Bose Turns Superbowl Tweets Into Songs

Bose didn't pay for an ad during the Superbowl broadcast, but it did figure out a unique way to capitalize on the event.

The company asked a number of artists and bands to turn Superbowl related tweets with the #LetsHearIt hashtag into some short songs for a campaign it called Fantracks.

A variety of artists from different genres turned in 30 second songs recorded on the spot at the Bose studio and then posted them on social media and a dedicated Tumblr blog.

Not only did the artists use the tweet's text, but emoji's as well, which added a fun element to the process.

They're all pretty good and fun to watch and listen to, and it's hard to get bored since they're all so short. In fact, some of them are so good I wish they were longer.

Check out the Fantracks here.

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You Now Have To Pay To Play At The Superbowl

Pay to play is the bane of musicians everywhere, but it's especially prevalent in New York City and Los Angeles. For decades, club promoters have effectively been auctioning off time slots to any band or artist willing to purchase 100 advance tickets that they're then free to resell, or most likely just give away. Musicians in most other parts of the country are used to getting paid for their services, but that all changes in the "big city."

But now the NFL is turning the Superbowl halftime show into the ultimate pay-to-play gig. Instead of the league paying a top-shelf act like U2 or Bruce Springsteen to play the show, it's now asking the acts to pay in order to get in front of 100+ million viewers that will be watching.

The price the NFL is asking hasn't been revealed, but the first three "candidates" that were chosen for the 2015 Superbowl to be held in Pheonix, Coldplay, Rihanna and Katy Perry, have been decidedly cool on the idea.

That said, an appearance at the world's largest gig can lead to years of prosperity afterwards, as evidenced by the 2007 appearance by Prince, who's sold-out venues ever since. His career had been lagging before the appearance.

To be fair, the NFL has never actually paid performers to appear at the Superbowl, but has supplied what's amounted to millions of dollars in expenses, which can be extensive for most acts appearing.

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Has The Superstar Torch Been Passed To Bruno Mars?

For a number of years now, those in the higher echelons of the music business have worried about a lack of upcoming superstars who might be able to sell out stadiums for decades to come after the current legends stop touring. Of course, there may not ever be another Rolling Stones or Eagles, but one still wonders if recent big hit recording artists like Taylor Swift, Katy Perry or Kenny Chesney have the long-term longevity that the concert industry needs to sustain into the future.

Perhaps the one with the brightest future is Bruno Mars, who just capped off a winning Superbowl half-time concert that brought him a level of exposure that could hasten his already accelerated race to the top. In a scintillating performance, Mars showed the craft and confidence that could well cement him as a superstar for years to come.

To some degree, Mars (real name Peter Gene Hernandez) was a both a stretch and a risk for the National Football League. After years of presenting well-established stars like Paul McCartney, Prince, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Madonna and Beyonce (who graced the stage last year) for their Superbowl half-time shows, having someone who hasn’t quite attained such legendary status caused some to question the wisdom of the NFL’s choice. In order to hedge their bet, the league added California funk-rockers Red Hot Chili Peppers to the bill for one song. This actually turned out to be a fit since Mars has credited them as a major influence in the past, and their music, while more agressive in nature, meshed well with Mars. 

Still, Bruno could have easily carried the show by himself, as he proved with his excellent high-powered performance. After selling 10 million albums in just a three year period (quite a feat in this new music business we currently live in), with four #1 records, 18  Grammy nominations (!!), more than a billion YouTube views, and a well-earned reputation as an spectacular performer, the NFL should have stuck to their initial plan and let the man do his thing sans guests. Read more on Forbes.

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Audio As A QR Code

One of the more interesting aspects of the Superbowl was the fact that Shazam, the 4rth most popular iOS app of all time, led something of a breakthrough in the world social promotion. The company ingeniously tagged the audio during the superbowl so you could automatically link to sponsors websites if you listened using the Shazam app. For want of a better term, it was an audio QR code.

If you don't know about Shazam, it's a great app that will listen to a song, then tell you its name. That makes adding an audio tag to the music played during the Superbowl so that you can link to a sponsor just an extension of what the app does anyway.

The list of sponsors included Toyota, Best Buy, Cars.com, Pepsi, Teleflora, GE, and movies Act of Valor and John Carter. Plus during halftime, a partnership between Bud Light and Interscope allowed listeners/viewers to unlock exclusive content from Interscope artists.

This venture into audio tagging is a significant development for a number of reasons. First of all, this opens up a host of opportunities for artists in the future. Imagine people automatically directed to your website as they're listening to your song without having to do a Google search first. On the television side, this opened up what's known as the "Second Screen" experience, where what you're accessing on your computer is just an extension of the television show that you're watching.

I always thought that accessing a QR code was anything but a sleek experience, since it always seems to take a number of snapshots from your camera to get one that registers. Audio tagging is so much easier, and let's face it, convenience always wins with the public.

Who would've thought that the biggest sporting event (really one of the biggest events period) could be such a step into the future of promotion?

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Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.

You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.