Bushmills Irish Whiskey Sets Up Legacy Fund for Emerging Artists

David C Clements and VerseChorusVerse announced as first recipients of £20,000 fund

Bushmills Irish Whiskey and artist development company Third Bar – made up of Snow Patrol lead singer, Gary Lightbody and Davy Matchett – today announced that they have joined forces to create and curate the Bushmills Live Legacy Fund.

Bushmills Live, the handcrafted whiskey and music festival, is a platform for established and emerging indie talent. This year the festival organisers wanted to take their commitment to supporting up-and-coming talent one step further and set up this Fund of £10,000. Recognising the significance this held for Northern Irish talent, Third Bar’s directors Gary and Davy pledged to curate and match this fund, creating a trust of £20,000 in total. They have selected two exciting emerging Northern Irish artists as recipients: David C Clements and VerseChorusVerse.

David C. Clements, 27, has an ongoing association with the brand having performed at Bushmills Live preview gigs ‘Bushmills Live In The City’ in both Belfast and Dublin. Last year he entertained the crowds at Bushmills Live 2012 and since then has shared a stage with Ed Sheeran, co-written songs with Gary Lightbody and performed exclusive tracks for E4.

VerseChorusVerse, aka Tony Wright, 29, founder of ‘And So I Watch You From Afar’, has recently finished recording his highly anticipated debut album with fellow Bushmills Live performer and Ivor Novello winner, Iain Archer, which is due for release later this year. He also took to the stage to perform intimate gigs in Belfast and Dublin to help celebrate the launch of Bushmills Irish Honey - the latest addition to the Bushmills collection of premium blends and single malts.

The team at Third Bar will be working with both to offer advice and guidance on the right places to invest their Fund. Additionally, Bushmills will be lending a performance platform to the two artists at this year’s Bushmills Live. Both artists will be taking to the stage on 20th June alongside headliners Of Monsters and Men, Jake Bugg, Sons and Lovers, Willy Mason, Bear’s Den, Iain Archer and Foy Vance.

Gary Lightbody’s passion for the Northern Irish music scene saw him donate Snow Patrol’s fee for headlining Bushmills Live last year to the Oh Yeah Centre, Belfast. This donation led to the creation of Bush Gardens – Belfast’s largest rooftop performance space.

He commented: “It’s no secret that I am a passionate supporter of the Northern Irish music scene. Davy and I have been friends since school and we set up Third Bar together to help advise up-and-coming artists in the music industry which is why I think it is brilliant that the Bushmills brand is prepared to get involved at this grass roots level and put their money where their mouth is.”

He added: “I am a big fan of both David and VerseChorusVerse, having watched them both live – they have incredible stage presence and fantastic material, they just need a platform to make it big.”

Bushmills Master Distiller, Colum Egan, commented: “Bushmills Live provides us with a great music platform for established and emerging indie artists. Last year it was where Gary Lightbody watched David C Clements perform and where the idea for the Bushmills Live Legacy Fund was born. We decided that we wanted to provide further support to emerging artists, beyond lending them a stage at the festival. I’m really excited about seeing the recipients of the Fund perform among the casks and pot stills at the Old Bushmills Distillery in June and then following their progress on their path to global stardom.”

Smirnoff - Yours For The Making

Last week I had the pleasure of attending a Smirnoff event in the Odeon Bar in Dublin. The event was hosted by Smirnoff's Global Brand Ambassador and Mixologist, Kenji Jesse. Kenji was in Dublin to present a Smirnoff Mad Molecular Mixology Evening to a very appreciative group of bloggers and journalists.

Essentially the evening was all about us (in teams of 5 or 6) making cocktails following Kenji's instruction. The twist was that all the drinks were designed to be particularly innovative or unexpected. We were taking traditional drinks and doing something a little different.

To give you an idea, we used ingredients like gold flakes, Vermouth mist, Ghost Pepper chilli sauce and Skittles.

It was an absolutely brilliant evening and I can't thank Smirnoff enough!

Heineken - The Voyage Commercial, Exclusive Version

Today, Heineken launched their brand new campaign, ‘Voyage’. This is the 5th instalment in the Heineken ‘Legends’ series and is a cross-platform, integrated campaign, which uses broadcast, digital and mobile.

The main campaign element is a newly created tv ad. The ad, set in India, follows the Legend from arriving in a remote Indian outpost to finding himself in all sorts of awkward and bizarre situations when he loses his pet goat.

As well as airing the TV ad, Heineken is going a step further and testing men to see what they are truly made of when taken out of their daily lives and dropped into the great unknown. Welcome to “Dropped”.

‘Dropped’ arrives on Monday, June 3rd 2013, and takes different men from across the world and drops them in remote global locations with nothing but the most basic of supplies and directions. The result is a series of episodic adventures following our intrepid explorers on their legendary travel experience.

Each experience will be in a different location with different challenges and every travel adventure will be tailored towards the character of its main protagonist - forcing them to discover their own limits and conquer their fears. The outcome of ‘Dropped’ adventure is unscripted and the outcome unknown!

Watch the series via the Heineken Dropped YouTube channel and follow each voyage, access documentary-style content and also contribute your own videos to the ‘casting couch’ for the chance of undertaking your own legendary travel adventure.

In the coming weeks, Heineken Ireland will also begin the search to find an Irish explorer - the ‘Irish Dropped’! Details of Heineken’s search for an Irish explorer will be revealed online in the coming weeks.

Conor McIntyre, Heineken Brand Manager - Communications, commented, “With ‘Voyage’, the fifth instalment of our Legends campaign, we want to go further and inspire men to be resourceful and open to the world. We are giving a few lucky people the chance to go beyond the borders of their comfort zone. The Irish are seen as a nation of global explorers who have made themselves at home in their own unique way in some of the most exotic cities and outposts around the world. The trademark wit, charm and ability to make friends wherever we go have become synonymous with the Irish travel experience. We have no doubt that ‘Dropped’ will uncover some legendary explorers who will display their true character on the adventure of a lifetime.”

Ben & Jerry’s 'Join Our Core' Finalists

The Ben & Jerry’s 'Join Our Core' Irish finalists have been announced. Hand-picked from over 430 entries to compete in the final stage of 'Join Our Core 2013', Ben & Jerry’s Europe-wide search for the most socially conscious and sustainably minded entrepreneur, the Irish finalists will have the chance to pitch their business idea to ten of Europe’s top ethical business gurus. The eventual winner will scoop a whopping €10,000 and on-going specialist business mentoring from Ashoka, the leading global network of social entrepreneurs.

The first finalist, CoderDojo, is an Irish led global movement teaching young people how to code, develop websites, apps, games and more, in a social, collaborative learning environment. MyMind, the second finalist, is a self-referral model of mental health that provides psychological and psychotherapy services to people seeking mental health support.

Europe’s finest social entrepreneurs will gather in London next month for the final stage of Join Our Core 2013, hoping to impress an expert panel that includes Ben & Jerry’s co-founder, Jerry Greenfield and Director of Ashoka Ireland, Paul O’Hara.

The 18 lucky finalists, which include Irish enterprises CoderDojo and MyMind, will have the chance to pitch their business idea to ten of Europe’s top ethical business gurus. The eventual winners each scoop a whopping €10,000 and on-going specialist business mentoring from Ashoka, the leading global network of social entrepreneurs.

CoderDojo, is an Irish led global movement teaching young people how to code, develop websites, apps, games and more, in a social, collaborative learning environment and MyMind, is a self-referral model of mental health that provides psychological and psychotherapy services to people seeking mental health support.

And there’s more! The winners will also be in the enviable position of having their business logo featured on an exclusive Ben & Jerry’s tub to be launched in 2014, as well as bagging a trip to Ben & Jerry’s home turf of Vermont, USA to celebrate its 35th anniversary this year!

Returning bigger and chunkier for its second year, Join Our Core is inspired by Ben & Jerry’s dream to find young business moo-vers that share its philosophy of people being as important as profit, which has seen the 2013 competition expanded from five to nine European countries – the UK, Ireland, Denmark, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, Finland, Austria and Switzerland.

When Ben and I set-up the company in 1978, we believed giving back to the community was as important as making great tasting ice-cream,” commented Jerry Greenfield, co-founder of Ben & Jerry’s. We’re humbled by the number and standard of entries we’ve seen this year, and can’t wait to meet and hear more from this year’s finalists.”

Ashoka Ireland Director Paul O’Hara commented, "We are truly excited about the incredibly strong applications coming in from all nine European countries. It is clear that technology is being utilised more than ever as a driving force for social good. We're seeing a rise in the demand for sustainability and resource sharing activated by technology."

For further information about the Join Our Core 2013 competition, the prizes on offer and all the 18 finalists, please visit www.joinourcore.com.

Heineken Unveils Social Tracker

Heineken Social Tracker

The Heineken Cup weekend is finally upon us and the excitement kicked off in stunning style last night with the launch of Heineken's Social Tracker in the heart of Ballsbridge, Dublin 4, at the Get in the Game Clubhouse at Ballsbridge Hotel.

The Social Tracker is a large (5 x 7.5m) projection structure that captures the Twitter chatter around the Heineken Cup. Fans can tweet at #GETINTHEGAME and see their tweets brought to life in stunning animations and visuals. Fans can also step up to the set and take a virtual conversion which, if successful, will send out a tweet of support to their selected team. Supporters can interact in real time by kicking ‘virtual conversions’ and show their support for the two finalists, ASM Clermont Auvergne and RC Toulon via #GETINTHEGAME.

Over 200,000 individual tweets have been measured since the quarter-finals with a surge of social conversation expected in the 48 hours leading up to the final. Fan conversations via the hashtag #GETINTHEGAME and tweet conversation in support of both finalists will be monitored live all weekend and this mind boggling array of tweets and data will be converted into a multi-coloured and multi-dimensional animated display on the 5m x 5m structure.

Social Tracker is just one of Heineken's many Get in the Game activities, which has seen fans engage with Heineken Cup rugby online, on their mobiles and in pubs and venues around the country in the build-up to the biggest sporting event to be held in Ireland this year. To date over 85,000 people have engaged and played Get in the Game online via www.heineken.ie/game.

The projections start from 9.15pm each night at the home of the Heineken Get in the Game Clubhouse at Ballsbridge Hotel Dublin 4 and will be displayed after daylight hours until the post-Heineken Cup Final celebrations on Saturday 18th May. Heineken’s Get in the Game Clubhouse is the best place to be this weekend to enjoy the excitement of both the Amlin and Heineken Cup finals. For live updates check out #GETINTHEGAME or www.facebook.com/heineken