Influence schminfluence

Ok, an oldie but a goodie: Just in case you didn't know just what is is you're doing for a living, Darren Brown explains all in a nutjob. I mean nutshell ...

Harp Supplemental: when is an ad just a research debrief?

Ah, sure there's no point ...
fish barrel etc.
Here's the one with the camel ...



At least they had the good grace to shoot it all on a beach in Ireland. What? You mean they couldn't even do that right! Ok, where was it: Portugal? South Africa?

The Pen is head & shoulders above the sword!

"Everyone knows a guy like Mickey"? What would have made this very mediocre commercial for the aptly named ‘Head’ & Shoulders far better is an ever so slight flick of the pen. It should read: “everyone knows guys like Mickey”. Carries the same meaning plus targets the pink pound. Opportunity lost? Or simply a double entrendre spotted by the AE or Client?

Dark Side of the Rainbow

This, at first, may seem to have nothing to do with advertising but … To those of you who haven’t heard of it, there is supposed to be a deep synchronicity between Pink Floyd’s (I can’t bring myself to use the word ‘seminal’ as it sounds like the punch line to a George Michael Urinal joke) Dark Side of the Moon and The Wizard of Oz. I won’t go into the details – you can find the science on: - Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_side_of_the_rainbow and the clips on youtube:



Suffice it to say, you watch Wiz whilst listening to DSOM and it seems to just work. That’s where we get back to advertising: sometimes, things just work. We’ve all seen a piece of crappy library music placed against a radio or tv ad that suddenly raises both the ad and the music to a new level. Or a prop or throw-a-way line in a commercial that becomes the hook everyone remembers. True, as often as synchronicity can work in our favour, it can work against – but it does work. Remember the monkeys on the typewriter thing? That they could write the complete works of Shakespeare? Yes, they could if given enough time but they would be producing the complete Words rather than Works. The true genius lies is recognising the synchronicities as we work and letting them live. Fighting for them, in fact, in the face of executive and client annihilation. ‘Why on earth are you using a monkey to sell right price tiles?’ Don’t know, it just works. ‘It Just Works’, once the core rationale for advertising is rapidly losing coin in this nut & bolts, wire and plastic packing, time and motion modern marketing melee. It’s up to us Creatives to hold on to the integrity of synchronicity, blind inspiration and happy accident. Don’t obey your thirst, obey your gut. It’s what got you into advertising in the first place. Now, fly my pretties …

Some other folk in our creative department have been pulling their hair out with a particularly obdurate client. I thought I'd send them this to cheer them up.

Noi is the winter of our in-content and the way it might look at you!

Screw the company you keep or actions you take. Similarly screw your word, your intentions and your deeds. Verily I sayeth unto thee: by your Brands shalt ye be known. Yes, the car you drive, the beer you drink, the clothes you wear, the brand of aftershave/perfume you wear are more telling than any other single thing about you (ok, we’re excluding over-production of sweat and voluminous body hair).

We have become a first impressions society – and those impressions count for 99% of how you’re perceived 100% of the time. Desmond Morris prattled on about it in the Eighties but now it is a reality.

Completely aside: wouldn’t it be great to remake 1984 and at the end, as Winston Smith is being led into Room 101 by Cyril Cusack to be reprogrammed/killed, Davina McCaul pops up to interview him and show him his best bits? ‘And here you are with the supposedly virginal Julia – what the Nation wants to know: did you shag her?’

Back to the point/pint: So wtf would anybody order a Harp?

Yes, Harp shares that special place in Irish Advertising. You know the one: ‘Northern’. It slots in there with Buttercrane centres and pit bull neutering, weather forecasts with a republican-challenged map of Ulster and the ever-effervescent Julian what’shisname. But please! I’m an insular knob, devoid of personality, taste or ambition – “I’ll have a Harp, please!”

High camp went out when the cops started going undercover at music festivals.

Next they’ll have a bunch of guys in pee yellow wetsuits swimming around in the stuff in time to some thumpy-thump piece of music.
Whatever about letting the client write the ads, letting the consumer ..?!

Verdict’s in on the new litter campaign: Rubbish!

The screen shot here is either from the new Department of the Environment anti litter campaign or this year’s Big Brother. Either way, it’s puerile, trashy and the usual case of government agency advertising by numbers. It does however smack somewhat nicely of Skins – the poshbrat follow-up to the scintillating Shameless. So, not entirely crap, then.
It is easy to knock this type of public cervix advertising (fish, barrel – am I stretching the metaphor?!) but this at least tries to look smart – at the same time as covered in shit, if you know what I mean?!Don’t like the song very much. Seems a tad twee. Could have done with injecting cajones via a pumping soundtrack. It all leaves me with the feeling of an acid flashback envisaged by someone whose experience of drug taking begins and ends with bonjella.