Diesel stages its music talent competition on MP3 web site

Emma Rigby, Revolution UK 01-Feb-05, 10:15

Diesel is launching its annual international music talent competition, diesel-u-music, on a site where entrants can download and listen to free MP3 demos.

The fashion brand is targeting its traditional 'cool, young audience' with the launch of diesel-u-music.com this February.

Agency Design UK built the web site, which allows musicians to upload their own MP3 demos and listen to those of other entrants.

Diesel is promoting the event on the homepage of diesel.com and via email to its database of 60,000 previous competition entrants. An online ad campaign will spread awareness through banners, 'transparent' DHTML and search marketing.

Underground labels will judge the best acts independently.

Diesel-u-music was started five years ago in the UK to promote young musicians who had not had media exposure. The competition grew around the globe and, until now, had been hosted on microsites in markets such as the US, Japan and Italy.

The brand also used DHTML in its 'Love Nature' campaign, which saw 70 million page impressions, according to agency Airlock, which created the online ads. The campaign, inspired by the work of Diesel's agency KesselsKramer, took the form of 3D banners and overlays on 175 sites.

The ads portrayed Diesel-clad models posing in a forest and gave users a feeling of secretly watching them from afar.