Tag: Polydor
Posted inNews

Glass Animals created a music video with fans’ head-scans

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

Back in May, we wrote about an inventive digital marketing campaign for the band Glass Animals, letting fans poke around a virtual computer desktop and create stuff with their assets.

Now label Polydor’s ongoing campaign for their album ‘Dreamland’ has taken some new twists. Fans were asked to download an app called Trnio, which scans real-world objects and turns them into 3D models.

In this case, what they were scanning was their own heads, which visual artist Marco Mori then turned into a music video for Glass Animals’ track ‘Tangerine’. It’s… strange (but good).

Posted inNews

Virtual re-Ellie-ty: Ellie Goulding makes XR music videos

Avatar photo by Eamonn Forde

British artist Ellie Goulding has a pair of new videos out for her new tracks ‘Brightest Blue’ and ‘New Heights’.

They’re the result of a partnership between label Polydor and Vevo for the latter’s ‘Official Live Performance’ series, but what’s notable is their use of ‘XR’ technology, which blends camera footage with computer-generated content in real-time.

For ‘Brightest Blue’ it begins by adding lighting effects (blue, of course) as Goulding sings and then stage dressing is added and it ends with the camera pulling back to reveal the soundstage it was filmed on and the musicians performing live that were previously out of shot. ‘New Heights’ does something similar but focuses on an evolving backdrop instead.

Posted inSandbox

Sandbox Issue 221: Fake Views. Lies, damned lies and music statistics

by Rocio Sanchez

Lead: Smoke and mirrors have always been part of music, but when it comes to data, truth is starting to play second fiddle to hype. The nefarious and ruthless are finding ways to “massage” social media and streaming numbers while offering the desperate and gullible a quick fix. But the platforms are getting wise to […]

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Posted inNews

Years & Years preview new album with Facebook Camera effects

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

The latest element in artist Years & Years’ campaign for their new album ‘Palo Santo’ is a set of augmented-reality ‘effects’ for Facebook’s Camera feature. Fans using the camera to record video selfies can trigger one of 11 different effects based on the album’s artwork – with the visuals overlaid as they film their clips.

According to Polydor Records, which is running the campaign, it’s the first time that multi-effects have been used for music in this way – Marvel was the first brand to use the technology. The incentive for fans to explore all 11 effects is that they’ll be able to hear snatches of each track from the new album ahead of its release.

Posted inNews

Years & Years get their own ‘cryptocurrency’ for fans

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

No, British band Years & Years aren’t minting their own cryptocurrency or trying to make millions from an initial coin offering (ICO). But the latest plank in the marketing campaign for their new album ‘Palo Santo’ is a fun riff on the crypto world.

It’s called YearCoin (naturally!) and it ties in to the narrative around the album – previously disseminated via the band’s Messenger bot and social media – about humans fighting back against their android overlords in a dystopian future.

“There is a small human rebellion being coordinated through illegal encrypted online communications and is funded by the cryptocurrency, YearCoin,” explains the new microsite for this element of the campaign. Fans can ‘mine’ and earn YearCoins with various actions, from saving the band’s tracks on Spotify and watching / sharing official videos, to sharing ‘encrypted messages’ on social media to promote the album.

Posted inNews

Palo Santo Messenger bot kicks off Years & Years album campaign

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

What is Palo Santo? It’s a fictional city where androids and humans live side-by-side, of course. But don’t worry if you didn’t know that: this is only just being revealed, bit-by-bit, to fans of British band Years & Years.

Or perhaps we should say bit-by-bot, since one of the initial planks in the campaign for the band’s upcoming second album is a Messenger bot launched by label Polydor Records UK.

Called the Palo Santo Entertainment Network Server (PSEN for short) it promises “a range of civic services for androids and the non-organic” – a mixture of cryptic clues and video clips, which signed up more than 5,000 subscribers in two days after its launch.

Posted inNews

Messaging, bots and AI’s music evolution in 2017 (#midem)

Avatar photo by Eamonn Forde

Hundreds of thousands of music fans are already interacting with their favourite artists through bots on messaging apps like Facebook Messenger. So how might this trend develop in 2017 and beyond?

A panel at Midem today explored the trend. Moderated by Music x Tech x Future’s Bas Grasmayer, it included The Bot Platform’s Syd Lawrence; Sony Music’s Ricardo Chamberlain; Polydor’s Luke Ferrar; SuperPlayer’s Gustavo Goldschmidt; The Orchard’s Nikoo Sadr; and Pop’s Tim Heineke.

Posted inAnalysis, News

Ellie Goulding: ‘On My Mind’ single withheld from YouTube and SoundCloud

Avatar photo by Stuart Dredge

It’s a big day for fans of Ellie Goulding: pre-orders for her new album have gone live, and her latest single ‘On My Mind’ is making its debut on radio, streaming services and download stores.

There are two prominent places you won’t find the full version of the track, though: YouTube and SoundCloud.

Polydor Records has confirmed to Music Ally that the song is being withheld from both services deliberately, in order to drive traffic to “monetised, legitimate streaming and consumption services rather than non-chart eligible, non-monetises ones”.