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What's New?
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Bon Jovi.com
March 8, 2010 By EricL 0 Comments
Recently we launched an all new version of Bon Jovi.com with a special three-song concert streamed live from the first date of The Circle Tour at Seattle's Key Arena with partner Ustream.tv. Tens of thousands of fans tuned in, and left comments in a ton of different languages through Twitter, Facebook, and AIM. We got to experience the tour's set featuring amazing robotic arms first hand when the band passed through San Jose.
The new home page gives a taste of what's in store for the site, with awesome new features such as localized versions for fans around the world, Questions and Answers with Bon Jovi Management, Fan Favorite photos, and "Last Night" which features photos, videos, set lists, and RSVP lists from each night, archived at our The Circle Tour mini site. You can even create your own Bon Jovi music video with our friends at Animoto. Also be sure to film your own Livin' On a Prayer video and join the band on screen while they're playing the song, a great idea with hundreds of hilarious submissions so far from The Rumpus Room. Stay tuned as we continue to roll out new sections this month, with something extra special in store for our Backstage JBJ fan club members in April.
Hats off as well to our Sparkart design talent up north, who redrew the iconic Bon Jovi Heart & Dagger seen above. Appearing everywhere on tour, on TV, and surely on someone's skin, it looks beautiful and is certainly one of our most well travelled logos so far.
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Country Throwdown
January 26, 2010 By EricL 0 Comments
We're very excited to announce the launch of the Country Throwdown 2010 tour site. Working with touring veteran 4fini, best known for Vans Warped Tour(!), we've built the most advanced country tour site ever. Certainly fitting for such an unprecedented and innovative festival for country music.
It promises to be a great time this summer.
The site has a ton of great features for fans to connect with the bands, see who's going to the show in their town, keep up on the latest tour news and tweets, buy tickets, and watch videos. Check out the site for a lot of great videos and photos, and stay tuned for much more as the tour hits the road. We think it looks great too, much to the credit of super talented illustrator Bryan Ewing. T-1000 in a ten gallon is exactly what country music means to us in 2010!
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The Killers
December 18, 2009 By Bryan 0 CommentsOn the event of their 3rd album release, Day & Age, TheKillersMusic.com was aggressively reborn. The occassion brought the band's official fan club, The Victims, into the site, which had traditionally only consisted of typical band website content. The official store was also launched, uniting the entire Killers online universe under one Sparkart-powered roof.
Conceptually, the band had some interesting requests. Abductions by UFOs, spaceman cowboys, tigers, palm trees, and a whole lot more. These kinds of requests aren't unusual, given our clients, but they were challenging to bring together in a cohesive concept.
A perfect venue was found in the band's hometown of Las Vegas, in a couple of fenced lots situated a few miles from the Strip. The lots contain The Neon Boneyard, where Las Vegas signs go when they fall out of fashion.
Photo of The Boneyard by el clinto found on FlickrWe moved these abandoned signs to a more dramatic location somewhere in the desert. Each sign stands alone against the stark, barren Nevada landscape, presented through a cinematic letterboxed format. The home page showcases a signature sign, taking some inspiration from the actual sign of the namesake casino for the second album, Sam's Town. The bulbs of the sign also make a connection to the album's artwork created by artist Paul Normansell.
At night the sign comes alive. The landscape itself changes as well with a literal interpretation of the album's title, based on the time of day in Nevada.
An alternate concept of pulp movie posters was also worked into the site, presented as billboards. The Victims showcases this concept with a mock Film Noir movie of the same name providing the perfect excuse to go black and white, type crazy, and fill the site with schlocky taglines.
The movie concept really comes to life on The Band page, where a short film of sorts features such heart-warming ploys as UFOs, band member abductions, and death by gravity.
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Home Makeovers
September 29, 2009 By EricL 0 CommentsWe're always looking for new ways to blend the content, community, and commerce abilities of our sites. The home page is a particularly important place, anyone passing through must be engaged, or they will leave. It's critical that anything of importance be featured, as there's no telling where any particular visitor will end up next.
We recently updated the home pages for two of our longer running sites, Slipknot1.com and Criss Angel.com. On each site we've seen a spike in community involvement and merchandise sales. And we're very happy with how they look too. The extra challenge for us that many other sites don't share is translating the unique qualities of each of our clients into a visual design.
Members of Slipknot's fan club, Outside the 9, get a special treat when they sign in: escaping the claustrophobic confines of the cave environment for a strangely perfect sky.
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Janet Jackson
August 7, 2009 By Gaille 0 CommentsWe were sad to see her site lie dormant for over a year -- for an artist of her caliber it just wasn't right. So Sparkart is very pleased to announce the launch of JanetJackson.com, the official site of Pop/R&B superstar Janet Jackson. Made for the fans of now and future, the site includes not only a deep discography filled with over a hundred photos and music videos, but also access to Janet's official Twitter feed, and her new single, "Make Me". What is live today is only the beginning as Janet gears up for her next album. Be sure to also check out the Life & Style section where Janet gives us her picks on the latest in Fashion, Movies, and Electronics.
Follow Janet on Twitter for the latest.
The Music section takes full advantage of Janet's iconic visual legacy. Provided with quality source material from Janet's archive, we put together a special design for every one of her eleven albums from the past 27 years. It's sure to take you back. And the navigation for browsing the releases is extra special, try hovering over an album and watch the disc slide out. Mark, of Sparkart Canada gets a lot of respect from us on this one. The home page introduction sequence is even better. And if that's not enough, check out every released music video ready for playback.
