T-Mobile/Josh's Band

20 Jan 2010

More than a thousand people join Josh's Band to play and record Come With Me.

Always wanted to be in a band? A real one that writes and records vaguely credible songs, makes videos and has a great time while they're doing it?

Josh Ward and T-Mobile seem to have made this wish come true in the UK. Josh was selected to promote its free mobile and texts for life offer after appearing in a previous ad for the brand where young Brits were asked what they would do with the deal. Josh's wish to form a super-band became the campaign, described here in its early stages.

Now, Josh has taken to the streets to realise his dream - touring the UK, recruiting band members from cities such as Bristol, Edinburgh and Manchester as well as London. The band was filmed and all 1,107 people who took part were included in a promo, premiering across an entire ad break during Channel 4's Celebrity Big Brother tonight (15 January).

The live performances were also recorded and has been released as a single. Here's a link to iTunes, for example, with the cd released through Universal Music on Monday.

The campaign was constructed by Saatchi & Saatchi, London, and the film was produced by Pulse Film's directing duo Fred&Nick.

Paul Silburn, creative partner at Saatchi & Saatchi London says: 'With each stage of the Life's for Sharing campaign, from Dance to Sing-along and now with Josh's Band, we have progressively given more control to the fans of the brand. It's been fascinating to see how the idea evolved. No-one knew whether Josh would actually be able to start a superband, it was up to him and the British public to make it happen. And they did.'

Like T-Mobile's previous work, it's tempting to find faults with the relentlessly upbeat creative work, however, Saatchi & Saatchi have continued to create work that is genuinely cheerful and uplifting at the time of year when we need it most, so why bother?