Rollout Roundup: Ranking and Critiquing This Week's Rollouts
Summer Walker feat. JT - Ex For A Reason
Strengths: WHERE TO START?! The storyline, picking right back up where she left off with “Over It”, the “Summer Walker’s Hard Drive” instagram page as a way to follow the album instead of simply Summer promoting on her own pages. I literally may not have enough time to list all the good things about this rollout here, so I’ll give you guys a full breakdown when the album comes out. But I have to point out one more amazing detail of Summer rollout - her social copy. I am ALWAYS saying how I wish artists would go beyond “out now” when they post their new releases, and she has really leaned in to telling the STORY of “Still Over It” with her social copy. Well done to the entire team here.
Weaknesses: Honestly, I have none. Might be a first for Rollout Roundup.
Young Thug - Punk (Album)
Strengths: NPR Tiny Desk performance was stunning. Thug proved he can move outside of genre lines like we’ve never seen him do before, and he’s still got it as a performer.
Weaknesses: The rollout here was pretty hard to follow. He started strong with the NPR Tiny Desk performance, and seemed to make no impressive moves after. In fact, the rollout content before a couple days ago was exclusively centered around paid partnerships, which is never a great way to engage an audience pre-release. I also signed up for his “Punk Hotline” which I thought would be creative in the way that Tyler the Creator used text marketing, but turned out to just be the expected “out now” and “get some merch” texts. Destroying a Rolls Royce for promotion - not sure how that thought process works. How does that direct back to the music, or project theme at all?
Adele - Easy On Me
Strengths: Between her soul-bearing Vogue interview where she brings up the iconic Beyoncé-Lemonade grammy snub, to her interactive instagram lives, we rarely see stars as big as Adele get so vulnerable and direct with their fans. THAT is what made this release so impactful. Someone like Adele, arguable the biggest artist in the world, just getting on IG live and chatting with fans like she’s one of their mates is exactly what fans want in this digital age. The more starstruck and glamorized someone is in 2021, the less fans are interested (as we are seeing with Chloe Bailey…). Adele and her team understood the assignment.
Weaknesses: Can we get Adele on twitter please?! It’s the perfect place for her new direct to fan marketing strategy! I would also have loved to see a bit more out of the box creativity in the assets, she’s telling the story of her divorce here which leaves a lot of room for that type of content. Maybe we’ll see it in the album?