On Branding Bras, Branding Britney, and Branding Balls.
As I got my morning bagel at the café downstairs, the lady that runs the place (it’s a family business) was explaining to me that some of her customers were complaining about the Java Jackets they were distributing with hot coffee. You know-those handy recycled things that keep your hands from getting burnt while holding the paper cup. She gets hers from a company that gives them away for free, and the company puts paid-for advertising on the java jackets, which people walk around with all morning long, but rarely notice, or bother to read.
These java jackets had an ad for Maidenform bras-the words “Simply Smooth” in white on sleek black manned the front of the cup, while two lovely ladies wearing the bras were visible from the chest up on the back of the cup. All in all, you don’t really notice what you are carrying until you get up to the office and realize you are fondling the breasts of two women with your fingers, and hope no one in HR sees you with the java jacket…mindfully turning the cup so that the palm covers the bra bearing women.
“One guy said that a lady in his office found this offensive and told him to get rid of it. He tried, but the coffee was still too hot and burned his hand, so he put the jacket back on and tried to keep it covered. What’s so offensive about a bra? We all wear them! We’ve all seen them!” The lady at the café said.
While I didn’t find it offensive, I could see the point of walking into an office with such a thing…hangin’ all out there for everyone to see. It wouldn’t be office-appropriate to take a bra ad out of a JC Penny catalogue and paste it up in your cube-so walking around sporting a bra ad on your coffee isn’t exactly appropriate either. Which makes me wonder…what was the Java Jacket company thinking? I would assume they got a lot of returns, despite them being free, which would probably make Maidenform angry for having paid for the ads that no one will see.
Which makes me wonder what on earth made Maidenform believe they belonged on my morning coffee anyway…someone’s not controlling the branding. Or are they? That’s the first Maidenform bra I’ve paid attention to in years, let alone remembered seeing and remembered the name of.
Speaking of bras, let’s move on to Ms. Spears, shall we?
One only needs to be reminded of Tom Cruise to understand why Image Consultants are so important to celebrities. Celebrities are a commodity whether we like it or not, and we buy them by their branding. Everybody loved the old Britney in her crotch jockey, dare-me pants, but once she settled down and had children with that…that…THING of a husband, everyone started hyper-criticizing every move she made.
Somewhere, somehow, at some point along the way…Mizz Britney pissed off the wrong person.
Stars like Britney are led in the music business and Hollywood by a team of people seeking to create the ultimate superstar by painstakingly patchworking an image to perfectly mold a face into fame, and immortalizing it forever. It’s called a “formula,” and acts like Primus and Expose were both “formula” acts. (That’s right, I said Primus - Les Claypool himself told me that in an interview I did with him at the University of Maryland many, many years ago-it ain’t hearsay).
You are paired up with other musicians likely to gel well, given an image to uphold, and stylists make you into that image for the world to devour.
From her Disney days, Mizz Britney was dreamed up, dressed, desensitized to her own self-identity, and thus…eventually devoured.
When I say she pissed someone off somewhere along the line - I’m not joking. Someone created that bomb of an act for the VMA’s, someone told her to wear the bra and panties outfit, and someone told her it would be a big hit and revive her career. That someone was lying through his/her teeth.
First of all, the girl isn’t fat by normal standards. Hollywood’s obsession with anorexic wraiths that never consume more than a bean every three hours is just beyond repair. For those horrible creatures to claw at that poor girl after what she’s been through---all poor judgement and poor management aside-is just criminal. To give a mother of two a complex about her weight is deplorable, especially after some stupid image person put her in a bra and panty set that she clearly wasn’t ready to wear. She lacked confidence, energy, and skill-in short, she just wasn’t into it. Who ever pushed that girl onto stage that night, pushed her off a cliff.
Simon Cowell said it best when he said he could remake her into the star she’s born to be, and get her away from her “stupid friends.” I say, give the American Idol folks a shot. They mold people into star images, and they do it every year successfully.
People wonder why Britney could have let herself get into the wrong crowd, or wrong management, or wrong hands (her management company just dumped her like a hot rock, by the way-after poorly giving her what will go down in history as Worst. Come-back. EVER). Thing is, she probably didn’t. She was a kid star, and kid stars are led by adults into adulthood, and become whatever is made of them by an industry seeking to churn out and then burn out celebrities. People wonder why they wind up doing drugs---and where they get them from. Guess how it happens? Some one in their crew hands them a bag of dope and says, “Here, try this. This will wake you up and keep you going through the show, and you’ll be fine again tomorrow.”
Ask any rock star. It’s happened to them. Even the ones that are clean. They’re clean for a reason. (Check out Nikki Sixx’s work on the Heroine Diaries for a good read on that).
I don’t pity Britney Spears, and I don’t want to see her spiral any further downward. I do want to see the assholes get FIRED that she’s been trusting to help her through a difficult battle with addiction, fame, and reviving a dormant (and now possibly dead) career. I do want to see someone who can actually parent show her how to be a good one to her kids, and maybe take them on for a while until she gets through her B.S.
I also think she’s probably never been a child…and hence…is doomed to be one throughout her entire adult life. Does Dr. Phil do celebrity house calls? Can he help Britney?
That said - here’s what I think should have been her come-back performance:
The song “Gimme More,” for one thing, can be expertly choreographed into a fine tango, and it’s a great song. Give the girl some top notch “So You Think You Can Dance” type dance lessons, train her for 6 months on a rigorous schedule…and you’ll see her drop down to her fighting weight again in no time. Doll her up in a sexy, fringe and rhinestone bedazzled tango dress, keep the fishnets, add spiked heels and 5 hot tangueros to the act and WHAMMO! Sexy, hot, amazing come-back ala Madonna-like performance standards. It would have kicked ass. Somebody get that girl a dance partner, and a gardenia for her hair.
Even I could make her a star.
Speaking of stars…I’ve been reading about Marc Echo contemplating launching that Barry Bonds 756 home run ball into space, but not before branding it with an * to denote his steroid use. Bonds replied rather publicly that he was stupid for paying $752k for the ball, and even more stupid for considering launching it into space. Marc Echo in turn has opted to make him a t-shirt that says, “Marc Echo paid $752, 467 for my ball, and all I got was this ‘stupid’ T-shirt.” Hahahahahahahah. I heart Marc Echo.
These java jackets had an ad for Maidenform bras-the words “Simply Smooth” in white on sleek black manned the front of the cup, while two lovely ladies wearing the bras were visible from the chest up on the back of the cup. All in all, you don’t really notice what you are carrying until you get up to the office and realize you are fondling the breasts of two women with your fingers, and hope no one in HR sees you with the java jacket…mindfully turning the cup so that the palm covers the bra bearing women.
“One guy said that a lady in his office found this offensive and told him to get rid of it. He tried, but the coffee was still too hot and burned his hand, so he put the jacket back on and tried to keep it covered. What’s so offensive about a bra? We all wear them! We’ve all seen them!” The lady at the café said.
While I didn’t find it offensive, I could see the point of walking into an office with such a thing…hangin’ all out there for everyone to see. It wouldn’t be office-appropriate to take a bra ad out of a JC Penny catalogue and paste it up in your cube-so walking around sporting a bra ad on your coffee isn’t exactly appropriate either. Which makes me wonder…what was the Java Jacket company thinking? I would assume they got a lot of returns, despite them being free, which would probably make Maidenform angry for having paid for the ads that no one will see.
Which makes me wonder what on earth made Maidenform believe they belonged on my morning coffee anyway…someone’s not controlling the branding. Or are they? That’s the first Maidenform bra I’ve paid attention to in years, let alone remembered seeing and remembered the name of.
Speaking of bras, let’s move on to Ms. Spears, shall we?
One only needs to be reminded of Tom Cruise to understand why Image Consultants are so important to celebrities. Celebrities are a commodity whether we like it or not, and we buy them by their branding. Everybody loved the old Britney in her crotch jockey, dare-me pants, but once she settled down and had children with that…that…THING of a husband, everyone started hyper-criticizing every move she made.
Somewhere, somehow, at some point along the way…Mizz Britney pissed off the wrong person.
Stars like Britney are led in the music business and Hollywood by a team of people seeking to create the ultimate superstar by painstakingly patchworking an image to perfectly mold a face into fame, and immortalizing it forever. It’s called a “formula,” and acts like Primus and Expose were both “formula” acts. (That’s right, I said Primus - Les Claypool himself told me that in an interview I did with him at the University of Maryland many, many years ago-it ain’t hearsay).
You are paired up with other musicians likely to gel well, given an image to uphold, and stylists make you into that image for the world to devour.
From her Disney days, Mizz Britney was dreamed up, dressed, desensitized to her own self-identity, and thus…eventually devoured.
When I say she pissed someone off somewhere along the line - I’m not joking. Someone created that bomb of an act for the VMA’s, someone told her to wear the bra and panties outfit, and someone told her it would be a big hit and revive her career. That someone was lying through his/her teeth.
First of all, the girl isn’t fat by normal standards. Hollywood’s obsession with anorexic wraiths that never consume more than a bean every three hours is just beyond repair. For those horrible creatures to claw at that poor girl after what she’s been through---all poor judgement and poor management aside-is just criminal. To give a mother of two a complex about her weight is deplorable, especially after some stupid image person put her in a bra and panty set that she clearly wasn’t ready to wear. She lacked confidence, energy, and skill-in short, she just wasn’t into it. Who ever pushed that girl onto stage that night, pushed her off a cliff.
Simon Cowell said it best when he said he could remake her into the star she’s born to be, and get her away from her “stupid friends.” I say, give the American Idol folks a shot. They mold people into star images, and they do it every year successfully.
People wonder why Britney could have let herself get into the wrong crowd, or wrong management, or wrong hands (her management company just dumped her like a hot rock, by the way-after poorly giving her what will go down in history as Worst. Come-back. EVER). Thing is, she probably didn’t. She was a kid star, and kid stars are led by adults into adulthood, and become whatever is made of them by an industry seeking to churn out and then burn out celebrities. People wonder why they wind up doing drugs---and where they get them from. Guess how it happens? Some one in their crew hands them a bag of dope and says, “Here, try this. This will wake you up and keep you going through the show, and you’ll be fine again tomorrow.”
Ask any rock star. It’s happened to them. Even the ones that are clean. They’re clean for a reason. (Check out Nikki Sixx’s work on the Heroine Diaries for a good read on that).
I don’t pity Britney Spears, and I don’t want to see her spiral any further downward. I do want to see the assholes get FIRED that she’s been trusting to help her through a difficult battle with addiction, fame, and reviving a dormant (and now possibly dead) career. I do want to see someone who can actually parent show her how to be a good one to her kids, and maybe take them on for a while until she gets through her B.S.
I also think she’s probably never been a child…and hence…is doomed to be one throughout her entire adult life. Does Dr. Phil do celebrity house calls? Can he help Britney?
That said - here’s what I think should have been her come-back performance:
The song “Gimme More,” for one thing, can be expertly choreographed into a fine tango, and it’s a great song. Give the girl some top notch “So You Think You Can Dance” type dance lessons, train her for 6 months on a rigorous schedule…and you’ll see her drop down to her fighting weight again in no time. Doll her up in a sexy, fringe and rhinestone bedazzled tango dress, keep the fishnets, add spiked heels and 5 hot tangueros to the act and WHAMMO! Sexy, hot, amazing come-back ala Madonna-like performance standards. It would have kicked ass. Somebody get that girl a dance partner, and a gardenia for her hair.
Even I could make her a star.
Speaking of stars…I’ve been reading about Marc Echo contemplating launching that Barry Bonds 756 home run ball into space, but not before branding it with an * to denote his steroid use. Bonds replied rather publicly that he was stupid for paying $752k for the ball, and even more stupid for considering launching it into space. Marc Echo in turn has opted to make him a t-shirt that says, “Marc Echo paid $752, 467 for my ball, and all I got was this ‘stupid’ T-shirt.” Hahahahahahahah. I heart Marc Echo.