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53 articles
ABRADEE | SEARCHING FOR BIRDS ON WIRES | 2026
Someone read the positions of birds perched on power lines as if they were musical notes. It's an ad for an electric company, but the only stars are utility poles and birds. That's it.
ADIDAS | Original Forever | 2026
The Gallagher brothers, who hadn't appeared together in more than ten years, showed up side by side on screen. What made it happen wasn't even the news that the band was reforming—it was an adidas ad.
UVA APP | UVA UVA BOMBÓN | 2026
The moment one line of lyrics played during the Super Bowl halftime show, the entire app flipped into a $1 sale. A store that only opens the instant a song plays — can you really pull that off?
UN LIVE, SPOTIFY | SOUNDS RIGHT | 2025
On Earth Day 2024, a brand-new artist called "NATURE" showed up on Spotify. Ocean waves, birdsong, the rustle of a rainforest. Every time one of her songs gets played, she earns royalties, and that money goes straight into conservation. The campaign was built by UN Live and Spotify together with AKQA Copenhagen, and it won the Grand Prix in the Innovation category at Cannes in 2025.
MASTERCARD | ABRACADABRA: FROM FAN TO FEATURED | 2025
Mastercard turned the music video for Lady Gaga's first new single in five years into the world's biggest audition. The star of the show wasn't Gaga — it was her fans.
BILLBOARD ARABIA | THE SECOND RELEASE | 2025
Bringing back a forgotten diva with AI. And timing it to Saudi Arabia's National Day, no less. The moment I heard this, my first thought was "wait, is this a good idea?" But the result was a Cannes Lions Gold - in a category where only 0.78% of all entries win.
BUDWEISER | ONE SECOND ADS | 2025
The very first note is all it takes to know the song. That feeling every music fan has was turned straight into an ad. Budweiser's "ONE SECOND ADS," an ad from Brazil, won the Grand Prix in the Audio & Radio category at Cannes Lions 2025.
SPOTIFY | Spreadbeats | 2024
Try to imagine the moment someone first came up with the idea of making a 4-minute music video in Excel. Somebody definitely laughed and said "that's insane." But that insane idea went on to win a Grand Prix. That's what advertising can be.
ERRATA AT 88 - | Errata at 88 | 2024
In 1962, a legendary concert at Carnegie Hall introduced bossa nova to the world. One of its founders, Alaíde Costa, wasn't on that stage. Now 88 years old, she finally got to stand there.
GORILLAZ | Gorillaz Presents | 2023
In December 2022, something impossible appeared over Times Square and Piccadilly Circus. A four-person band dozens of meters tall, playing music on top of the buildings. Only visible if you held up your phone. A band that doesn't exist was, unmistakably, right there.
GIRLS WHO CODE | DOJACODE | 2022
"Doja Cat is one of 999 things girls care about." That one sentence sums up the whole idea. If girls aren't interested in coding, why not use one of those 999 things to pull them in? Doja, in this case.
OLD TOWN ROAD FT. BILLY RAY CYRUS | Old Town Road (Official Movie) | 2020
A 20-year-old college dropout bought a beat for 30 dollars and wrote a song over it in a single day. That song was "Old Town Road." The official music video went on to win the Grand Prix in Entertainment Lions for Music at Cannes in 2021.
BECK’S | BECK'S FREQUENCY | 2020
Brazil is pilsner paradise. BECK'S makes the bitterest beer around, but it's behind competitors in both distribution and budget. So what did they do? They got people to drink their rivals' beer.
WARNER MUSIC GROUP | SAYLISTS | 2020
One in twelve children has a speech sound disorder (SSD). The key to therapy is repetition — but for kids, that's just plain boring. So what about music? Or rather, isn't music itself the ultimate form of repetition? Starting from that simple question, Warner Music and ad agency Rothco used an algorithm to analyze a 70-million-song Apple Music catalog and created "Saylists," playlists with genuine therapeutic value.
EPIC GAMES | ASTRONOMICAL | 2020
April 2020. The world was still stuck at home. Travis Scott grew to giant size and danced his way across Fortnite's island, trampling everything in his path. 12.3 million people watched at the same time, and 27.7 million joined in over five days—the biggest live event in gaming history.
REGENT PARK SCHOOL OF MUSIC | PARKSCAPES | 2020
Instead of "receiving" donations, why not "earn" them? Kids learning music ended up standing on the same ground as the pros who make a living from it.
WILLIAM PATRICK CORGAN | Aeronaut VR | 2018
It's a music video, but you can stand right next to Billy Corgan. As he plays piano, the scenery shifts and the colors change around him, and before you know it, you feel like you're on a journey together.
AB INBEV | TagWords | 2018
What's printed on the billboard isn't a photo—it's a "search term." This one's pure genius.
BJÖRK | NOTGET VR | 2017
Say "a music video in VR" and you probably picture something — but this probably goes beyond it. Six minutes where the experience changes every single time you watch. This piece won the Grand Prix in the Digital Craft category at Cannes Lions 2017.
GINZA SIX | メインストリート | 2017
The "full happiness mode" that Shiina Ringo sometimes shows is exploding along Ginza's Chuo Dori. A dream duet with Tortoise Matsumoto, an orchestra, dancers, balloons, magic. The 90-second film is so full of joy it feels like a musical movie, and by the end you'll want to walk Ginza's main street yourself.
Levi's | COLORS & Tight Fit Jeans | 2017
It's only 30 seconds, but somehow you can't look away. Jennifer Love Hewitt dances in Levi's commercial, made exclusively for Japan.
ADIDAS ORIGINALS | ORIGINAL IS NEVER FINISHED | 2017
What does "original" even mean? To answer that question, adidas remixed one of the most overused songs in history, Frank Sinatra's "My Way." The whole idea is ridiculous, and that's exactly why I love it.
Spotify | New Music, New Me | 2016
Mom is chopping scallions in the kitchen. That's all there is to it — but set it to Takkyu Ishino's techno, and the whole world changes.
キングレコード | RUN and RUN MV for Smartphone | 2016
You hold your phone upright and watch the screen, and without you noticing, it shifts from the lock screen to Twitter, FaceTime, and the camera app. A music video where six members run around inside all of it. This is exactly what you'd call a "now that's a clever idea" moment.
BEAMS | TOKYO CULTURE STORY｜今夜はブギー・バック(smooth rap) in 40 YEARS OF TOKYO FASHION & MUSIC | 2016
From 1976 to 2016, a single unbroken shot races through 40 years of Tokyo in just five minutes. It's simply overwhelming.
ROAD SAFETY AWARENESS CAMPAIGN | SAFE & SOUND MUSIC PLAYER | 2016
For people who love walking while listening to music, there's an app built with one simple wish: that they stay alive.
BROOKE BOND RED LABEL TEA | 6 PACK BAND | 2016
In 2016, an Indian tea brand teamed up with a transgender band of six. The reason it won the Grand Prix at Cannes comes down to this: the women weren't filmed as people to feel sorry for.
earth music&ecology | 合唱 | 2015
Aoi Miyazaki singing Miyuki Nakajima's "Nobody Is Right" — that alone could have carried the whole commercial. And yet something about it bothered me.
Apple | Someday At Christmas | 2015
90 seconds just isn't enough. Honestly, I wish I could watch and listen to this for three hours straight. At this point, it's gone beyond what you'd normally call a commercial.
BEATS BY DRE | THE PILLS | 2014
A speaker grew arms and legs and started talking. Its voice belonged to the likes of Eminem and Chris Rock — a pretty star-studded mouth.
BERGEN INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL BRAND CAMPAIGN | Brand Campaign | 2014
A festival logo built out of "music". And it went on to win the Grand Prix at Cannes. This is the story of Norway's Bergen International Festival, from 2014.
MUSIC ALBUM - JOHN FRUSCIANTE | SAT-JF14 | 2014
They launched an album into space, so you could only listen to it the moment the satellite passed over your head. Someone actually did this for real. It's the story behind former Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist John Frusciante's solo album "ENCLOSURE."
東山堂 | TOSANDO music「披露宴」篇 | 2014
A familiar situation, a familiar song. And yet it makes you cry. There's no surprise twist, no clever trick—so why does it grip your heart so tightly? Because everything lives in the acting and the direction.
METROPOLE ORKEST | METROPOLE TWEETPHONY | 2013
A Dutch orchestra on the verge of disappearing due to budget cuts had a full 52-piece orchestra perform a song live that was composed entirely on Twitter. You didn't need an instrument, just 140 characters.
THE LINCOLN MOTOR COMPANY | HELLO AGAIN | 2013
A brand that had been around for 90 years decided to shed 90 years of being "your dad's car." The password was "Hello, Again." Nice to meet you, once more.
SNOOP DOGG | Rolling Words | 2012
You read a book, then light up the page and smoke it. Who else but Snoop Dogg could get away with an idea this wild?
BING/JAY-Z | DECODE JAY-Z | 2011
In 2010, Bing was completely overshadowed by Google when it pulled off one of the biggest treasure hunts ever, scattering over 300 pages of Jay-Z's memoir across the globe. And the way they "scattered" them was wild: not just billboards, but the bottom of a pool in Miami, a burger wrapper, the lining of a Gucci jacket, a bronze plaque embedded in a Brooklyn housing project, a rooftop in New Orleans, even a pool table at the 40/40 Club.
SCOPE | SEE THE PERSON | 2011
In the darkness, rock music rings out. Then the lights come up on the members of a six-person band, Rudely Interrupted. The music tells you first, before anything else, that five of them are living with disability.
IGGY POP & ORCON BROADBAND | Together Incredible | 2010
In 2010, Orcon, a small internet provider in New Zealand, connected punk icon Iggy Pop with nine amateur musicians from around the country over ordinary home broadband to re-record "The Passenger." This wonderfully absurd product demo won the Grand Prix in the Direct category at Cannes Lions.
HEINEKEN | AUDITORIUM | 2010
On October 21, 2009, 1,000 football fans gathered at an auditorium in Milan, with no idea they were walking straight into a trap.
BANG & OLUFSEN | Audio Annual Report | 2010
Turning an annual report into music. Have you ever thought of that? I hadn't. But Bang & Olufsen and Serviceplan did it.
au | LISMO Fes! | 2010
Around the 0:22 mark, there's a moment where Haruna Kawaguchi opens her mouth wide, and it's unbelievably cute. Her charm from back when she wasn't as famous as she is now is all packed into that single instant. Whoever on the crew captured that moment did an amazing job.
NYC & CO. AND WARNER BROTHERS | Oasis Dig Out Your Soul In The Streets | 2009
In September 2008 (month 9), on the New York subway, a street musician was playing a brand-new Oasis song that hadn't even been released yet.
UNIQLO | UNIQLOCK | 2008
In 2007, the clock that kept more people awake than any other was born. UNIQLOCK is a blog widget that marks time with music and dance. Once you stick it on the side of your blog, you'll find yourself watching the five-second changes for ten minutes before you know it.
CADBURY | GORILLA | 2008
A gorilla plays the drums. That's it. For 90 seconds, no product, no dialogue. Just drumming along to a Phil Collins song. And somehow, that was enough to make the whole world smile.
ABSOLUT VODKA | ABSOLUT MACHINES | 2008
In 2008, robot orchestras showed up in Stockholm and New York. Someone, somewhere in the world, would send a short melody over the web, and the machines would "interpret" it on the spot, turning it into a three-minute song. It was a wonderfully romantic experiment cooked up by Absolut.
SMIRNOFF | TEA PARTAY | 2007
For a new product launch with no budget and no TV airtime, BBH chose a parody rap video instead. Within days of going live, it reached a million people.
富士ゼロックス | HUMAN BEATBOX | 2004
In 2004, a man appeared on TV making the sounds of drums, bass, and scratching, all with just his mouth. The word "human beatbox" wasn't something anyone knew back then. That feeling of "what is this?" flowed straight into living rooms across the country.