Marketing News (I)

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Saatchis turns to disposable pop as it creates girl band
by Suzanne Bidlake Brand Republic 10 Apr 2006

LONDON – Saatchi & Saatchi is touting a manufactured girl band, created by the agency, as its latest ad weapon in the battle to reach young consumers.

Marketers will be able to hire the as-yet-unnamed group to promote their brands in their songs, their clothing and what they eat and drink.

Already a drinks company, a consumer goods marketer, an entertainment business and car manufacturers are said to be lining up for the chance to align their products with what appears to be the most disposable incarnation of pop in a post reality-TV world.

Created by Saatchi youth division Gum, the idea aims to surmount the problem of ad clutter by taking brands into a fresh medium.

The agency is understood to be planning to roll out the concept further to a rock band and a comedian if selling pop as a marketing vehicle is successful.

Any similarities between existing brands and the girl band members' stage names -- Mercedes, Chanel, S-Jay and Rockwell -- is said to be merely coincidental.

The girls all hold down day jobs and are being groomed into pop stars with singing and choreography training and styling. It is estimated that the agency might have to send over £200,000 a year to develop the band.

The girl group will make its public debut next month in a "mobisoap" -- a series of minute-long soap opera-style films reflecting their real lives relayed via mobile phones.

Established music talent has already moved closer to marketing brands. Kanye West and four other rappers mentioned Seagram's gin in songs in 2004, and hip-hop acts such as Busta Rhymes and P Diddy lifted cognac sales with the 'Pass the Courvoisier' hit two years earlier.

The idea of manufacturing bands is hardly new with The Spice Girls, Boyzone and S Club 7 all blazing an early trail, which has been followed by reality TV groups Hearsay and Liberty X.

But creating them specifically as a marketing tool is likely to make some wince and question if it is not a step too far.

Whether brand owners will be tempted by the Saatchi girls' entreaty in an early track -- "Anything you want me to be baby, I'll play the part" -- remains to be seen.

Marketing News (II)

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

(NB if you want to vote in the POP WORLD CUP please do it by midnight tonight kthxbye. Iran and Serbia - I need yr tracks by tomorrow night!)

"Unilever has become the first major client to sign up to a new quarterly youth survey tracking UK music and lifestyle trends.

The syndicated "Tuned In" study uses guerilla interviews, focus groups, and a panel of music celebrities in an attempt to bring corporations up to speed on fast-moving trends in the UK music scene, and how those trends impact on the fashion choices, brand attitudes and lifestyles of youth people.

Spring Research - which developed the study - counts rap group Roll Deep among its celebrity panellists, who help to shed light on the origins of musical movements. The survey will focus on different musical 'tribes' each quarter, with the second wave expected to address the dance scene."

(from Research magazine, April 2006)

OMGUPDATE from "MRNews":

"the survey aims to identify emerging music and lifestyle trends, such as tee-totalism (‘straight-edging’ in current youth parlance)."

M'LUD!!!

The History Of Pop Part 36 aka So much for all your highbrow Marxist ways

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

AROOOO! AROOOO! GOTH ALERT! Yes, it's Now: The Placebo Years, or Now: 1997 as you might otherwise call it. I remember this as a deeply fallow time for pop but then I was living back at my parents' house, working sub-minimum wage (OK there was no minimum wage back then) and listening to EARLY MANICS records. Oh to be 23 again (not in a grillion years). Other new faces include Mansun, Sash and the Chemical Brothers. And TEH FIRST EVER INTERWEB NUMBER ONE. Well, it was if you were reading USENET.

Now 35 saw the Spice Girls triumph at the second time of asking, "Say You'll Be There" beating Pulp into a close-ish second, with Suede, the Pet Shop Boys and Undiesworld tying for third. It also saw a sudden dip in the number of people voting, probably because they were all on holiday, or because the late-90s were rub. But they weren't really, where they? Were they??!!

( Come play my game I'll test ya )

VOTE ME GOOD!

judicial reasoning

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

SONIC YOUTH ARE NOT INDIE ftb:
i. signed to geffen
ii. possibly that's IT unless being GOTH = not indie

SONIC YOUTH *ARE* INDIE ftb:
i. girl on bass
ii. the lex loves them
iii. "art pop" = indie by definition
iv. culturcide-style shenanigans w.the WHITEY ALBUM (obv they are better at shenanigans than culturcide cz they LIKE POP)
v. daydream nation!!
vi. "our" grateful dead
vii. postpunk = indie
viii. WALL OF GUITARS D00D!¡!

Indieguilt question of the day

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

(as indiguilt community seems to have MYSTERIOUSLY vanished)

So just how many copies of the Paris Angels "Perfume (Left It Up To You)" do you have counting compilation albums?