• by Tanya Gazdik , March 16, 2009

Headbangers have a new reason to go online. AOL Music has launched a new site, NoiseCreep, dedicated exclusively to heavy metal and hard rock music.

This is AOL Music's fourth genre-specific site, joining Spinner (taste-maker rock site), TheBoot (country) and TheBoombox (hip-hop). It is the latest in a yearlong campaign to launch more than 30 new Web sites across the MediaGlow network, AOL's publishing business unit formed in early 2009 to centralize AOL's programming efforts.

The newly launched site is accessible from the AOL Music main page and provides fans with metal and rock band news, music and video content as well as original editorial content in a blog format. The site will also serve as a launching pad for new artists and groups to develop a fan base. Advertising for the site will be sold through AOL's Platform-A organization.

The launch of NoiseCreep, which AOL Music Vice President Bill Crandall calls "metal done right," follows a successful year for AOL Music. The site ranked as the most popular online music destination in total unique visitors for all of 2008, and is currently the only site with over 23 million monthly unique visitors, according to comScore Media Metrics, January 2009.

"We're always looking to find new and innovative ways for providing music fans with a singular multimedia destination for artist news and discovery and bands a platform to showcase their music," said Crandall in a statement.

In 2007, AOL Music launched Spinner, and last year launched TheBoot for country fans and TheBoombox for hip-hop fans. All three sites consistently rank as the top sites in their respective categories. According to the latest comScore data, Spinner garnered more than 4 million monthly unique visitors in January alone, with more than 28 million page views. TheBoot drew in more than 4 million uniques, generating more than 32 million page views, while TheBoombox attracted more than 2 million unique visitors and 7 million page views.

In 2008, unique visitors to AOL's programming content sites grew to 70 million unduplicated users, with page views climbing 40% year-over-year and engagement growing 20% year-over-year. In addition, the influx of new consumers and deeper audience engagement levels provided AOL with double-digit increases in vertical content advertising revenue year-over-year in Q3 2008. Forthcoming launches include genre-specific sites for reality television, soap operas and horror movies, as well as international editions of successful U.S. properties.