Historically, an album rollout is based around big labels, big budget and profit. When profit is the main focus, the fans, publics and consumers become less of a priority. As social media has began to consume the zeitgeist and take over music, amongst other major industries, the corporation (artist) to customer relationship has improved.
Travis Scott took this to a new level with his 2018 album “Astroworld.” Similar to other album rollouts we have looked at, Scott’s album promotion started a couple years before the actual release of the project. In this case, Scott unveiled the name of the album on the social media platforms Vine and Twitter. With fans knowing the name and theme of the album over two years ahead of release, the hype kept building and building.
Travis took this world to new heights, incorporating art installations in the form of large golden inflatables in the shape of his face. These were put up in many major cities across the United States. When fans saw the installation, they were inclined to take a picture of it and post it on social media. This created a frenzy. Along with these inflatable art pieces, Scott created the “Astroworld Festival,” which brought fans together from all over the world to Houston, Texas. This is the birthplace of the original Astroworld, which was a theme park in the 90’s.
The ethos of this album and release was to create community. With art installations and a music festival, Scott was saying goodbye to the old was of big label promotion. He was saying goodbye to the prioritization of profit. He was introducing the world to a new way of music promotion. One focused on the fans. The album went on to be one of the most memorable releases of the past few years and the tour after the release took him to superstardom. The set design of the tour was also based around the theme park, so audiences remained a part of this nostalgic and psychedelic world. 