Last.fm, Eurostar and the Guardian team up for live showcase music events
Last.fm, Eurostar and the Guardian have teamed up to bring music to Europe through a series of live music showcases, culminating in a one-day festival in London on 14 July.
Devised by Arena Media and HAVAS, the partnership will support the Traction event that has been created by Eurostar, which aims to bring Europeans together to discover the best in new music from across Eurostar’s European destinations.
A series of ‘Discovery Trip’ events throughout May, June and July, created by Eurostar, will showcase musicians such as DJ Gilles Peterson, German band the Brandt Brauer Frick Ensemble and Dutch pop artist Benny Sings.
Events will be held in Cologne, Paris and Amsterdam before the London ‘Eurostar presents Traction’ event.
The Guardian website will feature content on the series in a special ‘Traction Hub’, including interviews, competitions, ticket information, facts about the host city, Gilles Petersons’ blog for the events, social media streams and user generated content.
Each event will be supported by an online music discovery dashboard which will sit within the Traction Hub, featuring live user listening data powered by the Last.fm community.
At the London event, Last.fm will also power a billboard-sized live dashboard, displaying a stream of Last.fm data in real-time.
Users will be able to find out what each of Eurostar’s destination cities is listening to right now with information showing the city’s, hyped artists, music events, top tracks, as well as the Traction festival headliners’ similar artists.
Chris Wistow, Commercial Director, CBS Interactive Music Group, Last.fm commented, “Music is a great way to bring people together, and this series of events will help Europeans discover the best in music while exploring the musical heartbeat of the host cities. The Discovery Trips and Eurostar presents Traction will truly help fans of music celebrate the summer in style.”