complexity, but isn’t that what made The White Stripes so impressive? As an amateur drummer, (and by amateur, I mean very amateur), I could always put on a White Stripes song and quickly pick up on the beats. It made me feel like I could perhaps one day be a real live rock star (just because it hasn’t happened yet doesn’t mean it won’t, people. Don’t be a dreamkiller).

In any case, for me, it’s a sad day. The White Stripes will always be part of a musical movement for me—the movement I discovered in High School.

I’ll leave you with this, from the band itself:

“The White Stripes do no believe to Meg and Jack anymore. The White Stripes belong to you now and you can do with it whatever you want. The beauty of art and music is that it can last forever if people want it to. Thank you for sharing this experience. Your involvement will never be lost on us and we are truly grateful.”

You’re welcome, White Stripes. You. Are. Welcome.

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