Publicity, Make-Up and Bad Ideas

It was brought to my attention by @Crumbolina that Reverend and the Makers, the non-descript indie band from Sheffield, are set to release their third album this year. Like you, I couldn't give less of a shit, but anticipating this their press release has armed us with the following knowledge:

"@reverend_makers is the first commercial album to be named after an artist's Twitter tag."

Now, I know nothing about PR and band promotion, but even the likes of me can spot the age-old  'look for bandwagon, jump on' tactic being deployed here, as well as the immutable rule that journalists and morons everywhere will report on any old crap if it happens first.

Promotion is like make-up. When it's done well it looks natural and effortless, as if the band in question isn't being promoted at all. The result is cool - just ask The Libertines. An alternative of course is to go completely the other way, and be hyper-theatrical about the whole thing. The idea is that everyone is so busy falling over themselves to gawp at the different colours on your face/dress made of meat that they forget about any, yunno, substance.

Reverend and the Makers occupy the sad middle ground of promotion - Trying Just a Bit Too Hard. It's the make-up equivalent of pencilled-on eyebrows and industrial amounts of fake-tan. But the really sad thing here is just how crap the idea of naming your album after your twitter tag actually is. It reminds me of the late '90s obsession with all things space-age and computers. Except whereas it took us years to realise painting cheap electronics silver doesn't make them look futuristic, this is cringeworthy now. Front-man Jon McClure was on hand to demonstrate just how misguided the name is:

"Nothing seems to sum up the present and the times we live in more than the @ symbol."

 @Crumbolina put it better than I could:

"Basically, nothing sums up the latest Reverend & the Makers press release more than the :-( emoticon."

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Something I like today: The Wire gets better each time a new friend watches it and can join in Talking About The Wire.

Something I don't like today: The proposed NHS bill.

Brave New World

So Steve Jobs died last week. This led to a not-unexpected frenzy of hyperbole in the media, with normally pragmatic titles such as The Economist proclaiming the death of 'The Magician'. All this is fine really. Goodness knows Mr Jobs was more worthy of the media attention than a lot of public figures. The fuss did start to veer dangerously close to Princess Diana territory, but the man was a genius who achieved a lot.

So why does the current tide of Apple-love (on top of the usual Apple-love) make me queasy? I don't dislike Apple products. They are invariably very good at what they do. But whenever I see a blog post, or a newspaper article, or a friend treating the loss of Jobs like the passing of some kind of messiah I just want to grab them roughly by the shoulders and shout "GET A GRIP" in their faces. So far this has had more of an effect on my friends than newspapers or computer screens.

Maybe I just have a chip on my shoulder. I am a little bit sick of Mac users looking down on their PC-using peers as if they were backward natives struggling to feed themselves, their primitive tools forcing them to live at the mercy of the elements, only one drought/crash away from starvation/losing that word document. I mean spending more money and receiving a better machine as a result shouldn't be anything special, should it? But the Apple branding is such that to buy an Apple product is to be more than a consumer - it is to be a member of an exclusive society. With an extremely intuitive secret handshake.

Of course, after the outpourings of grief and gratitude since the passing of Mr Jobs you could be forgiven for thinking it was a religion. Some Apple fans seem to come across as disciples rather than customers. In fact Googling the phrase "apple disciple" turns up thousands of results; bloggers and forum users proudly claiming to have "converted their friends/family". Steve Jobs is feted not just as a brilliant designer, but as a visionary.

And that there is my problem. Apple isn't the only company with solid branding and superior design. BMW and Dyson both spring to mind. But BMW and Dyson aren't proponents of a vision that I severely dislike. Yes, dislike. The Apple vision makes me miserable. I find the idea of everyone consuming their media, or interacting with each other through near identical rectangles with the same smooth edges just depressing. Elegant this new world is, and intuitive (oh how intuitive), but to me the dream that everyone uses these programs on these machines in this way, smacks of science fiction dystopia. I don't want to join the massed ranks of the Apple congregation. I'll be damned if ever get more excited about an upcoming gadget than the content it's supposed to help me access, or if I let a greedy multinational off the hook because the stuff it makes is pretty. I live a sheltered life, I'll sacrifice some efficiency if I can hold on to quirk and charm. I just need to find a credible alternative to Windows, so I can carry on complaining about this without sounding like a behind-the-times Luddite.

Help me!

Something I like today: Frank, Amy Winehouse's first album.

Something I don't like today: Being forced to look at a large bottle of rum all day when I should be jobhunting.

...So now what?

For the past week and a half I've successfully put off putting anything more strenuous than a token effort into job-hunting. While my procrastination skills are second to none, there are only so many times you can masturbate or rearrange audio equipment in a day. I need something more substantial to waste my time over. So the blog I'd been talking about starting has been born.

But what to blog about? Obviously my wisdom is well worth documenting, but shouldn't a blog have some kind of USP? A concept to wrap my posts around? Well I could stick to a topic, something I'm interested in. Like music for example. I quickly decided hearing about how great the gig was last night isn't that great in the pub, let alone on the internet without the bullshit-masking effects of alcohol. I'd probably get bored of coming up with fresh hyperbole to describe songs I like every day, or the endless search to find 'really exciting' new bands to be really excited about. I'm far too interesting and multi-faceted to blog about just one thing anyway, so that idea is firmly out the window.

Perhaps I could just pour my thoughts and feelings into the ether, bill it as a personal journal and if some of it turns out to be interesting so much the better. I like the idea of this approach, but I couldn't possibly be honest. Everything post would be calculated to make my life sound like a fulfilling, exciting experience. Which would a) be very boring, and b) not work because I'd balls it up. So no joy there.

How about a quirky format? Every post could be presented in 5 bullet points. Or I could always start with the same sentence. But the problem is those ideas are incredibly unoriginal, which is the last thing I want, and oh for Christ's sake I've already over-thought the whole process. I'm going to resign myself to making it up as I go along. I suppose if the worst comes to the worst I can just hunt for meaningless platitudes in a nice font that someone has mistaken for wisdom and stick them under a grainy photo of a skinny girl with a cigarette. Seems to work for Tumblr.

Tumblr.