US rock band Pinegrove have very loyal fans, so much so that they refer to themselves as Pinenuts. Really.
Ahead of the release of 11:11, their fifth studio album in January 2022, the band asked fans to submit their interpretations of what the album would sound like.
They were not exactly sailing in the dark here, but all the band gave them were the lyrics, the guitar chord boxes and some of the guitar lines in tablature form.
They built a very simple page on their official site with a series of boxes, each representing a track from the upcoming album. Clicking through on each song title brought up the lyrics, chords and tabs, which could then be downloaded for free.
Unlike a classical score, there was no indication of the tempo, meaning the fans would have to experiment with the chords in sequence and come up with their own arrangements for the songs.
They were then asked to submit recordings of their versions of the songs.
The band had done something similar for the Marigold album in 2020, but this time around they were encouraging fans to do duets (so they would have to work out the music as well as any harmonies).
The key function was to get fans familiar with the lyrics (and what they could mean) before hearing the band’s recorded versions.
“Pinegrove are very fan- and community-orientated,” says Tom Davies, the band’s manager. “The Pine tabs really played to that as they really engage with their fans.”
Fans submitted their versions of the songs and the band are currently working out how to best use and showcase them.
It was, in a way, like having a preview of the album before its release, but placing the fans (rather than the band) at the creative centre.
The overall costs were a small amount of design work on the tab sheets and their layout on the site, but this proved to be one of the parts of the campaign that the fans engaged with most.
While not completely free, the “spend versus return” equation here is one of the best an act could hope for.
(We will run a Behind The Campaign on Pinegrove in the coming weeks.)
