had never heard the brand speak before. However, as soon as we received the first tracks from the producers we knew that this was something we where going to continue for a long time. Music has an important role in all communities and as a creative brand we feel that this project is a perfect fit for us. We are more than enthusiastic to now be able to present ABSOLUT TRACKS.’, explains Michael Persson, Senior Director of Marketing at V&S Absolut Spirits. The chosen artists represent explorers of the world of music whose radical, challenging outlook synchronises perfectly with the ABSOLUT brand’s perspective on the creative world. For years the world’s most prominent artists and designers have interpreted the ABSOLUT brand. Nowadays, the world can listen to the brand as well. The results from the four European producers invited to participate in the ABSOLUT TRACKS project – ABSOLUT LOPEZ, ABSOLUT VADIM, ABSOLUT KRUSE and ABSOLUT SIENKIEWICZ – show the diversity and talent of all involved: ABSOLUT VADIM has DJ Vadim’s distinct minimalist hip hop style and is built as a sparse landscape of sound. He found the inspiration for his track in the core values of ABSOLUT: ‘I always knew what ABSOLUT tastes like, but I put a lot of time wondering what it would sound like. I realized that the brand has a lot of common with the music I make, and I used the ABSOLUT bottle itself as a source of inspiration. Clarity and simplicity are always there in my music – and as ABSOLUT it always strives for perfection and looks for understated simplicity’ explains DJ Vadim. The ABSOLUT LOPEZ track is inspired by the story of ABSOLUT, as written on all the ABSOLUT bottles: ‘My ABSOLUT track is a very personal play on the unique history of the brand intertwined with the history of house music in Spain. I used the famous bottle as a source of inspiration on several levels; First of all I based the track on imaginary voyage an ABSOLUT bottle took from 1879, the first year of the brand’s existence until now, the year 2004. A 135-year long voyage as the carrier for a message in a bottle from one musician to another,’explains Lopez. Monica Kruse chose to use the core values of ABSOLUT, clarity, simplicity, perfection, against techno beats for her ABSOLUT KRUSE: ‘The record I’ve made is house-influenced – it’s a very positive track. I used my voice and distorted it – to create the same effect as you would if you look through the bottle and see a distorted vision of the world,’ explains Kruse. ABSOLUT SIENKIEWICZ is a track that typifies the work of its producer and integrates the ABSOLUT bottle literally into the track. He says: ‘I thought it would be very difficult to make this track, but I spent a few evenings with the bottle and it was really easy in the end. I sampled the bottle – in the beginning it was full then it became empty – and used the sounds to make the hi-hat sound you hear in the track,’ says Sienkiewicz. The full experience on absolut.com At absoluttracks.com, the audience is presented with one individual experience for each track. The four pieces of music differ significantly in terms of character, tempo and build-up, meaning that the website actually offers four different experiences. The website can be characterized as a blend of the strong visuals and music videos. ‘The absoluttracks web site really gives the visitor a full experience of the project. The music will not be sold but is available for down loading on the site,’ says Persson. The tracks will be launched in October 2004 and will be available to download on http://absoluttracks.com The ABSOLUT TRACKS initiative builds on the brand’s ABSOLUT THREE TRACKS programme, launched in 2003. Here, electronic producers Taxi, Rollercone and Aril Brikha delivered their interpretations of the distinctive ABSOLUT brand and bottle |