If This Is A Blog Then What's Christmas?

The obligatory explanatory film is here at Creativity Online, but for those of you who can’t be arsed to sit through that, I’ll just explain that Oasis launched their new album in New York by teaching the songs to buskers and getting them to play them throughout the city.

Like this fellow with the electric violin:

I’ve loved the electric violin ever since I saw the Trilams trounce the jocks with one in the peerless classic, Revenge of the Nerds.

Ah, happy days:

Thanks to everyone who voted in last week’s poll.

78% of you would rather be an unknown genius than a known not-quite-genius.

I think that’s about right. If I knew I’d written There Will Be Blood, I’d feel quite pleased with myself both for writing it and for nobly keeping it to myself.

This week’s question is not ostensibly related to advertising, but watch me give it a go…

When I was ten, I thought Roger Moore was the best James Bond, Octopussy was the best Bond film and Paul McCartney was the best Beatle.

I was young and foolish. How could I rate the weird figure-skating plot and wooden eyebrow-raising over the naked girl painted in gold and ‘The namesh Bond, Jamesh Bond’? Or the Frog Chorus guy over the bloke who wrote Imagine?

But as time passed, I saw the merits of Connery, Goldfinger and Lennon.

Then my tastes changed again, mainly because Sean thinks women deserve a schlap, Goldfinger’s a bit straight compared to Diamonds Are Forever and ‘Imagine No Possessions’ is a bit rich coming from a bloke with a Roller.

So I guess I’m trying to say that you never know which direction your likes and dislikes are going to go in, and you’ve no idea how embarrassing your current favourites may turn out to be.

That’s both an arse and bit of fun.

(Oops…forgot to make it anything to do with ads. Um…I used to prefer Creek to Drugstore, then I changed my mind. How about that?)

Not 100% sure of his every waking moment, but there is this Lynx ad that’s appearing around and about:

(Thanks, L)

UPDATE: That’s Frank Budgen, by the way.

Well, Geoff Seymour did come up with ‘Reassuringly Expensive’, ‘The World’s Favourite Airline’, ‘The Australian For Lager’, the Cockburn’s ‘Lifeboat’ ad, ‘Irn Bru – Made In Scotland From Girders’, and this:

Cheers, Geoff.

Or Predator Rap?

At some point your advertising career will come to an end for one of the following reasons:

1. You couldn’t keep up.
2. You interrupted a PPM with your elephant impression (the one involving your genitalia and trouser pockets).
3. You were sent down for a twenty stretch, possibly for the brutal murder of a client.
4. You couldn’t give the first fuck about 25×4 price ads for carrots anymore.
5. You kept getting kicked upstairs until the most important decision of the day involved choosing which helicopter to take into work. Going into work seemed pointless.
6. You died, possibly from the boredom of going to Slough for client meetings.
7. You time ended.

Point seven occurred to me the other day when I was downloading some Suede off itunes.

It’s often suggested that retirees may not be able to hack it any longer, or they don’t care anymore or people stopped wanting them. But what if, like Suede, they had a time?

In the nineties, Suede were pretty big. Now they’re not. Are they shit? Can they no longer play their instruments? Has their taste completely disappeared?

Maybe, but maybe they had their time, a time when their drive, talent and look was right for the public. Then it wasn’t. Is it their fault that they didn’t continue to adapt after Britpop to prolong their cultural relevance? were they lazy? Should they have compromised their art to shape to a perception of the market?

Perhaps they were just lucky enough to synch with a huge audience for several years, then most of that audience moved on.

If you’re creative you need a number of people to be receptive to that creativity. There are no guarantees (look at Gorilla and Trucks), so if people want your stuff, ride the wave while you can.

You never know when it’s going to end.

This ad was made about five years ago for the Buckfast quaffers on the North side of Hadrian’s Wall:

This, on the other hand, just won a few golds at the BTAAs, but was made only last year:

(Thanks, G.)

Here (thanks, L).

“It seems to be different this recession time around. Instead of cutting advertising budgets to the bone as they did last time, advertisers this year are maintaining their budget for the most part, but are calling for tough, slug-it-out, retail advertising.

“One of our biggest clients, one we have done some of our best work for and won more awards for than any other, suggested that we are not able to do the kind of advertising the times demand. ‘You can do great image stuff, but can you do price advertising?’ he asked. The reason? We had resisted a client-suggested headline: WAS 299 NOW 249.

“The hardest part to comprehend is that these tactics are not working. They have been trying to recover by offering rebates, cutting prices, only to find that sales have continued in their downward spiral. It never occurred to them to take a look at the product.

“And anyway, who says that tough, sales oriented price cutting advertising can’t be creative? And who says sales promotions can’t be exciting?”

Jay Chiat, October 1982.

A few more significant posts got in the way of the usual trenchant analysis of last week’s question of the week and the setting of the new one.

Please accept my abject apologies.

I asked which cuisine you preferred. Amazingly, Italian won. People like Lasagna and Tiramisu. Who saw that one coming?

Anyway, I realised about halfway through last week that I had meant to post a different question, one whose answer might at least be vaguely interesting.

At some point in the future I’m going to do a post about legacy, or how you are remembered when you’re gone (not necessarily dead; perhaps just retired). This was inspired by an episode of The West Wing where Toby worked out how to reform social services, but the only way he could implement his plan is if Jed was unable to take credit for it. So they debated it for a few hours, while I thought it was one of the most pathetic things I had ever seen.

But hang on…

Legacy is actually important. In the case of Jed Bartlett, or Tony Blair, success or failure can make a difference to how their political stance is perceived in future. The Welfare State leaves everyone with no money? People may not be so keen on it in the next election. Increased taxation creates a demotivated workforce? No votes for that anytime time soon.

And in non-political circles, does an attempt at trailblazing creativity lead to good financial consequences? Does boring, route one football’s results justify its tedium? Is it a good idea to give a film director final cut? The lasting impressions of these decisions can be the difference between whether they’re allowed to happen again, or not.

So, legacy can matter, but the West Wing Question remains: would you prefer a big success that you can never take credit for, or a small success that everyone knows about?

And for reading through that load of old toss, here’s how to waste the next 12 minutes seven seconds of your life:

(Yes, I know this has been around for a while, but is that really going to stop you watching it again? And besides, youngsters read this blog, and they might not have seen it.)