The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

[Some fonts & some slides are screwed up – I don’t know why as it works fine on the master copy – so in the unlikely event you want a legible version, let me know and I’ll bung it over. Saying that, I’d advise you not to bother, it’s time you won’t ever get back]

As usual, this presentation has been written with the purpose of setting up my rant, rather than being my rant – so if it doesn’t make sense [which is almost guaranteed, ha!] – accept my apologies and be grateful you don’t have to hear it being delivered for real.

… no, I don’t mean by eating tons of food, marrying hot women then giving them a big chunk of your cash every month while they sit on their arses slagging you off to all their friends, family and lawyers … I mean seeing if you can insult someone and somehow still get the job …

Test yourself by clicking here.

I think most people know BBH is a bloody great agency.

Sure they’ve had a few issues in the past few years regarding their level of energy, inventiveness and drive – but despite that, they’ve still been miles ahead of most other agencies, even if their great thinking and creative has generally been executed via the usual suspects interms of media channels.

Maybe I’m biased – but I believe the future of that network is going to be driven by their Asian outposts rather than their London or NYC offices.

Don’t get me wrong, they’re European/US guys are brilliant – but in a lot of them, there’s this inherent arrogance which pisses me right off, especially when you compare it to how interesting, aware and – for want of a better word – humble, their China, Singapore and Tokyo teams are.

[See John’s A[P]SOTW assignment as an example – though he’s just buggered off to their London HQ]

Anyway, the reason I am writing this post is because I’ve just seen something they’ve done that is really good … something really, really good.

OK, so it’s for AXE/LYNX – one of their ‘glory accounts’ – but as much as you may it’s easy to do ads that say ‘turns good girls, naughty’, the fact of the matter is [1] they got the client to buy this strategy in the first place [2] they’ve been consistent to the core idea for decades across multiple markets [3] they’ve maintained the tone of voice to ensure it always draws a wry smile rather than a snort of disgust and [4] they’ve continually developed interesting work to keep the strat fresh.

So there’s this magazine in Singapore called Playeur.

It’s basically an Asian cross between GQ and FHM … lots of scantily clad Asian beauties inbetween articles about bloody tailored suits and/or expensive watches.

Anyway because reading magazines is part of my job [that’s my excuse and I’m sticking with it] I buy each edition and this month, as I was just about to put it down, I saw this ad for LYNX …

Not sure if you can see it properly, but it’s basically a bunch of photos of the same guy that all look like they’ve been ripped out from various magazines.

Anyway, underneath each pic you see there’s a ‘page number’ and you suddenly realise they all relate to that edition of Playeur.

One is of a model spying on the guy [see pic 2 of this post] … another features a model wearing a locket that has this guys photo in it … another has this guys photo on the mantelpiece etc etc

In short, BBH have worked with the publisher to subtly incorporate LYNX into all the photoshoots, so that when the idea finally gets revealed, it looks like an average Singaporean guy has had a bunch of hot models lusting/seeing/stalking him because he uses LYNX.

Genius.

Of course we all know LYNX doesn’t really have that power over women [sorry Doddsy] but the inventiveness of this idea means that the brands energy and relevance [interms of tone of voice and target customer] is kept high – not to mention the fact they’ve made a normal print ad work about 1000 times harder than it normally would.

Remember a couple of weeks ago I wrote a post saying I would be positive on Wednesdays?

OK so it only lasted one week but I thought I’d give it another go because everything deserves a second chance doesn’t it?

Well, except banking executives.

Anyway this week I want to you to tell me what home arcade game used to make you go weak at the knees.

I’m not talking about Xbox 360 or PS3 type of stuff … I’m talking about the sort of game that existed before characters like Sonic or Mario were even a twinkle in a nerds eye.

Again I’ll start to get things rolling …

Actually this is quite difficult because there were a lot of games that did it for me.

I never got an Atari 2600, I had a Phillips G7000 … mainly because my parents were anti games systems and because it had a keyboard, I was able to convince them it was something that could also help me at school.

The fact this was 1981 and it had all the computer power of a $2.84 calculator from Asda is besides the point, ha!

Whilst the Phillips system was fun … and it had games that were obviously ‘inspired’ by the Pacman and Space Invaders classics … I got more enjoyment from handheld games than stuff you played on the telly, though I have lots of good memories of playing

Over the years I had all sorts of gadgets … from the absolutely shite Merlin [which at the time was truly cutting edge, hahaha] … to Tin Can Alley [which my Dad had to put together one Christmas at 3 in the morning for his over excited son] … to a plethora of ‘Game & Watch’ machines to the shrunken Galaxian arcade genius that was ‘Astro Wars’ … however the 2 games that stand out – even though they were nothing more than battery operated clockwork machines’ – were BLIP and Demon Driver.

Blip was a tennis game that was advertised as being cutting edge because it had a LIGHT EMITTING DIODE. Yes, I remember when an LED was the sort of stuff NASA were producing.

Anyway you could play against a friend or against the ‘computer’ [hahaha] and it revolved around you returning the ‘ball’ by pressing button 1, 2 or 3 in time.

It was so basic that it’s almost embarrassing to admit I loved it – but I did – and when I first saw that LED light up, I thought I had met God.
 

Demon Driver was a racing game.

It came out after Atari launched their POLE POSITION arcade classic. The only similarity was that it featured racing cars because the ‘home version’ basically featured some racing cars printed on a cellophane loop that you had to avoid so you could go the furthest distance in the time allowed.

The time allowed was dictated by what is now known as a kitchen timer but the piece de resistance was that Demon Driver had a little gearstick allowing you to change speed between gear 1 and gear 3.

I think I was about 8 or 9 years old when I got these toys but even now at 38 – with all the toys you could want [or not] from Xbox’s and PS’s through to R2D2 and Nabaztag’s – when I think of them, I still feel the same pang of excitement and warmth as I did back when I ripped open the wrapping paper and for the first time saw the ‘future’ …

I’m not really sure why those games made such an impression on me … maybe it’s because they were the closest thing to the real arcade games I would get to play when my parents took me to Goose Fair … maybe it’s because they were the first toys that made cool noises … maybe it’s because rather than being kiddy coloured, they were in evil matt black … maybe it’s because they revolved around sports that were more ‘adult’ than an 8 year old kid was used to … but nothing has come out that has made me feel the same sense of awe as those 2 and I know that makes me sad, especially with the amount of money I blow on technoshit.

[Besides, shouldn’t the ‘talent’ in the ad feature a black and a white guy to make it truly Guinnessafied? God I can’t believe I wrote that! Apologies]