Posts by Caley Wilson

In 1978, when The Buggles wrote Video Killed The Radio Star, they would have been pretty confident about their crystal ball. The launch of MTV in 1981 was seen as a further nail in radio’s coffin.

“Back in line, please, Hadlee.”

“Shelford, I’d really appreciate if you’d stay beside your teammates just a little longer.”

Yep, that was Richard and Buck. And it was me – just out of university – trying to keep the greatest ever assembly of New Zealand’s athletes in the correct order as they were welcomed, by announcers and TV cameras, into the New Zealand Sports Champion of the Century awards.

The London-based Music Ally is one of the big players in the music/tech space. They work with all the major record labels, as well as the likes of Spotify and Google. Their Sandbox digital music marketing report recently shone a spotlight on Blinder.

While publicists are mostly using Blinder to provide phone access to the media, fans are now getting in on the act. With audio of these conversations able to be captured, and shared with other fans on social media, it’s changing the rules around fan engagement.

When Kevin Durant announced he was leaving the Oklahoma City Thunder to join the Golden State Warriors, he didn’t do so via a press conference or ESPN or the Golden State Warriors.

As a former director of Sony Music Australia – following roles at Warner Music, Festival Mushroom Records and EMI – Frank Varasso knows music publicity well. He’s worked with artists from Prince to Usher, and Armin van Buuren to Sia. 

When music and sport combine, powerful things can happen – as those at both the AFL and NRL grand finals found out over the weekend.

At the Big Sound music conference in Brisbane last month, 150 hot young acts were strutting their stuff by night and hoping to catch attention and step into brighter lights. Tash Sultana – who is currently on a sold-out US tour – is one who had done just that after performing at Big Sound last year.

The best player in the NRL right now started the season as, perhaps, the fourth-best player at his club.