It is manna to anyone with a creative bent and a sense of curiosity and invention – of looking at things differently.

During his career as a newspaper cartoonist – his legacy was his ‘invention cartoons’ where he looked at inventing incredibly elborate machine inventions to perform simple tasks such as pencil sharpening, or washing windows, avoiding bill collectors, peeling apples, putting toothpaste on a toothbrush. He was about creative problem solving in unconventional ways and having a lot of fun in the process .

Since his passing in 1970, his creative approach has continued to be celebrated in the form of his postcard format book called the “Rube Goldberg’s Inventions”.

IN essence these inventions over engineer very simple tasks in a very very complex fashion and usually features a series of chain reactions.

The Perdue Univeristy, Indiana USA, started the annual Rube Goldberg Machine Contest (RGMC) in 1987 and the results have been creatively intriguing and always entertaining in terms of human ingenuity. The name of the game is to solve a problem in the MOST CONVOLUTED AND COMPLICATED MANNER POSSIBLE.

Now when you to take this Goldberg approach and mesh it with a very creative and quirky musical group OK GO – the result is a masterful visual and audible event. Memorable and fun.

OK Go’s song This Too Shall Pass” and it’s Rube Goldberged all the way. Enjoy.

Hope you enjoyed that as much as we did.

Of course this is not the first time this musical group have delivered on a memorable video clip experience.

A previous music clip, very very simple in execution and concept, was superbly delivered on the back of some fabulous choregraphy using treadmills. The clip is called “Here It Goes Again”.

Just fabulous… Rube Goldberg and OK Go… fantastic. The applications within the special event environment in terms of team building, in regards to stage showcraft, out-of-the-box thinking and creative innovation is wide ranging and excites the heck out of the FACTOR168 team and never fails to recharge our mojo.

Now for some Goldberg trivia.

Some Goldberg trivia – Rube Goldberg’s machine inventions were the inspiration for the much loved classic board game “Mouse Trap“. Compare his artwork, compare the board game… yeah, you can see it too huh?

PLUS in 1931 the Merriam-Webster dictionary adopted the word “Rube Goldberg” as an adjective defined as accomplishing something simple through complex means.

Source Notes: More on the creative world of Rube Goldberg and for more music got to OK GO.

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Options and combinations. Endless sides. Huge laminated menus. But thankfully they all shared a common trait – they were all unimaginatively literal. They detailed exactly what was in the meal to the exclusion of everything else. And that’s mighty handy for a traveler half out of her mind with roadtrip candy and cola.

America is the land of choice. No doubt about it. When I visit for business and pleasure, I always try to make time to spend sometime walking the floors of their supermarkets like Winn-Dixie or Vons. The long cabinets packed full of every different type of ice cream flavor possibly imagined. It leaves me gob-smacked and disgruntled by my poor excuse for a diary aisle back home.  Our chocolate and beer is far superior. There is that.

A personal favorite is the more upmarket (eye of the beholder) and the seemingly more personal service offered by Trader Joe’s. Love their little hand written menu suggestions, in-store product reviews, and a selection of cute shop-boys hard at it.

The thick paper bags in the West Hollywood store are so retro cute. They make me feel so much greener while I over consume  – well more so than my normal plastics. And they sound great when you crumple the tops up as you walk.

Anyway back on message – Americans are a lot of things, good and not so good, and one of them is that they are literal. They say it how it is. They are not shy about coming forward and spelling it out. Unlike say the French… sure they always sound cool and exotic in their accented English but really… what are they really saying? So… obscure.

And I suspect that as a nation the French share a limited appreciation for a massive range of diary confectionery goods to choose from. A vast wine or cheese selection? Sure. The French love it. Mint Ribbon Ice Cream with Pralines… nope. Only us Australians and Americans there… the English? Most probably still in the pub eating salt and vinegar Walker Crisps and nursing a pint of something warm that may with care and refrigeration resemble beer. Gross generalization but there you have it.

Sometimes being literal yields the most unexpected results. Rather than the extended song and dance… just ask for the sale… wondering – just ask her/him out. Unhappy? They’ll never know unless you literally spell it. Just as importantly – happy? Then literally tell someone… tell everyone.

The guys and gals from Dustfilms agree and have recreated some really funny results from their compact series of ‘literal videos’.

Drawing on their personal music video favorites (they are without a doubt Gen X), they have remastered them with ‘literal’ lyrics to match the video clip.

Sure – it is a little hit and miss.The Billy Idol rendition of ‘White Wedding’ isn’t so hot.However the following clip from Tears for Fears featured below is a clear winner. Enjoy.

* Check out the old card filing system in this video. Yes Virginia – their really was a world before the world wide web and ‘puters. Entire libraries were full of paper books with covers and woven spines, and ka-thousands of index cards and heavy date stampers to manage them all.

Take an electronic leaf out of the kindle book – and just say it how it is. What you want, what you expect, what you like, what you don’t. And hopefully there will be someone who will be listening and care – like we do…. and perhaps the cute guys at Trader Joe’s.  Literally speak and listen.

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Some were voted because of significant popular culture reasons – like Jackson’s performance of Billie Jean at the Motown celebrations. This was the performance that introduced the world to the moonwalk and that glove. And of course it is an outstanding pop song with it’s driving baseline.

Love it almost as much as Smooth Criminal which introduced the anti-gravity foot lean dance movement. Sheer entertainment musically and visually that put many of it’s contemporaries of the time to shame. I’m talking about you Van Halen.

Others were unanimously nominated because they are plain and simple fabulous songs. Notably two of his earlier hits fall into this category -  Rock with You and Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough.

He was a very handsome man back then – young, black smiling, and with a ‘softness’.

Other songs were considered very good but the larger than life big budget of Black and White pushed it up the rankings and crowned Jackson as the undisputed Pop King of music video blockbusters.

You’ll note some songs didn’t make our top 5. Notably Thriller and Bad.

Sure – they were better than okay, sensational production values, and those group dance moves were something else buuuuut… well over time they didn’t seem to hold up on their own merits as well as the less ‘flashy’ efforts from Jackson. And Man in the Mirror and Dirty Diana were considered way too creepy, even for us fragile souls.

The number one track was selected because of it’s timeless quality, it’s sheer energy and groove, and as event professionals we well know that if you ever want to fill a dance floor quickly or lighten the mood – cue this track. It is our favorite.

The Top 5 Michael Jackson Songs

Number 5. Rock With You (1979)

4. Black or White (1990)

Number 3. Billie Jean (1982)

Number 2. Smooth Criminal (1987)

Number 1. Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough (1979)

SPECIAL MENTION goes to one of the best live performances with Jackson performing at the American NFL Superbowl with a ‘medley’ of his hits.

and in keeping with the Top 5 list – the best of The Jackson 5 with Michael up front.  “Blame It on the Boogie” (1978)

With thanks -Lean-to Image from Wikipedia, Rock with You courtesy of DailyMotion.com, Black and White from MetaCafe.com, Billie Jean from French site Wat.tv, Don’t Stop Till You Drop from MySpace Video, and all others from… you guessed it… Youtube.com.

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In addition to the to-camera confession and apology made by Vanilla Ice (posted here)we have also come across a number of other clips that were employed in the developing storyline for this campaign. We thought we’d share them with you.

The first documents Mr Ice wandering the streets of Florida… I suspect it may in fact be Fort Lauderdale rather than Miami as he lives there… just a bit of trivia. Could be handy in the future. Or not. Look this clip is a bit soft but I guess it gets the point across and helps build momentum.

The second better clip is a compile of Mr Ice seemingly ringing people randomly out of a telephone directly and apologizing to them… although some unkind people have suggested that he was just calling all twenty odd genuine fans.  This is not true people. Vanilla Ice has many a fan… and some have telephones.  Actually I like this one of the two as it seems less staged even though it clearly is.

We’ve employed a similar technique of story building with a number of different ‘developing’ clips as event invitation teasers and as a featured developing story revealed throughout an event run itself. This technique is very effective in providing a recognizable thematic thread to an event. It is effective in restating an events core messaging, and in turn proves effective in building on a shared event memory and ongoing event experience well after the event proper has concluded .

FACTOR168 recently employed with great success this technique with a ‘Jason Bourne’ theme for an overseas telecommunications company event series. The story documented a ‘teleco operative’ in search of his organizational identity within a harsh and unforgiving competitive world.

Atmospheric, layered, and entertaining. The story featured an ensemble cast of professional actors, industry ‘star’ cameos, and host organizational identities.

For a greater 360 degree immersive event experience, this strong tie-in theme was employed within the digital and print invitations, themeing the event environment and catering, featured within to-screen support material, soundtracks and musical stings, speaker programming, registration process, room drops and gifts, and satellite social events. The end result was an enhanced attendee participation and 100% post event messaging recall.

And finally… so as to wrap up this commentary on what was in our considered opinion a brilliant event marketing campaign by Virgin Mobile, and disturbingly now seems to have evolved into a creepy fan inspired homage to Vanilla Ice – here is an interview between one of those cookie cutter entertainment reporters apparently living ‘backstage’ and the Iceman.He talks about his career and a forthcoming televised celebrity rodeo (what the heck? Yup <sigh> only in America I guess).

Oh and look out for his freestyle rapping at the conclusion of the interview which just goes to prove that investing wisely is a very very good thing to do. Which got me to wondering how much money if any did he really get from this record… I recall a story about him being forced to sign away all royalties to Suge Knight or be tossed out a window… anyway…

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It appears a lot of people have been hooked and the website appears to have taken on a life of it’s own as more bands/songs are nominated for a swift innocence or guilty verdict.

It has actually evolved into a rather fun website to be honest. And now features added dimensions including a top ten listing of ‘wrong’ which makes for curious reading.

Although the top ten is forever in a start of flux, I think most reasonable lovers of ‘pop’ music wouldn’t question the inclusion of people like Paris Hilton, David Hasselhoth, and leading the pack is the truly dreadful Fast Food Rocket who I think Australia may have been spared from as it was the first time I had seen or heard them… as horrible as it was.

Oh and the sickly sweet Jonas Brothers and all their songs make the list. Clearly with this last act, the tweens haven’t found this site yet.

Personally I thought the inclusion of Milli Vanilli was a bit rough and a bit of a ‘free kick’ as I rather like many of their songs. Sure – the two ‘faces’ of the band didn’t actually sing or contribute to them in a musical sense but set that aside for a moment… the songs themselves were good. I stand by this people.

The top ten also seems to have thrown up an awful lot of product… I mean songs from the ‘noughties’. Is this because Generation Y’s musical memory doesn’t extend back more than a decade or is it because this decade has really witnessed rampant out of control celebrity-mania. Maybe I’m getting old.

Having said that Milli Vanilli is a noughties exception as the boys from the one hit wonders ‘Right Said Fred’. I’d actually argue that although it was their only hit, it was a cracker in terms of being a bona fide dance floor filler. I cast my vote as being innocent. It appears that makes three of us now.

Seriously – this song appears to be a special event standard expected of all DJ’s toiling their skills at corporate gala dinners and it has certainly competed with “Eye of the Tiger” as a soundtrack of choice for all those sales incentive kickoff videos. Most are okay, some are very smart and funny, and those made in-house are most often simply appalling. People – I beg of you, get your event management company to handle this video along with everything else. It’s for the best.

And now ladies and gents, for those who like myself can’t help but stroll down memory lane in your baggy Turkish silk parachute pants, here is the track that kicked off this websites hunt for those guilty of music crimes – the original ‘Ice Ice Baby’ version courtesy of PPGTV.

Note: This kinda goes without saying but all rights are reserved and remain with the owners of any video clips and images that may be used for illustrative purposes.So support our creatives and buy in this case a Vanilla Ice product. At least once. And then gift it as part of Secret Santa later in the year.

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Smart, brave, savvy, edgy, timely and consistent with the cultivation and management of their brand personality. This time, Virgin Mobile have stepped forward with a fabulous cross-medium event marketing idea. Nice one.

The idea has crystallized itself in a carefully engineered popculture ‘movement’ called Right Music Wrongs – which neatly dovetails into the Virgin Mobile branded V Festival.

When you have a precious spare moment, check out the super short manifesto on their website and the entire rational becomes… well crystal clear.

For those that are happy to take my word for it -in a nutshell, Virgin Mobile argues that music should not be about quantity, as in how many tens of thousands of MP3 tracks you own but rather how good your tracks are. And of course it may all come down to personal tastes and preference. And this is best illustrated by those musical hits that have sold in the gazillions (which is a lot even on Duran Duran’s Planet Earth) of copies but the question posed is – does quantity equal good?

Bands with their songs are put forward by the readership of the website and the faithful are invited to review each candidate and determine whether they are indeed guilty or innocent… of musical crimes against humanity I’m guessing.

But I digress. What this website has done for Virgin Mobile so effectively is squarely targeted its youthful, tech-savvy, and opinionated target demographic. In establishing the website, there was a progress marketing strategy of raising the profile and participation of the website through a mix of advertising mediums and starring one of the most famous of potentially guilty one hit stars.

The ‘star’ engaged to kick off this campaign was the high recognition (and I suspect relatively cheap) and some say cringe worthy world’s ‘first’ white rapper Vanilla Ice with his global hit “Ice Ice Baby”.

The Virgin Mobile guys and gals brilliantly reinvented him as a cause célèbre of epic proportions as means of activating their audience. Seems to have worked.

People flocked to the website to cast their ancient Roman inspired thumbs up or thumbs down… and much to the surprise of everyone, Australia declared Vanilla Ice innocent of all charges. A masterstroke in their campaign was to have the forgiven Vanilla Ice come out of ‘retirement’ (although I can reveal that he wasn’t actually that retired or retiring… I saw him in of all places a Hong Kong nightclub performing two years prior… very odd) and star… well contributed a featured performance at Virgin’s proprietary music gathering – V Festival.

Below is one of the successful video clip trailers featuring Vanilla Ice seeking forgiveness for his popculture crimes and inviting people to cast their votes at the website (oh and kinda slowly slowly be indoctrinated into a Virgin Mobile world). He apologizes…well for pretty much everything, all the while his instantly recognizable track is beating in the background. Product and brand awareness raised, traffic was strong to the campaign website.

I voted innocent and I still love this song to this very day… yes i know. I also like MC Hammer so there you have it. Oh shush. Check out the homepage and my vindication with the majority judgment of his innocence. Yay… curse you Virgin Mobile, I’m getting hooked! Word!

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Consider this if you are in anyway fragile, remotely prudish, or just not too keen on the French or watching people walking a lot.

For the rest of us – here is a great music track with a catchy driving beat and addictive chant like lyrics supported by a very simple concept and memorable vision.

In brief – a series of girls take turns striding down a series of streets in Paris, relieving each other relay style with Dylan-esque lyrics repeatedly masking out their genitals. Okay then.

Sure sure there is a certain degree of titillating shock value to be found here I guess but I’d counter that in this day and age… it isn’t actually all that shocking. Just enough ‘shock’ I’d imagine to ensure it reaches a global audience. The fundamentals of viral marketing appear to be all ticked here (let’s face it – this very post is testimony to this) ensuring a greater enhanced profile for this band.

As evidenced by their extensive touring now being undertaken it seems to be working out just fine for them… and having good music in my humble opinion certainly can’t hurt.

Artistically there is a lot to like about this project. It’s smart and simple.

And I love the effortlessly smooth transitions the ladies perform between each other. To be honest, I didn’t even see the first relief girl enter the scene until her dress came up.

From a purely commercial point of view, what I really love about this project is that for a relatively modest budget outlay – an allocation for a camera mounted vehicle or motorbike (or even a scooter), talent fees, and a reasonable block of edit time, this almost no-cost exercise has delivered a great result with huge ongoing potential for the band.

It is fair to say that this particular approach is not for everyone or for every business. But this notion of creating a strong vibe through an experiential event staged within the public arena is well worth considering for some.

It can certainly ensure media coverage. It can generate genuine word of mouth buzz  around the brand or product. It can seriously elevate profiles through the ‘compounding magic’ of viral electronic marketing.

A number of things to be mindful of in considering this style of experiential marketing. Safety above all else.

If staged in the public space and your undertaking a guerrilla approach like this clip – then speed and surprise are everything. If not, expect to either be shut down very quickly or even worse – public reactions may be much more studied and contrived and let’s face it this isn’t so hot. Forced moments invariably consign video productions to the edit suites as a ‘fix-it-in-the-edit’ casualty. Suddenly there’s CGI everywhere and a budget bled out all over the floor.

Other elements to consider are -a practical budget and a strong sense of what is ‘appropriate’ and what isn’t in terms of general public sensibilities and brand identity.

You’ll also need a seasoned experiential events partner to help produce, navigate, and execute the project at hand to ensure maximum value and impact is achieved from the ‘moment’.  Of course, above all else, you and your organization will need to demonstrate courage and conviction.

The music clip is not so surprisingly called “Baby Baby Baby” and is courtesy of the bands myspace website – Make the Girl Dance

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Some of us have lucky socks or undies, perhaps a handful of sunflower seeds… or a jangly keyring doo-dad…a single well worn poker chip… you know what I mean. Lucky stuff. Just to be sure.

One of our founding creatives, Darren Kerr, has a very odd ‘lucky’ practice he harbours when delivering a special event. Once he has conducted his Q2Q rehearsals, done his site walk through, greeted and briefed speakers and talent alike, and ensured everything is as it should be … he feels the need to play his lucky track through the room’s PA before he is content and good to ‘go-for-doors’… that track is “Funky Town”.

Importantly – we are not talking about the classic Lipps Incorporated 1970′s disco hit version but rather the 1980′s cover version by Aussie synth band Pseudo Echo.

We suspect it is the ‘funky’ Korg keyboard slung over the shoulder that seems to appeal most. In fact he loves the track so much he has attempted to book the band a number of times for clients eager for a really fun ’80′s themed retro event… thankfully he has so far been thwarted by the FACTOR168 good taste style police. He has however successfully engaged other ’80′s musical warriors such as ‘Air Supply’ so you can’t win them all. Oh dear.

‘Funky Town’ fast approaches. Strap in.

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This video ‘mash’* has creatively cut together a number of period Jazz musicians together and married them to a funky psychedelic soundtrack. The results are great. Love it.

This sense of taking the old and reinventing with a fresh new take is very liberating and can be applied to all sorts of things. Reinvent a product or a service, perhaps a business process or even a brand identity – I suspect most things could do with a thorough ‘mashing’ from time to time.

A great ‘mash’ opportunity is the much loved and anticipated ‘happy-faces’ event video clips we are often asked to produce and run at the conclusion of incentive styled events. A ‘mashed’ approach could work really well here. But of course like most things, be mindful not to over do it as the impact of this stylized effect can be lost or become…well… annoying.

* This videoclip is apparently called a ‘mashup’.

I wasn’t sure what this was but have been reliably informed it is a technique where as number of different data sources are are brought together to produce an integrated result that was not the original reason for producing the raw source data.

Ummm okay… so ‘mashing’ is where a collection of video images are edited together as a running montage to a cool soundtrack…. new words old meanings. Man do I feel old.

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In an office poll – his recent marathon effort “Australia” with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman was declared to have sucked the big one for being too self indulgent and long. And yet – everyone loves and admits to owning a copy of the iconic “Strictly Ballroom” starring a very young Paul Mercurio.

His other two efforts are also either adored or loathed -  “Moulin Rouge” again with Nicole and a strangely cast Ewan McGregor, and “Romeo+Juliet” with a pre-Titanic Leo DiCaprio and the Gwyneth Paltrow double, Claire Danes.

For myself personally, I can’t help but feel that Baz isn’t so much a great storyteller or a fabulous film director but rather his is a uniquely visioned cinematic stylist. His films are all stamped equally with the rich visual dimensions of his visual signature. Interestingly his partner in crime and wife Catherine Martin, is a three time Oscar nominee and a winner on two occasions for…. you guess it – costume design and art direction. Hmmm.

In any case – Baz (and or his muse Catherine) illustrate well practised artistic skills in re-visioning and re-packaging. Skills that are central to good business theatre practices. To take the familiar and the pre-existing in terms of set performances and audience expectations, and to revision (or as our Disney friends are want to say – reimagnieering) these elements into a newer, fresher and more impactful experience.

“Moulin Rouge” and “Romeo+Juliet” are both very good cases in point.

The well known Shakespeare story of forbidden love is expertly placed into more contemporary settings while “Moulin Rouge” draws heavily on the Toulouse Lautrec inspired historical Parisian setting threading musical sequences laced with distinctive and iconic pop music lyrics. I can assure you it was not just Ewan McGregor who appeared a little perplexed at this… but it worked. Which is a forced segway to today’s show and tell moment.

This music clip was employed at the time of the “Moulin Rouge” film as a great cross-platform promotional effort and what a great effort it was. Taking on a classic 1970’s dance floor hit “Lady Marmalade” by Labelle – this refreshed version starred the four biggest popstars at the time – Christina Aguilera, Lil’Kim, Mya, and the FACTOR168 fav’ Pink.

The results: a great musical cover version, a great cross-promotional experience, strong Baz inspired visuals, and a collection of distinctive thumbnail personalities presented by the girls. Not surprisingly – we’ve designed similar “Lady Marmalade” experiences and delivered them within the event context. Taking affectionately memorable moments and artfully redesigning them into even more powerful updated experiences. Good fun for all.

Enjoy the clip and the sisters in action!

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