MusicRadar.com claims to be the UK’s leading site for musicians with over 750,000 unique users per month across the globe, and 170,000 users in the UK. The partnership will see MusicRadar as the lead media partner for the nationwide competition, which is aimed at finding potential recording artists. Open to all genres of music, last year over 10,000 acts entered the competition, with over £100,000 in prizes to be won and the chance to play at the O2 Arena in London.
The competition will open in January 2011 when thousands of unsigned musicians will take part in auditions happening all across the UK with regional and area finals taking place from February to May. The grand final (the Live & Unsigned Festival) will take place on 23rd July at the Indigo at the O2, with a live judging panel which has previously included Noddy Holder, Annie Nightingale and Malcolm Mclaren.
The partnership between MusicRadar.com and Live and Unsigned will see the website as the media sponsor, offering a bespoke ‘Live’ channel which will be created on musicradar.com. Live now, the channel will feature information about the competition, live gigging content, ‘how to’ guides to bands, as well as updates and information as the competition progresses.
Live and Unsigned will receive extensive editorial and advertising support across Future’s market-leading music-making print portfolio which includes Total Guitar, Guitarist, Guitar Techniques, Computer Music, Future Music and Rhythm magazines, which reaches over 230,000 readers a month.
The relationship will also see the MusicRadar brand featured extensively in the advertising and promotional campaigns for Live and Unsigned throughout the duration of the competition, subscription offers and promotions for Future’s print brands as well as promotion of MusicRadar across external music publications including NME, Kerrang and Mojo.
Live and Unsigned’s Chris Grayston said: “I am extremely excited about Future’s involvement with Live and Unsigned this year and the introduction of the group as a partner! They are a world leading brand who are globally recognised and I know many of our acts will identify with having brought both publications and used online as a resource.
There is an obvious synergy between our two companies as we both want to develop and work with the best unsigned musicians in the UK. We are elated to be working with such an established, innovative brand and look forward to the 2011 competition and developing a working relationship with the team.”
Mia Walter, Group Publishing Director for Future’s Music portfolio added: “We are delighted to announce Future’s partnership with Live & Unsigned. It’s a great opportunity for our huge audience of active musicians to take part in this competition and MusicRadar.com’s growing audience will play a significant part in growing the profile of this competition and encourage more musicians to take part. It’s a great fit for our music portfolio, and will give us a fantastic chance to showcase our brands to thousands of musicians.”
