The Russian music group Auktyon (“Auction”) is a legend of the Russian alternative rock scene with a 35-year history and a whole army of fans. That said, the group had almost no young listeners. The group, being “old school” musicians, continued to just make music, without making any attempts to win over new listeners.

In the summer of 2016, after a five-year hiatus, the group made a new album and called it “On the Sun” (or “In the Sun”). This was a long-awaited event for those fans who had been supporting the group for many years. But the musicians wanted to bring their new material to both their dedicated fans, and to a new, younger audience as well.

To draw the attention of new audiences to the release of the new record On the Sun by the iconic Russian band Auktyon, we came up with the first ever album that can be HEARD and SEEN only ON THE SUN.

Two weeks before the official release we put out an application that starts playing back the record in the smartphone camera is aimed ON THE SUN. The app allows to listen to all the new tracks, pre-order electronic and physical copies of the new album and find out the live dates of the first concerts in support of the album. After publication, the application immediately got into the Google Play TOP, the App Store TOP, and the album earned a TOP-10 spot in the iTunes.

An important part of the release's promotional campaign was the first ever packaging to a musical album whose cover art can only be seen ON THE SUN. The cover was printed with special photochromic ink. The artwork appears only ON THE SUN and vanishes when in the shade.

"ON THE SUN" became the most talked-about music event of the year. The news of the release spread on the net with the speed of light.

Thanks to the project, the Internet for the first time ever in the band's history turned out to be the main sales channel, while the record itself ended up being Auktyon's most commercially successful yet.