If This Is A Blog Then What's Christmas?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4x1s60tXJtQ

I have to say that I quite like it. It’s nearly pretty good.

HOWEVER

Something about it just sets this big voice off in the back of my head that booms, ‘THE YANKS WOULD HAVE DONE IT BETTER. THE YANKS WOULD HAVE DONE IT BETTER.’

And you know what? The Yanks would have done it better.

Like this:

Make it A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

But if you buy a second, I’d highly recommend the exquisite new edition of D&AD’s The Copy Book.

As it’s my blog, I think I’ll make this all about me.

When I first got a placement at Abbott Mead Vickers (1998) it was the best agency in the world. But more than that, it was far and away the best agency for copywriters in the universe. This was proven beyond doubt by the first edition of The Copy Book.

That 1995 incarnation of the copywriters’ book of copywriters contained four members of my department: David Abbott, Tim Riley, Alfredo Marcantonio and Richard Foster. Then Alfredo left, only to be replaced by Tony Cox. Then David left, and I was down to three.

Shit. What would I do with only three of the world’s greatest copywriters to learn from? Well, I could slum it with some of the others: Mary Wear, Sean Doyle, Malcolm Duffy and Nigel Roberts. They all appear in the new edition of the book, and could always be called upon to help turn my copy from shit to slightly-less-shit to (very occasionally) not-shit-at-all. (I should also mention here that I always considered three other members of my department, Peter Souter, Jeremy Carr and Tony Malcolm, to be the equal of the newbies, if not the first edition giants. Also, Tom Carty and Walter Campbell could produce verbal advertising as good as anyone else’s. If anyone from Taschen is reading this, could we have another volume called ‘The Creatives Book’, which lays bare the secrets of the great TV and Integrated writers and art directors? Thanks.)

So I read the first book from cover to cover more times than I can remember and took a sad little thrill in knowing that so many of these greats were no more than thirty feet away from me at any one time.

It taught me a great deal, but fell from publication, so I’m delighted that a new edition with some more contemporary greats has been compiled (other new additions include Dave Trott, Andy MacLeod and Mike Boles).

I recently sold all my D&AD annuals because the online version is more useful and the One Show books have better copywriting. But I would not have sold my Copy Book (it went missing under mysterious and suspicious circumstances a few years ago when a client expressed an interest in owning one). Its wisdom is invaluable and will never go out of date.

The other point I must mention is that has been beautifully designed by my friend Paul Belford. As usual, he’s made it look utterly wonderful (and chosen a lighter paper, which makes the book easier to carry and flick through), but also took great care to make the whole thing legible, including this lovely little design idea on the front page:

Buy yours today.

PS: Nigel – three films better than the book: Jaws, The Shawshank Redemption and The Godfather.

It’s called ‘Chopsy’ and it’s by Aaron Smith.

Someone sent me an email last week asking if I could do a post about getting a job in advertising.

Well, I don’t think things have changed much, have they?

I have no idea about the other departments, but I imagine that aspiring creatives still have to find a partner, put a portfolio together, get it under the nose of whoever sorts out the placements, impress them, get a placement, impress whoever does the hiring (almost certainly the ECD) when they can afford to hire you, and that’s it.

Simple, eh?

Then what? If you want another job, you either have to engineer your own move or wait for someone to come in for you. This might involve a headhunter; it might not, but again, you’re going to have to impress the person doing the hiring at the point at which he can hire you. The difference is that at this stage you’ll need some actual made work to show what you can do. I think this may be part of the reason for lower wages these days: the UK work of the last few years has been at an all-time low, creatively speaking, so the vast majority of people looking for a job with 2007-2011 work in their books won’t have much good stuff to show. But maybe ECDs have realigned their expectations and now require less great stuff from their prospective hires.

When it comes to senior hirings, it can come down to client and category experience as much as great work (which ought to be a given, but actually isn’t. Client friendliness can occur many miles away from a D&AD annual). If you’ve CD-ed a great petcare account somewhere then that would be a big help in getting a job as a petcare account CD. If you’ve spent a long time on Motorola that might help you get a job on Nokia etc.

But often it also comes down to relationships. By the time you’ve become a senior creative, you will have spent quite a while in the industry; long enough to have met and worked with a lot of other people in senior positions (this is a good reason to avoid being an arsehole to people during your younger years – you never know which squitty account guy is going to become the next MD of a large, loaded agency). So when a friend of a friend hears about a job that might suit you, he may also be in a position to mention you to MD bloke who remembers you from that piss-up in Cannes back in 2004 where you hilariously ended up in hospital after molesting the pool pump at the Rushes Villa.

So those are some of the ways in which you can get a job as a creative/CD in advertising. Good luck if you’re looking.

I do find this spookily topical, as I have just this week found myself a really quite excellent job (thanks to everyone who had me in for freelance, as well as Daryl, Steve, Adam, Kurt and the many other occasional partners from whose skills I benefitted. It was (usually) a great experience, and even if the agency was surprisingly awful, there were always people around who made the days go by very enjoyably). I am going to be the joint CD of Media Arts Lab in London, and I am looking forward to it to the same extent that I looked forward to Christmas 1985 and that remote controlled jeep with the yellow go faster stripes.

Unfortunately, the agency is bound in great secrecy, so I can’t really say more than that, but I start in a week’s time and fully expect it to be tear-inducingly brilliant.

Very good letter from hackers to the FBI (thanks, D).

Japanese girl with a machine gun coming out of her bottom (thanks, J).

Ask Rupert Murdoch a question (thanks, J).

The most beautiful libraries in the world.

All the blasphemy used in Hollywood movies and where to complain about it.

Amnesty International has a TV channel.

Top new Beasties video (apparently it’s ‘explicit’; thanks, J):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mX2bcvb6rY

Sorry. That’s about it. If anyone has any good suggestions for better links (not difficult), leave them in the comments section.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXNpBY6orrQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtxGCbe_pso

Hi Ben,

I work for More Digital; a UK based Digital Marketing Consultancy.

We represent clients interested in social media marketing on smaller sites with little or no existing advertising and we’re currently looking for advertising partners.

We pay a fixed upfront annual fee which we will agree on with you. Once the ad is in place, payment is made within approximately 48 hours.

Would you be interested in placing a small text-based ad on Ben-Kay.com?

Kind regards,
Aaron Preece
aaron@moredigital.com

Hi Aaron,

How much are we talking?

Cheers,

Ben

So I rang my dad up (he lives there) and asked him to ferry me around some production companies, giving me the opportunity to leave my novel with some people who might like to adapt it into a ma-hoo-sive blockbuster.

I know this technique is rarely employed by Stephen King, but this allowed me to see some bits of LA that I wanted to see and have a couple of hours in the company of my dad (who usually lives 6000 miles away from me).

The reason why this technique is rarely employed became abundantly clear in Production Company Number One: they can’t take unsolicited stuff in case they accidentally make a film exactly like your story and you sue them, even though they just chucked your book in a corner and occasionally used its page edges to pick their teeth.

But we carried on driving around because it was kind of fun seeing where the ‘magic’ happens.

The interesting ones were Jerry Bruckheimer’s JB productions and Michael Bay’s Bay Films (you do know what kind of book I wrote, don’t you? It wasn’t Ali: Fear Eats The Soul. Having said that, I hadn’t intended to visit Bay films; I just bumped into it on the way to James Cameron’s place).

JB films is at the end of a dull-looking cul-de-sac off on 10th Street. It’s all a bit disappointing, but then you go inside and your eyes are treated to the temple of wealth that National Treasure 2: Book Of Secrets provided. It’s all incredibly tasteful with plenty of wood and plenty of space. I asked the English guy on reception if he liked working there. ‘It’s amazing,’ he replied as if he were talking about his first kiss that just happened to be with Grace Kelly in her prime.

Then on the way to 3rd Street I came upon the office of Bay Films. It’s surprisingly understated and tasteful with signage that’s been deliberately distressed just so.

So I went inside, and do you know what I found?

Hookers, robots and pounds of cocaine artfully placed on the naked body of Rosie Huntington-Whiteley to spell ‘I am Michael fucking Bay and I fucking rule!’…

Or was it a man gently preparing a wheelchair-bound person with cerebral palsy for a trip outside?

Dear reader, it was the more shocking of the two.

Hello.

I am in LA, but, as usual, happily prepared to provide some Monday timewasting fodder for you.

On the plane over I watched several bits of movies that were so shit I had to switch them off, along with two that were pretty good.

The shit ones (Battle Los Angeles, something with the guy from The Hangover in a mental home, something with Ashton Kutcher) differed from the good ones (The Lincoln Lawyer, Win Win) in many ways, and yet, two of them contained EXACTLY the same scene.

In the beginning of Battle LA and Win Win our protagonist is shown going for a jog. A few moments later, he is overtaken by other joggers, causing him (in a BRILLIANT microcosm of their characters) to stop, realise that he is getting to old for this shit, and give up.

One is a mindless $100m blockbuster; the other a gentle little indie that looks like it cost about the same as Battle LA’s catering budget – and yet they used the same scene to make the same point.

Just goes to show that you can have the best idea in the world, but if the execution saves it/ruins it, none of that matters.

Anyway, I’m here until Tuesday night, and have quite a full schedule, but if you fancy breakfast tomorrow, let me know. x

I think I put somethng like this up before, but this is neater and still awesome.

http://www.hasrebekahbrooksbeensackedyet.com/

UPDATE: well, she’s resigned instead, so now we have this site.

Elliot auditioning for ET:

An Argentinian footie fan swearing like no one has ever sworn before (thanks, D):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFm2JB9z-_g

The beauty of what sand really looks like (sorry it’s on the Mail’s site, and thanks, J).

BA Baracus words of wisdom:

Worst rap video of all time (thanks, G):

Email from an asshole (thanks, T – look, I finally got something back from you. Note the thanks).

What is going on in the world today (thanks, S).

Finally, a lovely bit of Masterchef editing (thanks, J):