Beijing Another View

I've never done a post like this but an email I received sparked such a good response that I asked if I could share it because I think it adds some really good flavour to the question what is Beijing like, through the lens of its vibrant music scene. Here is the response from Chris Emmerson which should really be seen in the context of two links that were sent prompting a private email exchange between three people, and which he has kindly agreed to allow me to share here. The links that sparked the conversation are:

http://www.demos.co.uk/publications/atlasofideas

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/china2008/story/0,,2264116,00.html

And here is Chris' response:

Finally got to these after a weekend off the intensive Mandarin. The science one was interesting: I did a study on perceptions of scientists back in the UK for a course I was doing, and the bitterness amongst that community is startling, particularly amongst biologists and biochemists. Scientists feel they have no status in the UK, and to do the 'good work' they all dreamt of as idealistic undergraduates they have to spent 15-20 years working in study groups they don't believe in, so that by the time they've reached the point at which they have the chance to set their own agenda they're politically conditioned to mark out and defend their own specialist territory, regardless of the value of research. A number of them suggested that since there was so much politics in funding, it was as well to have politicians actively running the show, since at least they might be expected to see the bigger picture and do politics well.

A lot of scientists end up in the private sector spending their lives tweaking established treatments so they can be re-patented: a fabulous waste of talent that was the elephant in the room as far as the article was concerned. So yes, China may have lucked onto a model that makes the most of a particular moment in its political and social history. I'd start on cancer if I were them, since living in this city is the equivalent of smoking approximately eighteen blue Drum roll-ups per day. I know because I smoked about eighteen blue Drum roll-ups per day until the day I left the UK, and my respiratory system has benefitted not one iota in two months.

As for the music: well....yes. If you're going to judge it in entirely musical terms....yes. And if you're a music critic, that's what you'll do so....yes. But personally, I'm finding the music scene here enormous fun. Possibly it's just that being in a foreign city gives you license to behave like a teenager sometimes but it's been a long time since I enjoyed going to gigs as much as here. The combination of aching cool and accessibility is striking. The bands all look like the cover shoot for your choice of cutting edge fashion mag the month after next, but you can wander up and chat to the lead singer after the set, even if you don't share a common language (you can also, in no particular order, learn a Taiwanese drinking game, teach a barman how to make popcorn in a microwave, discuss ska with a guitarist who thinks you're cool because hardly anyone he knows has even heard of Elvis Costello and get impressively drunk for under a fiver; although apparently if you're a Guardian music critic, you're above all of these things). There's also a bond with the audience that doesn't devolve into cloying sentimentality and I-saw-them-first one-up-manship which seemed to be an increasing feature of the London 'scene' the last time I was a hip young thing (which was, admittedly, never). And god knows, if most of them haven't got an original idea in their pretty little heads, at least they know how to put them together in a way that's entertaining.

In fact, I have wondered if it is the barriers to 'getting big' that keep things fun. Everybody's asprirations are on a similar scale; no-one's going to become U2 overnight. Having watched many documentaries about CBGBs, and then finally seeing the horror it had become in its final incarnation two years ago, D22 and its peers are the closest I've come to feeling how I imagine that scene was.

Right then. Now I've sorted out the future of science, politics and music I'll go back to my homework......

Go check out this post on the Guardian for more on the Beijing music scene and Ed's intelligent blogging on the subject.

Freedom To Move

 

Just because I love it so much to this day. The Music is Bach's Sarabande and the Director is Michael Glazer. Ad by by BBH.

Chinese Advertising

One planning topic that needs some understanding in developing economies is media literacy. Mary Goodyear has looked into this subject extensively, and you can read all about it over here and Fredrik did a splendid post related to the topic over at his.

From the outside it may seem that the creativity is often lackluster in this part of the world and for sure, it is in the main, like pulling teeth to coax the clients (and agencies) to go the extra mile and explore some of the dimensions of advertising that can be achieved. Forgive me if this seems like I'm pulling out unremarkable ads but this is one of the first commercials I came across that stood out.

This is actually quite a big deal for a paint ad in Asia. I can just see the spreadsheet marketer saying stuff like "you want to show people throwing my paint around?" or "what have birds, hay and diving got to do with my brand?", "why isn't there a paintbrush in the picture?", "can't we have a basso profondo voice in the ad?" and so on and so forth. The reason is that the people who frequently manage marketing and advertising in Asia are often the kind of people who can cope with high volume but really struggle with ideas like metaphors, feelings, emotions and expression. I should call a halt to this right now because I could go on and on but suffice to say that a lot of people have made a lot of money managing that huge growth and volume over the last 15 years or so and are at the top of their game without actually ever squeezing out a creative puppy.

So I think its a big deal that Saatchi & Saatchi advertising got this through and I believe it was subsequently awarded an Effie which pleased me if only because championing creative is so hard and because it won for those very same reasons I listed above, that I believe most China based marketeers and agencies are simply not geared up for. Clearly Chinese customers felt differently than the average marketing whizz often does, because they voted with their wallets and gave a 46% increase in sales value of high end products nationwide and more than doubled the targeted 20% increase. There are however a few problems before we pop the Veuve Clicquot, because the ad is way clearly an homage at best, and rip off at worst to the Fallon ad for Sony Bravia, which I think is even better than Balls. Here it is.

So you can park that Effie and all the planning plonk that goes into saying how good the agency and/or planner and/or creative and/or client were because all they did was probably add extraneous process between looking in the right direction for inspiration and actually getting on with ahem 'copying it'. I would however like to see more emulation of the good stuff and a stiff brush to sweep away the marketing mediocrity that needs to make 5.5 (million dollars) by 55 years of age....you know who you are! The problem is that a certain genre of adman has made a tidy living out of punting the lamest of the lame creativity and the emperor needs calling out on the absence of threads.

Sticking out is a big deal in Asian culture. There is an expression that the nail that sticks out gets hammered in, and yet it is my belief that this cannot pertain to advertising. The nail that stands out gets noticed in advertising or can even be outstanding. I've spent a lot of time listening to greatly opposing forces in meetings with spadefuls of advertising spiel and waffle that talks a good game on words such as creativity, brand values and vision but all boils down to the infinitely bland. Why is this happening? Take a look at that Joy Island's photography and the last few seconds of the Nippon paint ad and you'll start to make the connection because as soon as I saw it on the web, I knew I needed to know the story and find the photographer.


Lovely isn't it? There's more...


Brutal huh? Probably not for marketing communications but maybe another day as one of my more challenging traits is that I like to press buttons. Its only when someone explodes that I know their breaking point that I understand what they care about. One of my closest friends had exactly the same characteristic as me. We were both political junkies and we'd be at each other's throats over CNN and BBC world news. As early risers this would sometimes happened before before 6 AM when we shared the same apartment. Great times looking back, but returning to my point, through a process of saying the wrong things and seeing where the greatest sensitivity lies I've uncovered an uncomfortable truth about the powerhouse economy which isn't really a brilliant insight as its all been said before. It is however the most raw nerve in China. Innovation is not a trait that springs to mind in the PRC but the one that created the darkest face was when I rationalized the extra 40 slides being asked of me as along the lines of "so what you're saying is to copy other brand's mediocre strategy?"

I've since found that the "copy" word is like a red rag to a bull, like spilled blood to a boxer, like throwing paint around to a paint marketer (ok I'm exaggerating) because in the absence of innovation all that is left is correctional marketing and 'the middle way' between too much emotional and too much rational in a brand. Then stick it through the research process designed to remove any of the interesting bits and lastly link test it so that if there is a shred of an idea remaining, we can drill it out and stick in something the respondents wanted instead. I ask you, why don't we just give our TARGET market some pens and watch them under the cross hairs with a snipers bullet until they have written the ads themselves?

Maybe this is why some people don't want the blue collar migrant workers as their customers because WHO would want those people in our nice focus group room with free snacks and refreshments, even though they are the backbone of the country. I mean, their media literacy sucks anyway doesn't it?

I always thought that the point of really good advertising, as with any facet of popular cultural expression is to lift people in some way through humour, feelings or observation because ulimately it elevates us all in the end doesn't it?

Or as a very clever and young person said to me last year. Confusion makes you smarter.