Grammy-winning producer RAC kicked off the campaign for his third artist album, BOY, with a pre-campaign collaborative single with Hillary Duff and her partner, Matthew Koma – a cover of the Third Eye Blind classic ‘Never Let You Go’, which was covered widely (Billboard, E! Online, People.com and more)
The album BOY was announced on 8th May with the first album single, ‘Stuck On You’ feat. Phil Good, and a strong D2C merch setup via a brand new RAC.fm store, including the Spotify waveform link for the album printed inside the neck of T-shirts and under the hood of the hoodies.
RAC carried on his practice of selling his albums via the blockchain platform Ujo Music, as well as releasing a personal token on the Ethereum-based marketplace Zora, with the $TAPE token representing a cassette tape featuring BOY, sold on a bonding curve with a starting price of $28 per token.
As Covid hit and lockdowns started and tours were cancelled, RAC truly embraced the “new normal” and multiple new platforms and practices to create new audience connections, continue interacting with existing fans directly, and generate new revenue streams, including:
• a multi-tier Patreon
• regular livestreaming via Twitch (hitting the #1 spot on the Amazon Music homepage in the process)
• livestreaming and podcasting via YouTube
An official music video for next single ‘Carefree’ feat. Leyet followed, as well as a successful instore promotional campaign, leading to album release focus track ‘Passion’ feat. Louis the Child featuring on Starbuck’s US Spotify playlist, played in-store across the US for an entire month.
As album release approached, a number of marketing activations kicked off around focus track ‘Passion’, including:
• TikTok influencer campaign – working with Lightning Agency to pair appropriate TikTok influencers with RAC around the lead album single ‘Passion’
• Instagram Stories AR filter – working with Illust Agency to create a groundbreaking experience, placing the user’s face into the giant “ball” from the album cover, as it rolls, winds, drops and spins through a maze-like path expanding the “rooms” from the album artwork. Kicked off on release day by RAC, featured artists on the record, and other artist peers.
RAC then embarked on a truly multi-faceted release-day online promo tour, appearing across multiple platforms and via multiple mediums through the day, including:
• 9am – premiering the music video for ‘Stuck On You’ feat. Phil Good
• 12pm – full album livestream, album breakdown and Q&A on RAC’s YouTube
• 2pm – premiering an exclusive mix for Culture Collide
• 2.30pm – premiering an exclusive mix for Revista Marvin
• 3pm – a Billboard Dance Instagram takeover, streaming live talking about the album and answering fan Qs
• 4pm – a D99 Radio interview and exclusive mix premiere
• 5pm – a Magnetic Mag Q&A and exclusive mix premiere
• 6pm – an expansive “Happy Hour” livestreamed chat with all featured artists on the album and more on RAC’s Instagram Live
• 7.30pm – a livestreamed “Release Party Festival”, with featured artists and other connects performing songs from the album on RAC’s YouTube
Post-album release, RAC has gone on to create his own cryptocurrency, $RAC, built on Ethereum, again via the Zora platform.
