creative deconstruction

Imogen Heap Update Plus Full Streaming of New Album

Posted on 20. Aug, 2009 by refe in ARTISTS, NEWS

A few days ago Heap posted an update on Twitter linking to her website where she has her new album Ellipse streaming in its entirety. The record doesn’t officially drop until August 25th in the US.

Heap’s new work is full of her trademark quirky sentimentality. Her breathy, incomparable voice provides an anchor throughout the album’s different textures.  Ellipse begins with the bubbly, synthesized ‘First Train Home.’ In ‘Earth,’ Imogen’s multiplied vocals call to mind an assembly line of robots singing a cappella. ‘Swoon’ injects a bit of energy and and attitude into the middle of the record, giving way to an almost anthemic chorus. The breezy, sentimental ‘Between Sheets,’ and the manic ‘Aha’ finally lead the listener to the album’s dreamy anti-climax ‘Half Life.’

You can listen to the complete album for yourself below. Let me know what you think. Actually, you can feel free to let her know what you think.

It will be interesting to see the kind of buzz (and sales) that this full-album preview generates once the album is available for purchase. It has the potential to be pretty powerful. Listeners have made it clear that they like to try before they buy, and more  than 900,000 fans now have the opportunity to experience her new tracks before they hit stores. Remember when artists had to rely on radio for that kind of exposure?

Heap has also made it very easy for the stream to be shared by offering code for website owners to embed Ellipse with no strings attached. That means that with no additional cost or effort to herself and her team Heap has allowed the larger online community to promote her work on their sites. And why wouldn’t we bloggers take her up on it? She’s given us something that goes beyond self-promotion and actually adds value to our readers’ experience. Without the ability to embed Ellipse in this post I would have probably just retweeted the link to the stream and called it a day.

All hype aside, I think this is a nice move that is consistent with Heap’s marketing strategy up to this point. Not every act is going to be able to reproduce what Heap has done in the promotion of Ellipse, (nor should they try – come up with your own strategy!) But there are a lot of good lessons to be learned.

What are you doing to promote your music? How are you using social media and the web to engage with fans? Do you have the help of a label or are you doing it on your own? Let me know – it’s easy to get wrapped up in the buzz surrounding high profile acts but I’m interested in stories about artists at all levels.

Also check out last week’s post Imogen Heap shows us that DIY pays off – and takes a lot of work.

Photo by kk+

Tags: imogen heap, marketing, promotion, social media, Twitter