LNOYL

This morning, while staring upside down over the bed, reading off the Ipod touch, I learned that the record manufacturing plant, located in the Czech Republic, had pushed back our delivery date. This meant our records would not make it in time for our release event. I got up, emptied the bowl of cornflakes they had just peed in, and got to work typing up my “constructive feedback” to the manufacturing plant. Just before I hit the send button, Google auto popped another message on the screen; Jakub, our english speaking contact at the plant, had recalled our release date, and then apparently got together with Jana, our other contact at the plant, to sort it all out. The timing would still be ridiculously tight, but the morning was now flushed out, and optimism remained. This meant that it was time to surf “Used Ottawa” and “kijiji” (not so much craigslist anymore, because you can’t quickly scan through pictures without having to click on every single link).

If you see me scrolling on my cell phone, that’s probably what im doing – checking out “UsedOttawa”. This behaviour materialized because I got tired of dragging the futon mattress upstairs at night for sleeping, the particle board MALM coffee table who’s lower shelf sagged with every other magazine, the Ikea kitchen cart that functioned as a mixing desk (music, not cake mix), and the rest of the cardboard boxes and student furniture I’ve been holding onto since I moved back to Ontario. My sister, who is talented at creating livable and inspiring interiors on a budget, suggested I focus my attention on mid century modern design (MCM). The first time I saw examples of it, my reaction was “70′s furniture, why would I want any of that?” She shook her head, and then explained that yes, when we were little kids, MCM design was popular with mass market furniture manufactures and retailers, and thus could be found everywhere, which is why our generation would think of it as “70′s furniture.” It turns out that while achieving ubiquity in the 1970′s, MCM design can in fact be traced to the 1930′s. There is a classic element to it that if done properly, can appear perennial or indefinite. Check out “Revolution Road” (married couple struggling within the stifle of 1950′s suburbia) or Gattaca (futuristic SCFI, filmed in the late nineties). Both great flicks, and combinations of MCM found within the set design are equally at home amongst these differing environments. I think of MCM furniture as natural shapes, often perched on spindly little legs. Corralling MCM furniture is like collecting spiders.

To further my understanding of furniture and design, my sister then drew an analogy to music. Design in the furniture world is sort of like genre in music. On the whole, there is not infinite variety. There are generalized categories, which have their own history and story of development. Each carries its own message, and intends to get that message across according to it’s own set of rules. And then there are fusions, some of which are considered successful (rap rock a la rage against the machine or bad brains), and some of which are destined to be forever disposable or tacky (bubble gum screamo pop). My view on what furniture was all about changed when she explained this. I guess I wasn’t going to make multiple trips to Ikea after all, because furniture was no longer something I could, or should casually obtain. I had to think about it, then hunt it down. If you are very patient, and very, very persistent with the thrift shops and online markets, then over about a year, you can get sleeper MCM pieces which are usually built to a high standard. You can obtain enough to create a natural and stimulating living area, at minimal cost. This is true, because it just so happens that people who purchased quality MCM designs, 30 to 50 years ago, are now moving on in life, selling their family homes, along with all the furniture that is no longer being used. The abandoned furniture becomes a “a job to get done” by the busy older kids in the family. So to the thrift shop it goes, or put on “UsedOttawa” for bargain basement prices. Older MCM is plentiful, undervalued, well built and designed, and the abundance will not always be with us. In fifteen years time, I can see all the eighties furniture hitting the market in droves…

There was a listing for B&W speakers, going for 40 bucks. I thought they could be a perfect match for a mint, 1972 Sony amplifier/receiver I picked up, for close to the same cost. The amp literally looked like it just came out of its shipping box for the first time. It’s origins were not of injection molded cheap plastic; this machine is assembled from wood and stainless steel, with solid relay switches and levers. Planned obsolescence was not a design goal for Sony in 1972. I called the “speaker guy” up, and found out that they were all ready taken. But, he had this neat, vintage swan-style chair (Arne Jacobsen inspired). When the desirable items show up amongst the plethora of crap on “UsedOttawa”, you’ve got to get your ass in gear and move, once you’ve laid eyes on it. Within minutes. Even after you’ve called, made the deal, and start to drive over to pick it up, other people will keep calling the seller, and ramp up the price by the time you arrive (this has happened to me twice!). At one sellers house this spring, some guy actually pretended to be me, and “took” the Barcelona Ottoman that was being “reserved” until I got there after work. It was going for peanuts, and that brings out the fast and ruthless. The “speaker guy” I talked too said he would be there for at least another hour, and that I could come over now. He lived by the airport, so I figured I could get ready, and be there just in time.

Bungee cords, measuring tape and screw driver must always be kept in the car – or else you will be forced to leave things behind when you arrive to pick them up. It’s always hard to tell the scale of furniture on the pixelated “UsedOttawa” photos, so the corolla sometimes needs help staying closed on the highway trip back. After a frantic, ten minute opening every drawer in the house session, I found two bungee cords, jumped in the car, and hit the X. At the gas station up the road, I flailed towards the ATM, but failed notice the amber ‘gas light’ glowing on the dash when I exited the parking lot. I was thinking Arne Jacobsen, not fill er’ up. Three blocks later, there was a traffic accident, and I sat idling for about 15 minutes before I could pass.

I turned off the highway with fifteen minutes to spare, but then I took a wrong turn on Bank Street. As I turned around to head back in the right direction, the corolla sputtered, and then started to coast. The amber light was now dead, because I had ran out of gas. Bank street is very busy at noon, and I was repelled by the thought of being a traffic impediment on this road. Plus, paying for a tow truck would leave no money for the swan styled chair. But the car kept on coasting! We had the alignment done just last week and maybe that’s why it drifted in neutral as far as it did. If I was forced to hit the brake, I was dead in the water, stuck on the road. I coasted an entire block. At the upcoming intersection, the red light turned green ten seconds before I got there – I was able to make it through an intersection! I turned right, and headed into the mall roadway. I had to cranked hard on the wheel to do this, with the power steering disabled. The corolla groaned and coasted on nonetheless, even up the little sidewalk bump. Just like in those fake speeding Hollywood scenes, the cars and people moving in the South keys parking lot were perfectly staggered for my timing. I cranked left, and drifted into the very last spot in the mall parking lot. I probably had about 15 feet of momentum left…

I called the “speaker guys” number, and told him that I was not going to make it, and I apologized for wasting his time. He said he’d be there longer, and I could still show up if I wanted. He was pretty chill about it, and didn’t sound like he was the type to let the chair go to whoever showed up first. So how badly did I want the swan styled chair? My brain did it’s chemical computations – resulting in me getting out of the car, and walking to find the closest gas station. I used to pump gas at Sunoco, and over the years, I became very accustomed to the sheepish look on peoples faces that came before “do you have a gas can we can borrow?” Sunoco, of course, sold them the can for ten bucks. I too could now finally play this role, and complete my circle of life at Sunoco. Up a head, I saw a Walmart instead. Remember that department store Woolco, that disappeared in the late nineties? Well, Woolco bought the farm, and was bought out by Walmart. The year that it happened, I was looking for a summer job, and got hired onto a crew. My job was to smash Woolco parts and shelving and throw them into the dumpster outside. We had to crunch the stuff we tossed into the dumpsters, manually, to save them money on disposal (kind of like stomping on grapes to make wine; except we were stomping on Woolco to make Walmart). I remember sitting on top of a pile of Woolco parts, in a Walmart dumpster, thinking that there had to be more to life than this. Eventually, I was transferred to a crew that unloading gigantic pallets of merchandise onto the new Walmart shelves we had just installed. Since that day, I know where everything is located inside of a Walmart, and I knew exactly what shelf the gas cans would be on. I ran to the back, found the nine litre red can, and made my way to the gas station. The stupid cheap gas can leaked from the air vent on the back, and I ended up smelling like gasoline.

Once the car was juiced the car up, I found my way to the address I was given. There were two streets beside each other that had almost the same name (I missed the “unit 9″ prefix that distinguished them). I went to the first townhouse with the right number, and there was a guy upfront, painting. I walked up to him, and introduced myself as Kris, the guy who was coming to pick up the chair. I explained that I was sorry for being late, and that I smelled like gasoline. He said “that’s too bad eh. Do I know you?” I had the right house number, but the wrong crescent. When I explained this, he put down his paintbrush, and said I should buy a lottery ticket (I guess because I’m a big winner.)

When I finally landed on the right porch, I was met by Micheal. He knew why I smelled like gasoline, and didn’t tell me to buy a lottery ticket. I saw the chair in the corner, but my focus was drawn to a guitar that was perched amongst some unique MCM designed pieces. He picked up the blue guitar in the corner, and he obviously knew what he was doing with the instrument. He mentioned that he built custom guitars. He brought down one of them; a new prototype of his. I saw it as a guitar that could be played with a bow – something I’ve been trying to figure out for a few months now. Uncanny. I left with the swan-type chair, and hopefully within the next few weeks I’m going to bring over a bow and test out Micheal’s prototype guitar.

There is a simple reason why I am explaining all this. As it turns out, I will chase bungee cords, drive on empty, run through Walmart isles and busy streets carrying a leaky gas can, and almost complete my “Sunoco gas station circle of destiny”, all in an effort to obtain something that drives one aspect of my world. When was the last time that new music had this type of influence within our culture? When was the last time you went through hoops to find a new band? What do you do, when the stark reality for any new artist, is that most people will not, or cannot buy your work? What do you do when music, as a whole, fails to drive the culture as it once did in the past? No one will be running with a gasoline can in hand in a search to dig up your latest work. The culture has moved on, and the rate of change has splintered us into small groups that are already content with what we have. If you’ve recognized this, and want to respond to this change in how our culture perceives and reacts to new introductions into their lives, then whats the next step?

When you consider the solutions presented online, like artist centric iPhone apps or the marketing tools that most social media sites offer, you will notice that they often rely on distraction based techniques. Straight out of the TV complex play book. Sure, they’ve been dressed up in a pixelated jumpsuit to exist online, but they are, by definition, susceptible to the very same response that marketers now experience via TV complex efforts. These marketing efforts will be justifiable ignored by most people. According to Godin (2003), the dynamics of marketing, and the culture you are introducing your work too have changed so much, that strategies previously considered “alternative” are the only strategies left. One such strategy, that I believe has particularly strong applicability to what we do as artists, is described as the “purple cow” (Godin 2003). The “purple cow” is simply a metaphor that describes a remarkable service or product that people can’t help but talk about. Remarkable means just that – people make remarks about it.

While that idea seems insular and small, the implications are quite encompassing. By definition, creating a “purple cow” (something remarkable), means you have to stop with the advertising, and start innovating. It means that taking any new album, or work of art that you created, and simply slapping on the marketing afterwards is a recipe for failure. People still have a voracious appetite for new music and artistic work, but they are simply much too busy for the marketing messages that typically accompany those works. If your work is introduced in association with distraction based marketing, then it is simply invisible to most people. Making efforts to generate awareness, so that people can become self motivated to check out what you have might seem like common sense, but what it actually represents is a tactic that the average person will reject early on in their decision making process. Most people really don’t care about the majority of the stuff that is pushed their way, and will ignore it just as if it wasn’t there to begin with. Their time is more valuable than ever before, and you become the petty thief if you seek to take it from them. The implications are that if your method to introduce your work involves trying to get the attention of a lot of strangers all at once, then you will likely fail. Banner ads? Fail. Radio promo? Fail. Newspaper article or advertising? Fail. Magazine write up? Fail. Generic reviews of your work by paid sponsors? Fail. Hanging your work up at any available gallery you can get it displayed in? Fail. Unsolicited mail outs of your demo? Fail. Yes, those things could generate transient interest, or a few momentary “sales”, but transient interest or sales is no longer something that builds the architecture for continued growth of your work. These methods, taken on their own, represent clinging to the past or just doing what we know, because it feels safe. You will be striking out on your own, pursuing what many will perceive as “unproven” or a “novelty”, should you choose the alternatives.

Creating remarkable work implies that you are building things worth discussing, right into what you are creating. By achieving this, you are actually embedding the marketing into what you are producing. In other words, the marketing isn’t the icing on the cake. It’s going straight in into the batter. What you build into your artistic offering must be remarkable, because if it is not, today it will be simply invisible. That is the reality of how our culture responds to the saturation. Innovation and remarkability, as described by Godin (2003), are the new marketing basics for independent artists, and it is imperative to create things worth talking about. According to Godin (2003), the pursuit of something remarkable comes from passionate people, framing an idea or concept, and composing something for themselves. Sounds a lot like what you are probably doing, day in, day out anyways, doesn’t it? So why not structure the process to bypass the drudgery and false hopes associated with old marketing and promotion methods. We shouldn’t “Willy Loman” our work. Accessing our culture and creating attention for new ideas or concepts is a learned skill, and integrating the discussion into the work we are creating is the first rung on that ladder.

Our culture has lost certain characteristics that made it amenable to TV-industrial-complex, distraction based marketing techniques. Those were the old rules that taught us how to gain attention from lots of people when trying to introduce something new. The key to understanding why people reject this, is to get the idea that time is a valuable commodity, and you’ve undoubtedly got to earn this time rather than “steal it” with traditional marketing techniques. As an artist, you do this by building the marketing right into what you are creating. This has absolutely nothing to do with sticking ads, or integrating unrelated, disparate things that compromise or conflict with your work. That’s not what is being proposed here. Instead, this has everything to do with focusing on your art and developing it even further until you have achieved that moment where the innovation to be found in your work speaks for itself.

We now must understand how these remarkable works spread, take hold, or lose traction in a population….