SteveCastellano.com

I really have to work on my rhetorical style. And by that I mean to say that I don’t think it’s the rhetoric that’s the problem so much as the delivery. I make what I think is – what I know to be a perfect conversation-ender and then turn as if to walk away, and at that instant, someone says “Yeah, it’s like when…” Some of them know what they’ve done as soon as they do it. “I have nothing to add,” a colleague once stammered. “And now you’ve added it,” I told him.

And so it was when I sent out the above cartoon to some marketing colleagues. What I expected were replies along the lines of “LOL” or perhaps knowing nods in the company kitchen, accompanying co-workers saying, “Got that thing, it was effing righteous.” But that’s not what I got. I got, “You should write a blog post about that.”

Now I’m in the awkward position of trying to elucidate what we could have all pretended was some wry, sage, unspoken statement about our jobs, and the state of marketing in general, and left it at that. But we didn’t pretend, or leave it at that, and so this blog post is going to be like The Gospel According to Peanuts, only about a million times more soulless.

Just as a quick recap, I work in marketing. I work for an advertising company. So I can truthfully say, when asked my occupation, that I am a writer who works for an advertising company. But the question that always follows that is, “Have I seen any of your work?” And my truthful answer is always, “No, not that kind of advertising. Not the cool advertising. I write mostly digital and direct. What you unwashed masses would refer to as banner ads and junk mail.” It would be equally truthful for me to continue to explain that there is more, oh, so much more to it than that, but just because it’s the truth doesn’t mean it’s worth my time to explain, or yours to listen. Suffice it to say, this ain’t Mad Men.

Likewise, the idea that the client insists that we make the logo bigger is a trope, but with the kind of blue-chip clients we deal with it’s not even so true anymore. They don’t have to tell us how big to make the logo; they have a cirlux-bound book of brand standards that we swore on as if it were a floppy bible, on pain of a thousand mind-numbing emails from a cadre of humourless corporate lawyers, that tells us on their behalf. And if you didn’t spot the redundancy in the last sentence, it was the word humourless.

What we do get asked to do, however, is make the call to action bigger (like so many things in our business, the part of the ad that tells you what to do has a super-secret marketing name and an acronym to go with it). The call to action, or CTA, is the “act now” bit at the end; the URL; the 800 number; the part that tells you what to do if you like the thing that the ad is telling you about. The CTA has to pop. It has to be in a coloured box. It should, perhaps, be a “hot” colour like red or yellow. A former president at one agency I have worked at called, quite straight-facedly, for a design standard in which the CTA was “as big as the headline.”

Well I used to be an art director, and I still have some vestigial knowledge of what kinds of problems these suggestions can cause from a perspective of visual aesthetics. And what you can’t really tell people about aesthetics in marketing and advertising if they don’t already believe it is that the way your stuff looks, in particular how good it looks, how much respect it shows for the visual cortex of your audience, speaks to the character of your brand as clearly as your headlines – which is why a former creative director of mine suggested, in typically diplomatic and understated terms, that we attempt to “err on the side of good taste.”

And what I know as a writer (a senior writer, if you please), is that no one is going to act now, or act at any time, if that action isn’t going to make them better off, in their own estimation, than they would be if they did nothing. Which means we have to give some weight and thought to what the hell is so cool about what we’re trying to sell them. This seems obvious to me, and to many people I talk to – but surprisingly it’s not obvious to absolutely everyone. I don’t fault my clients for loving their products. Their products are as much their children as my first draft copy decks are mine. But unless you’re Apple (and maybe we’ll have a chat about blind Apple adoration sometime in the future) you are on thin ice if you just assume that a big old hero shot of your product and a bone-dry list of techs and specs is enough to compel them to jam a crowbar into their wallets and buy one from you.

Look at it this way. All offers are essentially discounts. Order by x date and save y. Or maybe we’ll send you some kind of tchotchke or throw in some service that we’re going to try to convince you that you wanted anyway, so by giving it to you for free we’re saving you money; same difference. But a discount on something your potential customer is not sure he or she wants – about which the benefit has not been communicated to their satisfaction – is hardly a bargain. You might as well be giving away free ads. But if you can manage to convince them that your product is worth owning, and will benefit them in some way, they might end up actually wanting to read the CTA. And if  the reader is actively seeking it out, maybe it doesn’t have to be the same size as the headline, or in a neon colour, or in a starburst. Maybe you can shrink it down to a more reasonable size.

Like, say, the logo.

the obsolete logic hardware key

I talk a lot about music hardware on this site, but the music that I write wouldn’t sound like much without software. Logic is my main audio production app, and I’ve been using it in various incarnations since about 1989, when it was called Notator SL, and was available exclusively on the Atari ST platform.

At that time Performer, by the embarrassingly named Mark of the Unicorn (more commonly known as MOTU for obvious reasons), was all the rage, but Macs were out of the price range of students and many Europeans, leading German software companies like C-Lab and rival Steinberg to create some truly kick-ass sequencing software for the less expensive Atari.

So in that respect I’m pretty lucky; I backed the right horse for once, and in spite of some kind of rift at C-Lab that resulted in a new company called Emagic, and the buyout of Emagic by Apple (there’s a detailed history  at TweakHeadz Lab), I can actually dig out files I worked on 15 years ago and import them into my current setup.

In other respects, I’m like anyone else, in that I’ve been heavily reliant on music software that is no longer supported, and which has been rendered obsolete by seismic changes in Mac processors and operating systems over the years. And the more I invest in software instruments – my current arsenal consists of Logic Studio, Reason 4, and Native Instruments Komplete 6 – the more vulnerable I am to the sudden dissolution of any of the companies that produce them.

Bitheadz Retro AS-1, which I used to refer to as the “Retro-Ass” synth, was one of the earliest consumer-level real-time analogue synth emulators, and it worked pretty well on my 266 MHz PowerMac. I still have the install disk somewhere, which means I could install it on an XP box if I felt the need. Thankfully I don’t feel the need, really, and all I’ve lost is my initial investment of $250 or so – though I was pretty cheesed when these guys went under, without so much as a gurgle. As of now, there’s certainly nothing I needed the Retro-Ass to do that I couldn’t duplicate with Logic’s ES2 or a number of the NI synths. But there passed a few long years during which this was not the case.

Propellerheads RB-338 was from the same era, and emulated the Roland TR-303 bass synth and TR-808 and 909 drum machines. It emulated their user interfaces as well, which had a lot to do with the 303’s idiomatic lines in particular; that interface resulted in a lot of melodies that no one would have come up with first on a bass or a keyboard. It wasn’t quite powerful enough to construct a song on its own, but it laid the groundwork for Reason, which is gradually evolving into a soft-synth based audio workstation with the recent introduction of Record.

Propellerheads did a great and generous thing when they pulled the plug on ReBirth, in that they released a Reason ReFill with all the ReBirth sounds and made it available for a free download. Of course, you no longer had the 303 or the UI. And if you had been downloading the user hacks, which replaced all the sounds in the drum machines with user-created samples, of course you didn’t have those anymore either.

look i still have the manual and everything

Aside from Notator, the music app that I spent the most time in on the Atari was an amazing patch editor/librarian for my Yamaha TG77 called Synthworks SY77, made by Steinberg. The SY/TG77 is a hybrid synth that was both a ROMpler and an FM synth, boasting “Advanced FM” (AFM) synthesis. AFM2 gave you access to not only sine wave operators but more complex op waveforms and even ROM samples as operators, plus resonant digital filters, which was pretty groundbreaking at the time. I amassed a huge collection of sounds for this machine that would have been impossible to create and maintain without Synthworks.

Considering the fact that the Atari had no hard drive, merely an internal DD floppy drive (I had the external floppy drive as well, which made me some kind of power user), 1MB of internal RAM, and an 8MHz processor, Synthworks did a phenomenal job of indexing, retrieving, and comparing over 3,000 patches. But Synthworks was also a powerful editor, giving you intuitive graphic controls for the SY77’s myriad parameters, even allowing you to create FM algorithms that were not available from the front panel of the hardware unit itself. It could also generate random patches based on a selection from the library, or allow you to proportionally mix parameters from up to four separate sounds using a simple point-and-click graphic interface. Neat-o! And while this software hasn’t been supported for over a decade, I still refuse to admit that it’s dead – I still have the software, an Atari, and the hardware dongle, in case I ever decide to fire the TG77 up again.

Stay tuned for part 2, I’m going somewhere with this, honest.

Sorry about those trees, we'll have them cut down immediately.

I have often said, of my day gig in advertising, “If this job is ever difficult, it’s because somebody screwed up.” You might think that’s pretty upbeat coming from me until you realize that only one screw-up has to be signed off on to make an entire campaign, or even a brand, difficult. And sometimes one screw-up is made up of a bunch of tiny, intricate, co-dependent screw-ups. Conversely, one screw-up that happened years ago can continue to resonate in work I have yet to complete. You get it. It’s like that old chaos theory chestnut.

I haven’t worked on either of these brands so I can only guess at what made these ads into a punchline. Many will immediately blame a failure of creative imagination; others might blame the media buyer. My theory is that the guidelines for the brand on the left were cooked up south of the border, and then applied rigorously in a market where a strong local brand presence had already been using the same layout and font for years. The rest is a foregone conclusion. It was practically fate that these two billboards would meet sooner or later.

That’s not to say we couldn’t pick at the execution if we were being churlish. Yeah, that Sensodyne billboard reads like a brief, but that’s pharma for you, for the most part, particularly in a medium where you have fewer than 10 words to get your point across. And I’m sure it’s not the first (or best) headline the creative team came up with. I also imagine this conversation happening somewhere between the creative presentation and final sign-off:

CLIENT: It has to be clear that the person making the statement is an expert. Ideally a dentist.
CREATIVE TEAM: Well, he is wearing a white coat and talking about toothpaste.
CLIENT: I don’t think it’s obvious enough. He could be an OB/GYN. Or a veterinarian.

(If you can’t make out how that particular issue was resolved, click on the image for a closer look.)

My sympathy is not reserved solely for the Sensodyne team. I don’t think making the hippo board would have been that much more fun. The look of Telus ads hasn’t changed appreciably in over 10 years: Creature, check. White background, check. Helvetica Neue, check. Sure, you get to work with a nice clean layout and cute animals. Imagine if writing lolcats was your job! But try having the same thing for lunch every day for a couple of weeks and get back to me. Oh and I almost forgot to mention, try something else for lunch and you’re fired.

I have to thank my wife, who has a keen eye for the absurd, as well as for hippos, for pointing this rather awkward juxtaposition out to me (and photographing it). She also suggested a slight improvement to the Telus billboard, and I have obliged; results are here.

The end of the year is a time for lists, and as I am a writer it only seems natural that my list is about words. And because I am cranky, it is equally natural that my list is about words I don’t like.

To be clear, I am not fascistic about the English language; language is an organic thing that grows and changes over time, and I accept that. I have biases of course, but I will be the first to admit that many of them are subjective. They are, however, well-considered, and difficult to refute without being cursed and derided roundly. And because my intention is not only to deride but to educate, I offer suggestions here that will make your discourse at least as effective, if not more, once you have eliminated the offending words from your vocabulary.

Usability
The shame about this word being on my list is that there’s nothing wrong with it. But we in the business of creating websites and other things people can mess around with on the internets (I’m not going to say “online experiences” because that one narrowly escaped this list and may yet find its way into an addendum) have been using it for a long time now, and too many of the people we’re saying it to still have no idea what we’re talking about. Maybe a new word would help; I’m willing to try anything at this point. Suggested alternative: sense-makingness.

Tout
This word was ruined for me by a hipster creative director who used to come into my office and put his stinky Converse-clad feet up on my desk while we were talking. He is also remembered for unironically uttering the words, while attempting to high-five me, “Come on man, don’t leave me hanging.” Irritating dig-me personalities aside, this word just sounds ugly. And when you use it as a noun, the etymological connotation is of a shill or con man. Is that what you meant to say? I didn’t think so. Suggested alternatives: sell, advertise.

Amuse bouche
I’ve got nothing against dragging non-English words and phrases into your conversation or writing if they actually express something that doesn’t have a precise English equivalent. Ennui, for example, is distinct from mere boredom. The German language has a lot of unique and appropriate compounds like weltschmerz and schadenfreude that you can’t really duplicate in English. But not only does amuse bouche not describe anything that can’t be described equally well in English, it is composed of a couple of words that pretty much any Canadian student learned in grade 4 French class, and so my brain hears “amuse mouth” before it hears “appetizer.” And then my brain becomes angry. Suggested alternatives: appetizer, palate cleanser, taste.

Optics
This is a great example of people trying to use a word in order to sound clever and failing miserably. That’s pretty commonplace in the marketing industry, but the misuse of “optics” has infected the world of journalism, and I suspect PR flackery was the carrier. I don’t have any objection to this word when it appears in its natural habitat. But if you’re saying “the optics aren’t good” and you’re not talking about the kit lens that came with your entry-level DSLR camera, consider my objection lodged, and if you’re lucky it’s not lodged where I’d like it to be. Optics already means something guys, and it’s not what you’re using it for. Suggested alternatives: look, looks. As in “It looks good” or “It doesn’t look good.”

Olympic
I have little to no interest in sport but even if that wasn’t the case I don’t think you could convince me that there aren’t enough world championships already. In fact, if your sport of choice doesn’t have a means of determining who in the world is best at it outside of the Olympics, please consider the possibility that no one really cares. And speaking of not really caring, all the Olympic city selection scandals, bribed judges, boycotts, doping, and sponsorship saturation have pretty much obliterated any recollection of this tradition’s noble and historic origins. Suggested alternatives: None. Do us all a favour and pack it in. Special Olympics get a special dispensation, of course.

Additional suggestions are welcome in the comments.

Heist (2001) is a daunting subject for analysis, as is its writer and director David Mamet. It is an example of what I call “semantic screenwriting,” in that it demonstrates that you can put pretty much any nonsensical line into Gene Hackman’s mouth and tell him to spit it back out as if it is the cleverest thing anyone in the room has heard all day, and people will likely assume that it is in fact a juicy bon mot that they just didn’t get.

This kind of writing makes for very pithy quotes, but take it from someone whose favourite pastime is coming up with his own pithy things to say and then saying them to real live people. My experience in this regard, in particular my familiarity with l’esprit de l’escalier, means that the disbelief I must suspend while watching Mamet is doubly heavy. Firstly, no one talks like that, at least not in real time. Secondly, if people did talk like that, the people they were talking to wouldn’t just nod appreciatively. They’d say, “What are you talking about? That makes no sense.”

That the movie works on this semantic level says a lot about Hackman’s talent (and to a lesser degree that of his co-stars Delroy Lindo, Danny DeVito and perennial Mamet favourite and sometime magician Ricky Jay) and Mamet’s audacity, but little else. And it has been a while since I saw the movie, but I recall Mamet also devotes a lot of screen time to characters discussing how hot the Hackman character’s wife is, and if you know as I think most of us do that the actor playing that part is Mamet’s wife Rebecca Pidgeon, those frequent departures tend to grate on the ear after a while. The fact that Pidgeon’s wooden acting makes your average cigar store Indian look like Alan Arkin doesn’t help matters either.

There is however one real gem in there among the head-scratching non sequiturs – e.g. “Everyone wants money… that’s why they call it money” and “My man is so cool, sheep count him” – and I think it must give fiction writers pause, wondering whether Mamet is offering us a glimpse into his own thought processes. Hackman’s character, Joe, is refuting the D.A.’s assessment of him as a “pretty smart fella.”

JOE: Ah, not that smart.
D.A.: If you’re not that smart, how’d you figure it out?
JOE: I tried to imagine a fella smarter than myself. Then I tried to think, “what would he do?”*

My only support for this argument is that I never gave it so much thought as when I began writing fiction myself, and had to come up with the name of a character whose parents are wildly intelligent and creative people (I have yet to come up with one). The problem will worsen when it comes time to put words in all their mouths. I’ll be in Joe’s position, trying to think of what people who are smarter than I would do.

While I’m at it, I’ll try to think of what kind of things people with really interesting lives might get up to, and what kind of things happen to people who experience awe-inspiring, life-altering events.

Wish me luck.

*This is very reminiscent of another famous Mamet tautology. I have yet to track down an interview in which this exchange actually occurs, but in his book Writing in Restaurants he claims, “People always ask me where I get my ideas. I always tell them that I think of them.”

In the infinite immutable wisdom of millenia upon millenia the human body decided that an appropriate response to hostile viral takeover is to clog all available breathing passages with goo. It’s a good thing buildings don’t evolve, because if they did whenever there was a fire they’d automatically lock all the exits and cut the power. Happy birthday and thanks for nothing Darwin, you bearded freak.

Mike Silverman, a.k.a. That 1 Guy, croaked, slapped, stomped, bowed, looped, laughed and howled his way through a bafflingly under-attended set at the Rivoli last night. Accompanying himself on the Magic Pipe – an electrified 2-string proto-bass cyborg made of articulated piping, sample and loop triggers and a valve that spews smoke when things get really exciting – as well as musical saw and talking boot, T1G treated the somewhat subdued audience to his unique outsider-funk stream-of-consciousness poetry, opening with some remarkably contrabass-like arco work that exploded into the Beefheart/Zappa/Waitsenescent “Weasel Pot Pie”, and continuing on a raucous foot-stomping journey through favourites from his CDs Songs in the Key of Beotch and The Moon is Disgusting and closing with his iconic breakout single “One.” Aside from his obvious rhythmic, musical and lyrical talents, T1G manages to merge digital with electro-acoustic without letting anyone get hung up on the technology. While many contemporary performers wrap themselves in their own loops as if weaving incantations, Silverman’s show is a more organic construction – one tends to focus more on his wide-eyed expressions and the blur of his hands while the arrangements seem to build of their own accord, eventually engulfing the tunes unexpectedly as if in an aural backdraft. It’s a sure sign of a soul-deadening recession or a truly random universe (maybe both) when a show this polished and energetic doesn’t even garner an encore. But a remarkably polite and grateful post-show T1G signed CDs with a toothy grin, already planning to return later this summer.

got comped to the artist’s gala opening of the new AGO tonight. a+++ would visit again. you’re probably not supposed to take pictures of the art.

…on the History Channel. It’s their answer to Shark Week, I suppose. I’ve still managed to avoid both the movie and the book, though I did accidentally read  The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail,  one of whose co-authors appears, dressed like D-Day from Animal House,  in this evening’s greasily compelling conjectumentary Beyond the da Vinci Code. So while I figure out how to create a podcast with my DAW looking like this, I’ll leave you with the brilliant Andrew Maxwell’s review of Dan Brown’s bafflingly popular tome.

The most puzzling thing about this ad is how someone who posesses enough unstupid to be able to successfully post an ad on kijiji doesn’t know how to spell “guitar”, in spite of owning one. Do I know where you can buy a guiter tuner? Aside from a MUSEC STORE, no, I’m effin’ stumped. Though it’s nice to see you’re keeping your options open with respect to digital vs. analog – I gather you’re willing to consider a $10 analogue stroboscopic tuner, or perhaps a tuning fork?