Took me past the following:
I then took a left past Harvey Nichols and almost rode into the back of a chrome Porsche 911.
There were also several Aston Martins but they’re about as remarkable as an old beat-up Mondeo round these parts.
I’m sure you all think it’s as wonderful as I do, so for your further enjoyment, I’ll try to remember a few anecdotes about its creation that will make you gaze in awe at its wondrousness to an even greater extent than you already do:
Apparently, Tom and Walt originally wanted Richard Burton’s recording of Under Milk Wood for the V/O. I heard that whoever controlled the rights to that particular recording said no. Perhaps they were a bit strapped for cash a couple of years back.
A cut was put together before the horses were added. the client thought this was so good, he rang up a senior bod at AMV and questioned the need to spend another £250,000 adding the equine element. The AMV person agreed and called Tom and Walt into his office to give them the news. Tom and Walt responded by saying that they would resign if the horses were not added. The horses were then added.
During the V/O recording, various things were tried. There was mild approval, then everyone went out of the studio and (as I have been told) Walt just made the current V/O up on the spot. Jonathan Glazer came back in, saw the final result and did a long skid on his knees across the floor of Wave sound studios. He was delighted.
Maybe you don’t think Surfer is the greatest ad of all time. If that’s the case, I’m afraid you’re wrong. The people at Guinness appeared to prefer Swimblack, which is also a work of genius. It’s just not as good as Surfer. Nor are Cog, Mountain, Gorilla or anything else that’s been made before or since.
If Surfer were made today, it would still be just as amazing. Congratulations to all involved, and thanks very much.
When judging something (anything, really, but let’s stick to ads), one of the overwhelming criteria to apply is that of difficulty.
People rarely mention this explicitly, but often it can win out over originality and craft.
Take this winner of a Gold at D&AD for example:
As an idea it’s pretty blah, but blow me down if they haven’t gone and changed the backs of coins. Can you imagine how difficult that is? It must be like trying to get a somersault out of Steven Hawking.
And what about Millions? As impressive as the idea is, what really gets you doffing your cap is the the fact that they got Samsung to donate millions of phones, Verizon to give the text and talk time and the NY Dept. of Education to OK the whole thing.
It’s also the reason why people say things like ‘for a shitty price ad, it’s amazing’. Doing something really good on a crappy brief is much tougher than doing the next Nike ad (I’m not saying good Nike ads are easy, but the budget, brand personality and heritage do give the work on that account a bit of a head start), so it’s the difficulty we’re rewarding, not just the ad itself.
Of course, the difficulty is often linked to the execution.
Guinness Surfer, for example, is jaw-dropping because none of us has any idea how to make that happen, even ten years on. It combines enormous difficulty with a perfect idea and perfect craft.
Look at Cog and Grrr. Same thing.
I think this is why the highly lauded conventional poster is rarer these days. It has to be a solar panel that powers a village, or a version of the National Gallery that’s plastered to the walls of Soho (fancy negotiating the permission for that, anyone?).
The difficulty bar is being raised on a regular basis, so if you want to win something, make sure it’s a really good idea that’s well executed, but also make sure it looks like a bit of an arse to pull off.
Americans are fucking fat. Many Brits are fucking fat too, but Americans are fucking fat.
And www.thisiswhyyourefat.com explains why.
(Thanks for the tip, M.)
Have a good weekend. I’m going to see that Lars von Trier film, but maybe not till Monday.
x
PS: regarding the ‘death of creativity’ post below, someone asked what the solution was. Well, I don’t think there has to be a solution because there isn’t a problem. So what if advertising goes into a malaise that fails to produce or attract creativity? The creativity will still exist, just elsewhere. In my opinion, there aren’t enough properly good movies or TV shows, especially in this country. If some advertising creatives decided to leave the industry and improve that situation, I think that we’d have a big net gain. And I don’t think that many of the public would notice, let alone care, that the ads had got a bit worse.
1989ish
Mac comes to the fore. Ads now easier to create. And easier to change. Clients and non-creative agency people have yet to notice.
1989ish-1997ish
Golden period where the Mac could still help without any buzz-killers to spoil the party.
1997-2000
Mainstreaming of online/email. Communication becomes quicker. Ads can now be presented instantly over a computer rather than in person. Clients have noticed the lubricating effects of the Mac and email and begin to reduce deadlines and demand changes. Work can occasionally be done well within these reduced deadlines. Similar things happen with moving pictures where Henry/Flame etc means that you can ‘fix it in post’. Clients not yet aware of the extent to which this is possible/affordable.
2001-2004
Clients impose reduced deadlines as the norm and start to realise they can tinker with anything up to and beyond the deadline. Whether the changes can be done within the budget becomes a somewhat moot point as, once the fixed costs (computers) have been met, you are only talking about electricity and people’s time. Both are plentiful and relatively inexpensive. The internet and its user-generated content angle starts to appear. As a consequence of easier communication and maximisation of budgets work becomes far more pan-European, if not pan-World, leading to more generalised work that must please a widely-divergent target market. This work can be good but is usually poor. Media begins to fragment so more ground must be covered with the same budget (or less, as procurement people appear on the scene to question why ads needs helicopter shots).
2005-2008
The encroaching primacy of constant and pointless changes has yet to become a huge issue. Enough good ads are still getting made that it’s easy to say, ‘Well if they can do it, why can’t you?’. Clients also want to know why their ad is going to cost so much when Subservient Chicken cost $5000. Creatives start to become disillusioned with the process and begin to do ‘scam’ ads in their spare time to balance out the work they have to do for clients who will not allow them to express any creativity, at least not in the way they thought would happen when they left college. Creatives are marginalised as the other parts of agency management take greater control. A vicious circle begins where disillusioned creatives create less good work and are given less respect, leading to greater disillusionment. Rise of new media agencies and brave new worlds superficially create new opportunities, but also create new sticks with which to beat creatives. Non-experts behave as experts and are treated as geniuses by people who are scared that they are going to miss a boat which is still in dry dock five years later. Larger numbers of international clients lead to longer and less constructive meetings.
2008-Present
Financial downturn tightens the screws. 2008 is very clearly the worst year for UK advertising creativity that anyone can remember. Budgets are slashed. To accommodate this, deadlines are further reduced and work gets worse. Everyone excuses this by citing the recession and the strictures it has imposed. A corrosive mix comes to the boil, consisting of being able to tinker until the last minute at no extra cost, very tight deadlines, marginalisation of creatives, lower budgets, less trust, ads for more people made at a lower cost, fragmentation of budgets corresponding with fragmentation of media, internet advertising explosion turning out to be a busted flush (creatively speaking), no one outside of creative departments truly caring about this because they never really did. Blog post is written about this, complained about, then ignored because there are sufficent numbers of anomalies to refute the general suggestions, even though deep down everyone knows in their hearts that this is all true(ish).
Present-2015
As the recession continues and deepens, advertising sees a gradual but accelerating seepage of creative talent. An industry which used to create work that was better than the programmes that surrounded it, and prided itself on the provision of enjoyment in the workplace, becomes just another job. Creative people realise that they will rarely be given the opportunity to use their talents in this particular industry and decide to work elsewhere. As the better people leave, the teaching and development of youngsters disappears, creating another vicious circle where no good work is made, no new talent is attracted and the new and talented do not join the industry to create the work that would attract their kind.
2015-2020
Polar Ice caps melt. World underwater. No one cares about the difference between ‘bang and the dirt is gone’, and ‘colour like no other’. Humans seek higher ground to avoid drowning. People eat their children to survive.
2020-300000000
Fish people rule the world and reinvent advertising as it was circa 1985. Everyone is happy again.
After Dontevenreply, we now have the ker-azy fun of whythefuckdoyouhaveakid?
Just as enjoyable, but with pictures too.
And for those of you who are in a more advertisational frame of mind, check out the ten worst headline constructions, from The Denver Egotist.
They left off a favourite of mine that seems to have been used exclusively in America: (Doing something that makes a lateral reference to the product) since (year), eg: Making Pavements Dangerous For Pedestrians Since 1972 or Keeping Dogs’ Tails Wagging Since 1948.
Yawn.
The arrival of their brilliant, brilliant, fucking brilliant brilliant brilliant new video for Coldplay (thanks for the tip, D) reminds me that Shynola have made some of my favourite promos:
Let’s just bathe in the wonder that is Eye for an Eye:
And the joyful beauty of You Got The Style:
And while I’m here, enjoy these awesome building projections:
Projection on Buildings from NuFormer Digital Media on Vimeo.
(I found this on the excellent Escapology blog of the Escape Pod agency.)
So imagine my delight when I came across this website.
For those of you who have yet to click the link, or refuse to do so until I give you a better reason, this is ‘a collection of e-mails I have sent to people who post classified ads. My goal is to mess with them, confuse them, and/or piss them off. These are the ones that succeeded.’
There are some great ones on the home page, but don’t forget to check out the archive for such gems as Barter My Whore Wife, Brokeback Beach, and Apologetic Nationals Fan.
