Thousands Text-Message Into 'Social Aid and Pleasure Club' in Anticipation of Upcoming Voodoo Music Experience's New Orleans Music Festival.

NEW ORLEANS & NEW YORK -- The Voodoo Social Aid and Pleasure Club, a mobile community created by Rehage Entertainment and Counts Media, is luring music fans to New Orleans via Creole-laced mobile messages, mysterious band interactions, and a unique experience of New Orleans. This project is creating a minor frenzy of awareness and ticket sales, building up to one of the most eclectic music festivals in the country.

How it works

The initiative started months ago when the festival logo began appearing on artists' Web sites with artist-specific text codes (i.e., "RHCP" for the Red Hot Chili Peppers). Fans of the artists who wanted to discover what was behind the logo simply clicked on it and the Voodoo image revealed a box for them to insert their mobile number. By "opting in" to the program -- dubbed the "Voodoo Social Aid and Pleasure Club" -- fans started receiving insider information on this year's artists, marking the first time a music festival has launched its line-up via text messaging before releasing it through traditional media outlets.

The line-up messages were simple, "XXX artist has joined the ritual, see you in New Orleans, mon ami." The messaging started 24 hours before any official announcement was made, beginning with artist Sidney Bechet's quote about his grandfather's origins in Congo Square and ending with the artist being announced in real-time as the booking process was actually happening. The program, built on Counts Media's mobkastr(TM) platform, created an interesting dialogue between people attempting to share the information they had received.

"Are the Red Hot Chili Peppers trying to tell us something?" MTV recently asked in a response to the promotion.

"We're melding mobile marketing and mobile entertainment by using text messaging as the 'voice' of the experience. It's another way for the event and its artists to speak to music fans, drive awareness of the festival and do so in a Creole accent," says Counts Media CEO Howard Pyle.

In the months leading up to the Voodoo Music Experience, Counts Media and Rehage will continue to develop "the club" through mobile and web based content, culminating Halloween weekend (October 28 and 29) on the festival grounds. Throughout that weekend, members of the "Voodoo Social Aid and Pleasure Club" will find themselves gaining certain privileges that will allow them to switch from passive to active participants in "the club" as they begin receiving messages directly from the 60 plus bands on the bill. These activities will include invitations to on-site events, such as joining a band onstage, having dinner on a tour bus, receiving All Access Passes for the weekend, side stage viewing, alerts of unannounced performances and secret locations of post-event parties and performances.

Fans take and make a music tour of New Orleans

The next step of the program will be the launch of the vmXperience New Orleans as part of the Voodoo Music Experience and Yellow Arrow Web sites. The design allows fans to publish their favorite locations and stories of New Orleans music and culture. Artists performing this year are joining in and are in the process of sharing stories of their first or most memorable performances and experiences in the city. Ultimately, each location will have its own code allowing people to access its content via their mobile phones, creating a tour of New Orleans written by the festival's artists and fans. The message is simple, New Orleans music and its musical culture have made a big imprint on music history overall, come experience the Xperience, discover and share it.

"The Xperience was initially a concept of interactive storytelling, written largely by the audience," Voodoo Music Experience founder Stephen Rehage says. "People who come to Voodoo are more inclined to want to discover the unique aspects of the city than hang out on Bourbon Street. The Voodoo Social Aid and Pleasure Club, along with the interactive maps and tours, is part of that discovery process."

Now that mobile media and mobile marketing are becoming prevalent in the entertainment industry, ventures like Counts Media and Rehage Entertainment are leveraging their storytelling talents and creative planning to drive consumer uptake. The partnership was responsible for planning, creating, and delivering the mobile experience to fans via Voodoo's Web site and relationships with artists' official Web sites. Counts Media is the same outfit behind the wildly successful Yellow Arrow (yellowarrow.net), a project that offers a fundamentally new way of exploring cities. Yellow Arrow has spread to 350 cities in 35 countries and uses a unique system for publishing and consuming content via text messaging on mobile phones and interactive maps online.

Anyone can join the ritual by texting VMX to MBKST (62578)

For tickets to this year's Voodoo Music Experience, visit www.voodoomusicfest.com. Single-day tickets will go on sale today (Friday, September 8) at 10:00 AM (CT) for $35. Additionally, weekend passes are available for $60 and a limited number of VIP LOA Passes are still on sale for $325. The LOA Pass grants entry to the festival for the weekend and access to the "LOA Lounge," which includes premium viewing of the main stage from VIP grandstands, exclusive food vendors, full-service bar (three complimentary beverages) and other special amenities. Upon arrival at the venue, all tickets will be exchanged for wristbands that will grant "In & Out Privileges," allowing fans to come and go as they please throughout the weekend's festivities.

The line-up for this year's Voodoo Music Experience (as of 9/8) is: Red Hot Chili Peppers, Duran Duran, Wu-Tang Clan, The Flaming Lips, My Chemical Romance, Social Distortion, Kings of Leon, Ozomatli, Secret Machines, Blue October, Kinky, The Fiery Furnaces, Brazilian Girls, Ferry Corsten, Broken Social Scene, Drive-By Truckers, The Living Things, Jack's Mannequin, Joseph Arthur, Yerba Buena, The Rentals and The Whigs. Plus, a New Orleans line-up that includes the much-anticipated reunion and return of The Original Meters, plus Troy "Trombone Shorty" Andrews, Soul Rebels, Hot 8 Brass Band, Kermit Ruffin's BBQ Brunch, Morning 40 Federation, Amanda Shaw, Cowboy Mouth and Friends and Jose Conde y Ola Fresca.

See you in New Orleans, mon ami.

About Counts Media

Counts Media, Inc. creates consumer and branded entertainment that merges mobile and Web technologies, location-specific content, live productions, and broadcast. Our mission is to deepen and enrich the way people experience the world by making the ordinary extraordinary. The company is headquartered in New York City. Learn more at www.countsmedia.com.

About RE:

Rehage Entertainment (RE:) creates and executes live entertainment products, properties, and media. Founded in 1992, RE: combines the magic of live events with emerging technologies and urban science to create interactive entertainment experiences. The company offices are located in New York City and New Orleans.

About The Voodoo Music(R) Experience

Since its 1999 debut, the Voodoo Music Experience -- known for its diverse blend of high-quality artists from all genres, as well as up and coming critical favorites -- has called New Orleans home. The wide-ranging line-up of talent each year reflects the multitude of cultures that define the city. Music fans from across the country and around the world come together annually to experience a musical convergence amid 11 lush miles of bayous and lagoons to see how the locals do Halloween -- with a little help from some of the most celebrated artists in the music world today. For more information on the Voodoo Music(R) Experience, visit the official festival Web site at www.voodoomusicfest.com.