Brace yourselves, another #Artist4Hottest100 campaign is coming.
The Australian betting company responsible for the #Bieber4Hottest100 hashtag has now inexplicably switched sides, championing Major Lazer for the win.
William Hill stirred up controversy this week after launching a campaign to back The Biebs’ Diplo collab Where Are Ü Now to top triple j’s Hottest 100 of 2015, to which the head honchos at JHQ responded by whipping out their new “troll clause” and threatening to disqualify Bieber from contention if the company didn’t STAHP trying to influence the voting results.
But now the bed has really been shat, because William Hill has started a new campaign squared at an artist who – unlike the Biebs and Tay Tay last year – already has a pretty damn good chance of winning the countdown.
Major Lazer’s track Lean On featuring DJ Snake and MØ is the runaway favourite to take out the top spot on this year’s big list.
“Major Lazer’s Lean On is a clear frontrunner at $2.25, having opened at $4.00, and would be the worst result for the bookmaker by a country mile,” the bookie said.
So why in the living fark, then, have they started a #MajorLazer4Hottest100 campaign?
“We’re hoping to achieve parity here by getting behind Justin Bieber’s good mate Diplo (Major Lazer) with the #MajorLazer4Hottest100 campaign; despite the financial impact it’s likely to cost us come countdown,” they explained.
“For Triple J to blacklist Bieber, despite actually playing his Grammy nominated collaboration with Diplo and Skrillex (Where Are U Now) back in April, is baffling.”
Ok, listen.
A) They haven’t blacklisted Bieber, just said they’re ready to disqualify votes for him if they reckon the books have been cooked. And
B) The station’s updated voting guidelines state that “triple j reserves the right to remove artists from the list who have benefited from competitions or commercial campaigns that incentivise fans to vote for them”. DON’T YOU PEOPLE READ THE RULES?
As such, we can only assume that the reason the good folks at William Hill have pulled a 180 and backed Major Lazer to win is either because they’re dumber than a box of potatoes, or else they secretly want ML to get disqualified so the company doesn’t haemorrhage dollarydoos.
Either way, it’ll be interesting to see how triple j handles the situation.
The troll clause was easy for the youth broadcaster to invoke to rid their annual list of commercial “popstars”, but a bookie-led campaign targeting one of the indie EDM acts it champions? That’s a horse of a different colour.
Watch: Major Lazer & DJ Snake – Lean On (feat. MØ)
