Coca-Cola Europe launched an interesting project for Sprite earlier this month that I think is worth noting.  “Green Eyed World” is a video series revolving around a 23-year old singer from London as she looks to fulfill her dream of becoming a star. The audience is able to influence her choices as she journey’s through the music world by commenting and voting on the site.

The audience can follow and interact with this 23-year old singer from London as she creates new opportunities for herself by following her dream.  By joining her journey online, the audience can influence her choices through commenting and voting directly in the GREEN EYED WORLD videos using their own Facebook profile.

The interesting twist is that the highly customized YouTube channel doesn’t include the familiar comments that we’re used to using, but only allows users to comment by logging in with their Facebook credentials via Facebook Connect. This function makes each comment act as a seeding element for the campaign across your friend’s list as well as allows you to easily see what your other friend’s have said about the episode.

This use of Facebook Connect stood out to me because it was completely replacing a very familiar commenting system, but I think it works for this branded entertainment campaign. The quality of the video looks solid. The videos views aren’t particularly high yet, but I think this could be very interesting to see how it plays out as it’s too early to see how successful it’s going to be.

The “Episode Zero” show will be immediately followed by several viral extras on YouTube and Facebook updates from Katie leading up to premiere “Episode One” of “Season One” on May 1st. Viewers can also download a free application for their iPod/iPhone in time for the beginning of the season.

I don’t think that many people would argue with me that this generations MTV is YouTube and it’s lesser cousins. The highest viewed videos on YouTube represent a large number of musical artists. Social networks like MySpace, Facebook, and to a lesser extent last.fm are connecting artists with their fans in more rich way then any fans in history.

How big is this aspect of an artist’s success online? Britney Spears is hiring a full time social media expert and she started by posting on Harvard job boards. My point is that the music industry has changed, the way fans are interacting has changed, but the way we consume music videos hasn’t for the most part.

Music videos are still, even on YouTube, just broadcast video. They might drive people back to a website or a myspace page, but for the most part lack any form of interactivity. Why aren’t people pushing the envelope?

For starters the budgets in the music business are impossibly small for online marketing, they’re shrinking, and I feel that a huge portion of the big labels are in state of atrophy as they continue to panic at how their industry is changing. There’s an opportunity to do something wonderful and really cut through the clutter, but someone is going to to have take a risk. Dear music industry, here’s a suggestion: Use your music video production budget to produce an interactive music video that in it’s primary formed would be viewed on a website. It would extend the artform of music video production, leverage your video production budget to aid marketing, and interact with fans in a way that is obviously successful in all other aspects of your online interactions with them.

Luckily some people have taken some interesting experimental attempts at this. The indie band Arcade Fire released two of the singles off their last album in this form last year. They created quite a bit of buzz considering the fairly low profile of the band (in comparison to some mega-artists). MGMT also released an interactive video using Quicktime.  I guess no one had heard of Flash at their managmenet group. Aside from that minor jab, they deserve respect for making the effort. Check them out below and you’ll get an idea of what I’m talking about.

I think they’re all interesting and add a new dimension to the music. What excites me is that I know there is so much more potential there in terms of breaking new creative ground.

Arcade Fire – Black Mirror
Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
MGMT – Electric Feel (Interactive with Quicktime)

One of the things I learned recently is that the music companies are getting paid royalties now for the number of views on their music videos by video sharing sites. If it’s actually a revenue stream for them – doesn’t it make sense that they’d want to create more versions of their videos personalized by the fans and up online?

There is no doubt in my mind that this is the natural evolution for music videos. The sad part is that someone like Madonna will probably be the first big artist to come in and do this in a big way and get all the credit for it.

This is a true sign that the music industry has accepted that the right way to manage piracy isn’t by making consumers jump through ridiculous security hoops, but by offering a high quality convenient service.

Apple will also be allowing iPhone users to download tracks directly to their phone via the 3G network as opposed to only being able to download via a wireless network.

From Apple’s perspective this could continue to boost sales of their products such as the iPod and iPhone due to increased flexibility, but it might also cause a decline in market share for iTunes as their current iPod and iPhone users will be less restricted in their choice of music download services.

The end of DRM might embolden a host of new, online download venues and other ventures as traditional album sales slump. Album sales fell 9.5 percent in 2007 while the sale of digital tracks rose 45 percent.

You can read about the iTunes changes in more detail here.

I hope you enjoy this cross section of 5 albums you probably haven’t hear but should be listening to. It covers the full gambit of musical taste and should satisfy any night out unless you’re a country music fan. If you are a country music fan, please leave my blog now.

Cut Copy  – Ghost Colours

Cut Copy, an Australian band, have brought one of my favorite sounds to the modern age: new wave. This fun album mixes a bit of New Order, older The Cure, with a healthy influence of modern electronica and house. It hit #1 on the Australian charts and has proved to be a slow starter here, but everyone I show it to loves it. The song below is titled Out There On The Ice from the Ghost Colours album.

Santogold – Lights Out

You may have heard of this one. If you haven’t you don’t read up on music very often as she’s been called the artist to watch in 2008 by the BBC, Spin, and Rolling Stone. My favorite thing about this album is that it seems to have so many different styles from songs that remind of Siouxsie and the Banshees to dirty bassy funk. She toured with M.I.A. at one point and you might hear a track that let’s you understand why that pairing would make sense. If you’re looking for something fresh and new then this is a good album for you.

The song below is called L.E.S. Artists and it’s one of the first singles off her debut album.

She Wants Revenge – This Is Forever

She Wants Revenge’s last album was one of my favorite releases of the last two years. It’s like Bauhas reborn, but in my opinion bigger, bolder, and better. Their debut single Tear You Apart really got my attention. The new album which came out this year is equally worthy with a slight evolved sound. Something about the singers voice really appeals to me and this band easily fits onto my gothic guilty pleasure list.

The video below is from the single True Romance off the new album.

CSS – Donkey

CSS, like She Wants Revenge, was one of my favorite releases of last year. This quirky band from Brazil released a raw unapolagetic album filled with electric riffs, fast beats, and dirty vocals. It was crude and amateurish and I LOVED IT.

The second album, Donkey, is far more polished. It’s obvious that they got the attention of a top quality producer now that they’re so many records. I missed the rawness of the first album, but after taking the time to listen to it a couple more times I’ve come to the conclusion it’s a great album. You’re just better off if you don’t compare the two…

Rat is Dead is the first video single from the album Donkey.

Etro Anime – See The Sound

In the interest of not being predictable I’m going to mention an album that is three years old. Somehow it slipped past my radar so I’m going to guess it slipped past yours too. Etro Anime featuring Lissette Alea’s exquisite vocals can be described as a kind of electro-trip-hop smoothed out with a few jazz elements.

The album rounds out my top 5 list with something you want to play laying in bed as easily as you’d want to hear while entertaining friends. I love the sound and I think they’re just one of those unlucky bands whose album came out at the wrong time, because it’s lack of recognition is not for a lack of matching talent.

Watch Endless from their 2005 release. It’s probably one of the poppier tracks of the album. If you want to get a little deeper search for some of their other songs.