Virgin Mobile's 24by 7 Rockathon -- 100 hours continuous music fest!

BANGALORE, INDIA: In a constant endeavour to enthuse the youth with unlimited music and masti, Virgin Mobile in collaboration with Planet M today kick started the first ever attempt at continuous 100 hours of live music performance at Planet M’s flagship store on Brigade Road.

The event titled ‘The 24x7 Rockathon’, will witness a massive congregation of approximately 50 music bands from all across the country performing live spread across 5 days. This first of its kind hatke music fest organized by Virgin Mobile will attempt to enter the Limca Book of Records for the longest ever continuous musical concert.

The event is being organized by Virgin Mobile to promote their latest offering vJazz which lets you download music absolutely free, without any charge, for one year. Virgin Mobile users do not have to pay any charges to access and download music from a library of over 1,00,000 compositions featuring a wide variety of genres. vJazz priced at Rs. 4250/- can be purchased from Planet M and during this festival customers can take advantage of the fabulous offers being given by Virgin Mobile.

Additionally, for every customer who walks into the venue, Planet M and Virgin Mobile India will donate Rs. 5 to support the hearing impaired kids of Dr. S. R. Chandrasekhar Institute of Speech & Hearing, Bangalore.

Besides, the entire 100 hours live performance will also be webcast live on www.rockathon.in –- Powered by Yahoo! India -- setting another record, as the current longest live streaming record is at a bit over 50 hours. Virgin Mobile users will be able to hear this performance live on their phones by calling in the Voice Portal on 5868656 – the third record and the first unique initiative in VAS services by a Mobile Provider.

A Time Capsule is being created; in which the audience can put in their photographs, messages or anything else that they choose, to be sealed for the next ten years. Gibson has also participated in this unique initiative by giving a Les Paul Guitar to be featured on the Time Capsule along with the names of the bands that participated and other memorabilia from this event will also be preserved inside the time capsule to commemorate the completion of this unique music fest.

The guests of honour at the kickoff of the Virgin Mobile ‘24x7 Rockathon’ concert were the children from the Dr. S. R. Chandrasekhar Institute of Speech & Hearing. Visual DJ Archana Prasad added a special dimension through her translation of the music being played through image and light for the hearing impaired children.

M.A. Madhusudan, CEO, Virgin Mobile India said: “This 100 hours continuous musical concert is an extension of the concept of our recently launched phone vJazz which allows Virgin Mobile users to access and download unlimited full-track songs from an array of up to 100,000 Bollywood, Regional and International chartbusters for free for one whole year. We want the youth to enjoy music non-stop without any limitations with Virgin Mobile. Also, with this initiative we want to help the cause of the hearing impaired and jointly with Planet M we have pledged to donate Rs. 5/- for every customer who walks into Planet M during the days of the Rockathon."

Subir Ghosh, CEO, Planet M Retail Ltd, added: “We take great pride in associating with Virgin Mobile India in launching the ‘24x7 Rockathon’ (100 Hours Continuous Music Concert) to encourage musical talent in India. The convergence of mobiles and music is certainly the way ahead in the field of music and mobile retail. Through our committed service & constant product & service innovations, we are missioned towards making affordable feel-good indulgence available to more & more youth in the country."

During the course of the concert, the audience can win Virgin Mobile’s vJazz phones and other cool merchandise for being the best air-guitarist or the coolest head-banger. Besides, all the attendees at the music fest get a chance to vote for their favourite band and out of those one lucky rock enthusiast along with a companion gets to travel to the VFestival organized annually in London (UK) by the Virgin Group.
The best performing band will be adjudged by an audience (both at venue and through www.rockathon.in) poll at the end of the 100 hours of continuous performance and the winner will get to travel to the VFestival in UK.

DJ Gopu (part of the band G2Live , plays keyboards , guitar and is a vocalist has composed music for many movies down south), Gopi (percussionist , member of G2Live , played as a drummer for AR Rehman and Adnan Sami) and Pavitra Halkatti (fashion designer) are supporting this initiative and will be present during the opening and closing ceremonies.