build-up

from The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

buildup \build"up\, build-up \build-up\n.
   1. the act of building up an accumulation.

   Syn: build-up.
        [WordNet 1.5]

   2. the events, such as advertising or publicity, causing
      increased interest in some coming event. The buildup to
      Superbowl XXIV was the most intense of the series.
      [PJC]

from Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0

103 Moby Thesaurus words for "buildup":
      access, accession, accretion, accrual, accruement, accumulation,
      acknowledgment, addition, advance, advertising, advocacy,
      advocating, aggrandizement, amplification, appreciation, ascent,
      assemblage, assembly, augmentation, ballooning, bloating, blurb,
      boom, boost, broadening, bruiting, building, combination,
      commendation, composition, compound, constitution, construction,
      crescendo, development, drumbeating, edema, elevation, embodiment,
      enlargement, expansion, extension, fabrication, fashioning, flack,
      flood, formation, gain, getup, good word, greatening, growth, gush,
      hike, honorable mention, hype, incorporation, increase, increment,
      inflation, jump, junction, leap, make, makeup, mixture, mounting,
      multiplication, organization, piecing together, plug,
      press-agentry, productiveness, proliferation, promoting, promotion,
      publicization, publicizing, puff, puffery, putting together, raise,
      recognition, rise, setup, shaping, snowballing, spread, structure,
      structuring, surge, swelling, syneresis, synthesis, tumescence, up,
      upping, upsurge, upswing, uptrend, upturn, waxing, widening