The physical sales team did their share of heavy lifting to deliver a #139 Billboard/Soundscan Top 200 debut for Rhett Miller‘s The Dreamer, which also hit #2 on the Heatseekers chart. This follows a long list of Top 200 chart debuts for our artists, including Pitbull, DJ Premier & Bumpy Knuckles, Royce Da 5’9″, The Black Angels, The Raveonettes, Ryan Adams, and more. Who needs a major label anyway?
Accompanied by Blake Russell and Ronit Shaham, I traveled to Atlantic City two weekends ago to check out The Black Angels & Torche’s sets at Metallica’s massive 4-stage, 2-day Orion Festival. All of the artists were hand-picked by the headliners themselves and the show was covered heavily on Fuse.
The Black Angels were joined onstage by newest member Rishi Dhir (Elephant Stone/High Dials), who played sitar in addition to rotating on guitar and bass. After their solid set, The Angels’ lead singer Alex Maas told us the band has been working hard with something like 30 new songs already written for the next album expected in 2013. Could some sitar sounds be included in the new directions Alex spoke about?
Torche had the honor of being introduced by Metallica bassist Robert Trujillo. Playing to a crowd estimated at 3-5k, they delivered a crushing, yet melodic set, making many new fans in the process. When Torche left the stage, the surprised band were warmly greeted by Trujillo and Metallica lead singer/guitarist James Hetfield, who hung out to chat for several minutes.
Props to Vector Management’s Lauren Pattenaude and Volcom’s Michael Nobrega for the hookups! And megathanks to all of Torche and The Black Angels for some quality face-time with The Orchard crew.
Check out the photos from the festival here.
Last month, The Orchard’s Interactive Marketing team introduced you to the new Facebook Timeline. Hopefully we helped make the transition as smooth and as painless as possible for you and your artist(s). This month, we are going to walk you through three things that have proven to be highly effective for us in the land of digital marketing over the past few weeks – SoundCloud’s Story Wheel, NoiseTrade, and last but not least… bat piss (wait for it).
First on deck, Story Wheel. Story Wheel was rolled out via SoundCloud Labs, and it is an online and embeddable version of a slide show projection (sound effects included). The app allows you to login through an Instagram account and drag and drop photos pulled from Instagram into a photo carousel. Next, you are able to narrate the reel through the powers of SoundCloud. Just click the giant red record button and lay down audio as you click through your very own Story Wheel. Once created, you can embed this gem using the following code:
Our friends in ZAMBRI captured their adventures to SXSW in a StoryWheel featured on NYLON…
Hey, Freeloaders! Happy Friday! No matter what you’re up to, we’ve got a ton of free music to craft the perfect soundtrack for your day. In addition to a free song download from Carina Round, you should check out new album streams from Maps & Atlases, Suckers, and Torche (which features bassist Jonathan Nuñez’s track-by-track commentary):
Carina Round: “Girl and The Ghost” via FILTER
Tigermending out May 1st on Dehisce Records
Maps & Atlases: Beware and Be Grateful via AOL Spinner
Album out now on Barsuk Records!
Suckers: Candy Salad via Paste
Album out April 24th on Frenchkiss Records
Torche: Harminocraft via SPIN
Album out April 24th on Volcom
Are you one of those people that gripes every time Facebook changes something on you? Just when you had mastered “poking,” Zuckerberg goes and takes it away. Well, earlier this month, Facebook announced that all artist pages will take on the Timeline format by March 30th. But, hold your gripes! The Orchard’s Interactive Marketing team is here to walk you through the Timeline. EMBRACE THE CHANGE! Here, we will show you the various upgrades that come with the Timeline and how you should use them to your advantage.
1. Get Covered
The new Timeline gives artists a creative outlet to display a large cover photo (850 x 315) at the top of their new profile. To add an image to your cover, go to your Timeline, and click “Add Cover” at the top of the page. You can upload a photo or choose one from an existing album. You can then reposition the photo so that it appears exactly as you want. If you want to change the photo, simply click the image and select “Change Cover.” Here is an example of Torche‘s updated cover photo displaying their upcoming album artwork.
A few apps and services have popped up since the announcement of the migration to the Timeline. Here are some worth checking out: CoverJunction (allow fans to upload and share your cover photo while tracking shares), MyFBcovers & CoverCanvas (create a customized cover). Meshuggah saw over 100 cover photo shares and uploads of their album artwork from fans after one day of implementing the CoverJuntion app.
NOTE: Covers may not include…
It doesn’t roll off the tongue with quite the same alliterative ease but let’s call this Freeloader Monday.
If you’re heading down to Austin next week, it’s a good bet that you have started to assemble an elaborate SXSW itinerary that will take you all over the city to see literally dozens of shows, from day parties, to official showcases, to late night performances taking place in weird and wonderful locations like, say, the middle of a bridge at 4 am. (Said itinerary will hopefully also take you to many many delicious Tex-Mex and BBQ joints as well but that’s for another post. Sleep, however, is for the weak).
Navigating the list of artists can be a daunting experience but we’re here to help. Our free Don’t Mess with Texas: SXSW 2012 New Music Sampler contains tracks from 23 can’t-miss-artists.
Click HERE to download the compilation. Starting tomorrow it will also be available for streaming on services like Spotify, Rdio and Amazon.
Check out the track list after the jump.
