The rolling campaign for Ariana Grande’s Sweetener is shaping up to be one of the most interesting – and ambitious (considering the budget behind it) – music marketing campaigns of the year.

We have previously written about her bundling of the album with a range of merchandise options as well as fast-track entry to (but not tickets for) her 2019 tour. There was also a partnership with Snapchat on a lens and album download bundle as well as a link up with Landmrk on a fan treasure hunt.

The latest part of the campaign is around the DSPs – well, around one DSP in particular – while edging into the real world at the same time.

Spotify has built an “immersive exhibit” inspired by the album and it opened last weekend (29-30th September) in New York. Spotify tweeted the news while encouraging fans to RSVP to secure entry to the pop-up exhibition, Sweetener: The Experience. The guest list was quickly filled, although Spotify said in the run up that it would be making more tickets available via its Instagram Stories during the weekend in question. It was also at pains to say “[the] artist will not be present at the event”. That said, the singer put a “private walk through” of the exhibition on her Instagram Stories and Spotify ran a series of photos from it on its Instagram account (generating over 1,000 comments), the two working in marketing lockstep.

It’s an interesting part of the unfolding Sweetener campaign, showing the continued desire of streaming services to make their artists partnerships physical/ experiential rather than just digital/on-platform.