If This Is A Blog Then What's Christmas?

Arnold Fartzenegger:

How to dance in a fabulous manner (thanks, B):

Donny and Marie do Steely Dan (thanks, B):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDeVAF58jPg&feature=youtu.be

David Lynch on where ideas come from (thanks, T):

Taking crazy photos of waves (thanks, B):

Send ANYONE a giant cardboard dick (thanks, V).

Men saying dumb things to Playboy (thanks, J).

Mmmmm… watching calligraphy is niiiiiice (thanks, B):

What if England had won the War of (non-) Independence? (thanks, D):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1YvJBwC4xQ&feature=youtu.be

Awkwardly sitting cats (thanks, T).

US comedy screenwriting masterclass (thanks, R).

So the big winner at Cannes was this campaign:

It won Grands Prix for Film, Press, Promo and Integrated. So that’s four separate juries who loved it enough to give it their last Rolo.

Funny thing is, at D&AD it scored a nomination in TV, an entry for Integrated and didn’t even get in for Press (I assume it was entered). It did get a Pencil for branding, but I don’t think that category crosses over.

So one Film jury of top-level international creatives loved it, while another liked it a fair bit; one Integrated jury of top-level international creatives loved it, while another quite liked it; and one Press jury of top-level international creatives loved it, while another didn’t.

And it’s not the only example (oddly enough from the same agency). This ad won TV ad of the year at the BTAAs, Gold at Cannes and nothing at Creative Circle:

The point I’m taking ages to make is that awards are, of course, matters of opinion. If your ad meets the right people at the right time it will do well, but another, somewhat arbitrarily selected group might ignore it.

So go and worry about something else.

Thanks, Vik.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nRKyQ11494

Next month I’m leaving London to go and live in Los Angeles.

There are lots of reasons for my move, but I’m afraid I can’t go into any that are particular to the job I do. I am staying with the same company, but beyond that, the many NDAs I’ve signed prevent me from revealing more.

So what about the other reasons?

I’m a big fan of LA as a city. My parents took me there in the early 80s and there was something about the heat and sunshine, in such stark contrast to London’s fifty shades of grey, that I missed when I returned home.

When we took further holidays there in 1986 and 1987 I caught the movie bug pretty hard and spent many hours watching films like Robocop, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and The Untouchables in their natural habitat (for some reason I’ve always found watching movies in America to be more exciting than in London. This might be a throwback to the days when they were often released six months earlier in the US, and thus remained in my mind as unattainably exotic, pregnant with possibility. In subsequent holidays my brother and I would hoover up all the movies we could find for fear that we might not get the chance to do so for half a year, and then in rainy Golders Green or grim Hendon).

So my love of LA was intertwined with my love of movies, but then in the early nineties we entered a great period for hip-hop and, considering myself pretty fly for an extraordinarily white guy, I popped over again. Although I didn’t venture into Compton, I did meet some interesting junkies in the Greyhound depot Downtown. Anyway, it was all jolly good fun and I didn’t get killed at all.

In 2000 my wife and I holidayed to LA, got married in Vegas and took our honeymoon around California. Fortunately Gabi took to LA to the same extent I did and we always felt we’d end up returning. In 2005 we both came over for something I had spent my career dreaming of: an LA shoot (ie: going to LA on business class and staying in the Sunset Marquis). When I was at Y&R my friend Lee Goulding had gone over to shoot the Steve McQueen Ford Puma ad and returned with tales of convertible Mustangs and some other stuff I probably shouldn’t mention on a family blog, so the idea of going over there without worrying about the expense was ridiculously alluring, and the experience did not disappoint. Waiting outside the hotel one afternoon, John Voight walked past, still looking as cool as a Midnight Cowboy. In London John Voight has never walked past me, but I once had a nice chat with Jarvis Cocker after sneaking into the Groucho Club.

In 2006 my dad moved to LA (Pasadena, actually; no self-respecting Angeleno would tell you they lived in the indistinct sprawl of ‘LA’; they all belong to one of the towns that bleed into each other to make up the wider city) and took to it like a Brit to LA, which might have given me a subconscious impression that making that move would definitely work out for the best. In addition to his job with the Sunday Times he took up stand-up comedy and screenwriting at the age of 59. This is what California does to some people: from the movie business to Silicon Valley there’s a clear home for the creativity that you just won’t find a reception for elsewhere. I think it’s because California must have been populated by the people who wanted to go further west than anyone else. That kind of attitude, of seeing how far you can go, feels present in the optimism and positivity of many people who live there. Then again, that might be bullshit.

In recent years I’ve had to visit many times for work, and my love of the place has only increased. From the beaches to the canyons, from Ralph’s to Sugarfish, from the feeling I get when I’m driving down the PCH and Zeppelin comes on the radio to the massive sunsets that turn the Pacific Ocean pink, there’s always something else to make me think this is the place for me and my family.

Of course, LA isn’t perfect, but its property prices are less than half of London’s, you can plan ahead for a barbecue and it has several branches of Mendocino farms.

So here we are in 2014, and the move is on. I love my job, and am very much looking forward to taking it on in an office 5500 miles away from where I currently work, but fortunately I also love LA. If any of you live over there or are popping over temporarily and would like to go for a kale smoothie, don’t hesitate to get in touch: the email address is the same, but the real address will be in Laurel Canyon.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ty_WlmIKvY&feature=kp

GoT theme as it oughtta be (thanks, N):

100 ways to attack the groin (thanks, J):

Cost/speed of collecting the entire Panini album.

Fuckloads of ducks.

Grindr Lolz (thanks, J).

Another top-class OK Go video (thanks, J):

World Cup sex faces (thanks, N).

The hilarious no-music music video:

Mexican fighting cars:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bZ-x2HWLx0#t=204

Japanese urinal game:

It’s this year’s Dollar Shave Club.

Kinda.

(Thanks, D.)

The Cannes advertising festival is upon us again.

Although I shan’t be attending (again) I’m pretty sure the following will occur:

1) A bottle of Carlton Terrace rosé will now cost more than the flight most people took to drink it.

2) World Cup Cannes: the venue ‘everyone’ is going to will be the venue no one is going to.

3) Conveniently, The Gutter Bar crowd will now spread far enough to encompass at least 75% of Cannes hotels.

4) At least 1000 advertising people will take taxis to a party in the hills, hosted by a production company they’ve never heard of. After 45 minutes they’ll wonder if they’ve just been on one long circuitous route to a house five minutes away from where they got the cab. After an hour they’ll wonder if they’re being abducted to a slave ship in Marseilles. After an hour and fifteen they’ll arrive to find most of the buffet has been eaten and the beer is now warm.

5) The organisers will have invented at least 276 more categories to (pay to) enter.

6) British and French people will discover that it’s possible to recreate the effects of jet lag in the South of France by following the waking hours of Peru for five days. Delegates from Peru will return home as if they never crossed a time zone.

7) The rumours regarding the possible arrival of the ‘dealer’ to whichever agency party is on that night will be discussed 135% more than the winners of the Lions.

8) Those leopard skin-clad mother and daughter hookers will not be employed by anyone – until the last night, when a sad, wealthy client delegate from a valve company in Micronesia will decide to take the plunge. He will then bring a fascinating, virulent and hitherto unknown STD back to his tiny island community.

9) 14% of all lies to spouses via mobile phones in 2014 will be told in the next five days in the Cannes area.

10) This will win all the Grands Prix for which it eligible (12? 13?):

Here’s the Sun’s World Cup ad:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khV6hg0oFEo

I have to say that it really stands out amongst the giant CG-festeramas that have been populating the WC airwaves, but beyond that it feels just right for the product and the country.

See how you feel when you watch it compared to the Nike or Samsung ads and you’ll realise how a focussed ad for a smaller target can hit home with more impact.

It’s also hard to stop watching it once you start, and that’s a rare thing these days.

Interview with director Ed Morris (interest declared: he’s a friend) here.

In recent days I’ve become more and more impressed by Elon Musk.

Here’s a TED interview:

In a nutshell, the guy co-founded Paypal, then went on to found/co-found/take on three companies which literally have the potential to change the world.

First is Tesla, the first electric car company to create an economically viable car that matches the speed and comfort of regular cars (I know it’s currently around $70,000, but a model at half that price is due to arrive in a couple of years). It also has charging stations, some of which are solar powered, across the US that allow you to drive from coast to coast. Yes, the sun can now power your car across America. Although still in its early stages as a company, Tesla has just made its patents available to anyone who wants to use them ‘in good faith’, a brave move that will open up the possibilities of other manufacturers making their own electric cars and improving the costs and supply processes. If, finally, the tipping point version of the electric car is here, we have this man to thank for it.

Second is Solar City, a company that leases solar panelling to you so that your overall energy costs are lower, and that energy doesn’t come from fossil fuels. Again, if this is what brings mass solar energy to the world then that is an incredible game changer. (To be  honest I haven’t been able to find a huge amount about the success or otherwise of Solar City. It doesn’t appear to be moving ahead with quite the blaze of publicity that follows Tesla, but it’s surely a large step in a very good direction.)

Then there’s SpaceX (aren’t his websites lovely?). In June 2002, Musk founded, and invested $100m in, a company that intends to make space travel economically viable, so that ultimately we can go and live on other planets. I think that’s a pretty big (some would say foolhardy) ambition, but he’s actually making it work. The principle is to reduce the costs of sending rockets into space by taking the parts that are usually jettisoned and guiding them back down to where they launched from, to be reused hours later. Fuel is 0.3% of the cost of space travel; the rest is wasted rockets and he’s actually sorted that problem out. Take a look at the proof:

You know when people say ‘it’s not rocket science’? Rocket science is hard, fucking hard, and this guy has revolutionised the entire discipline.

So he may be experiencing varying degrees of success with those three ventures, but I’d like to take my hat off to him for even attempting what he’s done. It takes massive amounts vision, balls, intelligence and money to do those three things simultaneously, and they’re going to make the planet a whole lot better.

I think that’s what you call a win win win win win win win.