BeatFM reframes ‘today’s hits’ as something you take, not just hear

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Adpro& Group in Amman has launched “Side Effects,” a bold new campaign for Seagulls Broadcast’s BeatFM, marking the relaunch of the station as the home of today’s best music. The campaign shifts the focus from what music is to what music does, celebrating the emotional and behavioral side effects of the songs shaping culture today.

At the heart of the idea is a simple but powerful truth: today’s music does not just play in the background, it actively influences how people feel, think, and behave. From overthinking eye contact to sending paragraphs instead of “ok,” music has become a trigger for every day, often unspoken behaviors.

That thinking became the creative springboard for “Side Effects.” As Jarrad Pitts, Creative Director at Adpro& Group, puts it, “We’ve all used music to modify ourselves. Whether it’s our emotions or performance, sitting there ugly crying to one song or listening to another on the way to the gym. We wanted to capture the prescriptive nature of music. ‘Today’s best hits’ became ‘get your hit today.’”

To bring this to life, Adpro& Group created a distinctive visual world inspired by pharmaceutical and medical packaging, transforming hit songs into “products” with exaggerated side effects. Each execution mimics the codes of medicine boxes, pill bottles, and prescription labels, complete with cautionary language, dosage-style hierarchy, and clinical structure.

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For Hatem Soliman, Creative Director at Adpro& Group, the success of the idea relied heavily on craft. “The art direction is built on real pharmaceutical design systems, from grid structures and typographic hierarchy to color-coded labeling and material finishes. Every detail had to feel authentic for the idea to land,” he said, crediting Malek Smadi, lead Art Director on the project, for bringing the world to life with precision and care, and Anas Makkawi, Head of Motion Design, for translating the new identity into a living system that works just as powerfully in motion as it does in everywhere else. 

Rolling out across outdoor, social, and digital platforms, the campaign features a series of executions tied to globally recognized tracks, turning song titles into triggers and behaviors into proof. It positions BeatFM not just as a station that plays hits, but as one that understands how those hits show up in people’s lives.

“This relaunch is about owning what it feels like to listen to BeatFM today,” said Shantal Abu-Sharar, Marketing Director at Seagulls Media. “Side Effects captures the emotional intensity of the music our audience loves in a way that feels current, honest, and instantly recognizable.”

That emotional intensity also became a key signal during development. As Rizek Jildeh, Head of Strategy at Adpro& Group, explains, “The moment we knew we had something was actually in the room. You could sense a bit of discomfort, a bit of hesitation, especially from people slightly outside the core audience. Not rejection, just that pause of ‘wait, is this too real?’ And that was exactly the signal. Because for Gen Z and younger millennials, this is how music shows up in their lives. Not as something they listen to, but something they feel, act on, and sometimes cannot control.”

With “Side Effects,” BeatFM reclaims its place at the center of contemporary culture, proving that today’s best music does not just sound good, it comes with side effects.