Actually, this is just a little plug. Last year, I worked on the subtitles for a documentary called “Where is the Love in the Palm Grove?”, produced by Iota Productions. Jérome le Maire spent a year in southern Morocco, and decided to ask the locals how young people meet in this remote area, where the social norms are hyper-strict. The result is a fascinating look at the relationship between love and marriage – and not just from their point of view. It will be shown at Munich’s Dokfest festival on May 2 and 5. I highly recommend it.
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Maybe it’s a bit optimistic. Maybe it’s just plain wrong. But I’ve been speaking to a number of copywriters in Europe these past few days. None have a spare minute. All are struggling to keep up. What does this mean? Do I know the only successful copywriters in Europe? Or – as one of them suggested – are we an indication of the way industry in general is headed? I’d like to think it’s the latter. I’m currently working for two very large companies and a hotel. All are very upbeat in their sectors. They are all confident about picking up extra market shares and have the plans and processes to do so. Significantly, this involves new products, applications and – in the case of the hotel – a totally new way of talking to people. So it’s a time of innovation and working together with customers – the type of things copywriters love.
I think we have all heard that the music business is in pretty bad shape (and just today, it was revealed that figures are down 15% in France). As the foremost music trade fair, Midem obviously has had to reconsider what role it plays in the new music business. This has led to them providing a whole range of conferences and networking events that enable people to get new ideas about surviving and moving forward over the coming years. With this in mind, the concept we developed with Consorcom for this year’s brochure and ads is “Think Louder This Year” – reflecting the business’ need to be loud and brash, but with a little more brains. Incidentally, I’ll be in Cannes myself Jan 26-29. Look for me under The Write Stuff in the MidemWorld database.
I’ve done words for a couple of songs in ads over the years, most notably the UK and German campaigns for Alpro soya (“Happiness is Easy”), Tuborg beer and two hilarious mini-musicals for Douwe Egberts coffee. A great song does great things for advertising, connecting immediately with an audience or instantly creating a period or atmosphere.
Advertising Age has drawn up a list of Best Songs in Ads for 2007, as well as the notable raspberries. Leslie Feist’s “1234″ for iPod Nano in North America picked up the Palm. Check it out on Advertising Age. Any favourites?
Incidentally if you need that extra atmosphere that only a song can bring in your next ad, you know who to ring!
Who writes these things? I gave the dog a shock laughing at this one. If you’ve ever seen discussions between the creative and accounts dept of an agency, you’ll enjoy this spoof, taken from “A Few Good Men”. Unfortunately, the direct link to YouTube breaks my frames (ouch). So click through for one of the funniest spoofs of agency life I have ever seen.
By the way, while you’re there you might also want to check the original speech given by Jack Nicholson’s character at the end of the trial. Brilliant writing and a perfect role for Nicholson.
There is always something glamorous about the movie business and it’s nice to see one’s name on the credits of a film. This summer, I got a call from composer Steve Willaert who was writing music for the Belgian thriller “Vermist/Missing” directed by Jan Verheyen. He was preparing a track for the end of the film and needed some lyrics. After a little coming and going, the result was “Waiting” breathlessly sung by Chantal Kashala. What I didn’t know at the time is that the film stars two of Flanders’ biggest new actors, Koen De Bouw and Kevin Janssens. So when I went to see it on the second night, I was surprised to find a capacity audience in one of the largest theatres (it opened in 29 cinemas in Flanders). “Waiting” plays over the final credits. I’ve had music used in movies before, but this is the first time I’ve written something from scratch for one. There are plans to turn “Vermist” into a TV series. Check Vermist here.
The French pavilion has had a neat idea for the Saragossa world exhibition of 2008. As water is becoming increasingly important, they have decided to focus on water and sustainable development as their theme. And for that, they are looking for images of water. The company handling the event, 3e Pole, has set up a website in French, English and Spanish (guess who handled the English copywriting?). If you have any interesting photos of water, why not send them over? Your images could be used as part of the pavilion. To find out more, visit Water Images Collection.
I can’t take any credit for this, but Belgium picked up 13 awards at the Cannes Lions this year. That’s one more than Holland and (gulp) three more than France! So the Creative Club of Belgium launched a cheeky campaign to point this fact out to European advertisers under the title, “We’re lousy at football these days, so we beat our neighbours with something else”. Em, who says long headlines don’t work? (To be frank, I might have condensed it to “Belgium 13: neighbours less”).
I quote: “So how did we manage it? It’s simple. Constraints make us creative. Being
a 10 million people federal state with three languages, we deal with smaller
budgets, tougher clients and delicate cross-cultural issues.”
I can vouch for that! Click over to the Creative Club for more.