Albums out of thin air

What’s happening guys and gals it’s your boy Zain here; the young bachelor, the seductor, the connoisseur of fine music and anything urban and popping today or yesterday, this is my first post and indeed it is a monumental occasion that will for sure change your life regardless of who you are or what you do In life.

I want to talk about albums and promotion stunts these days or perhaps the lack of album promoting, a new age phenomenon that gets the public excited, imagine your favourite mainstream artist dropping a project overnight without any prior notification or singles, an album that when you wake up there’s news of 17 tracks on it, and the world goes nuts because of it. An album that is followed by several visuals, having absolutely no idea that such a morning would exist. That’s what Beyoncé did with her self-titled album and clearly succeeded at. Selling 80,000 units in its first three hours, 430,000 digital copies and 120,000 in the second day.  Critically acclaimed and one of the greatest secrets hidden from the public, an age when almost anything can be leaked and exposed. Impressive, especially from such a prestigious artist.

Beyoncé’s husband Jay Z also released an album ‘Magna Carter Holy Grail’ earlier in 2013, and only let the world know a week prior. A deal with Samsung allowed the project to happen, the advertising hit the Internet and was shown on YouTube before any clip played. Using YouTube advertising to its best advantage.  Within the trailers you had some amazing producers working on the album along with Jay talking about it, just pure artistry displayed.

J Cole let the world know only a few weeks prior of release of ‘2014 Forest Hills Drive’ no singles, Cole seems to be coming from more of a humble place, releasing a couple of trailers discussing his current mind state. It all revolved around him wanting to be happier as a person, the album reflects his anger of social and political injustices and the need of materialism and capitalism being a poison within mainstream society. The album went Gold and a well-taken risk on Cole’s part.

D’ Angelo released his new album literally 14 years after his last and it has always been considered one of the most anticipated albums of all time, especially in the R&B sphere, D’Angelo is considered one of the greatest. ‘Black Messiah’ had a trailer that lasted under a minute with no idea of a release date, this got the public excited and only a few hours later did we realize that it would be released that very night. The Internet went crazy and Black Messiah saved classic R&B in 2014.

It seems as though the theme of little promoting shook up the world in the last 2 years and will continue to do so it seems as though this method works, people care about names and labels more than anything else and if you have it then take that advantage. It may be too late as this has been done a few times now, there is however still time to make it a unique execution.