The Barbarians Like to Rock. What is it about Rock and Roll and interactive advertising? I think it’s because the Internet is the new rock and roll. It’s the new punk rock. Kids used to twiddle about on four track recorders and with tape machines and they made music. Now they twiddle about on computers and make music and movies and graphics and doctor photos and rip, mix, burn and sample. We get fan letters. Like musicians get fan letters. Isn’t that weird? No, of course it’s not weird. We all know it.
The first time The Barbarians paid a visit to their first client – Nike – someone on the campus in Beaverton assumed we were a rock band there on some sort of endorsement deal. I suppose no one would make that mistake these days if we sent Jay
The problem, of course, is that the music industry – and you may have heard this – is in a bit of turmoil. So, weirdly, they don’t seem to have quite as much spare cash as, say, global brand managers, to experiment on the web. Weird, isn’t it? So we try and help them out when we can. Let’s all save Rock and Roll.
on March 11, 2010 at 11:21 AM
filed under: Rock and Roll
Big news today!
For the last year, we’ve had the great pleasure of working with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum to redesign their website. It didn’t take more than a second after meeting everyone at the Rock Hall to see that they are extremely passionate about the preservation of rock and roll.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum shares an immersive, interactive experience complete with sound, video, and lights, not to mention all kinds of stuff from your favorite rock and roll artists. The music nerd in all of us wet our collective pants over Mick Jagger’s Union Jack cape (from the Stones’ 81-82 world tour), the larger than life-size photography of Jimmy Page in mid-backbend, or the phone in the Annex’s John Lennon exhibit (if it rings, answer it. Trust me). Rick’s mind was blown by the hand written lyrics to “Love Will Tear Us Apart” by Joy Division, and David Byrne’s original polaroid artwork for the cover of “More Songs About Buildings and Food.”
But all this needed some help translating to the web. That’s where we came to play.
The passion behind the “most powerful art form ever created,” to quote Greg Harris, Rock Hall’s VP of Development, wasn’t translating well in the online world. Static, informational pages dominated the landscape. Media types present in the offline experience were placed sporadically throughout the site. The mission of preservation and education of a legitimate art form wasn’t being fulfilled, and the story of rock wasn’t being told as it should be.
But today – no longer.
The experience design of the new RockHall.com shifts the focus of the site to the content that makes the Museum unique, both in the educational, historically oriented content we create, as well as the information about the museum and its programs. The Rock Hall is actively creating new educational programs, events, exhibits (and so much more), and we needed to capture and translate that online.
on January 06, 2010 at 02:03 PM
filed under: Rock and Roll
Midway through 2009, we got word that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame would be be throwing a huge concert event to celebrate their 25th anniversary. They were understandably secretive about the artist list, so when we got the final bill, our jaws dropped. Stevie Wonder. Aretha Franklin. Simon & Garfunkel performing together. Metallica with Lou Reed and Ray Davies. U2 performing with Bruce Springsteen and Mick Jagger. Woah.
So we got on the ball and built a fitting site. It’s simple and smooth, but packs a lot of content into a small space. It features artist biographies, iTunes playlists hand-picked by the Rock Hall, merchandise, video, and unique artist pages. The show happened back in October, but much of the site is still up at rockhall25.com.
on September 10, 2009 at 06:50 PM
filed under: Rock and Roll
It’s so easy to buy TV media these days even a child can do it. My son Brian spent $2 on Google AdWords to promote his webseries Guitarings (a collaboration with Kyle Gass of Tenacious D) and, after picking his programming schedule and demographic mix, sure enough, on Monday night at 3:19am on Versus, his 30 second TV spot ran, nationally. Haha. Awesome.
Here’s the spot:
I wonder at what point clients are just going to set up an account with Google and make their own media buys?
And ok, so at 24 my son’s not exactly a “child.” But it made for a better opening line to this post.
on August 23, 2009 at 12:07 AM
filed under: Rock and Roll
This is not a work of art, and that’s entirely the point.
I’m a designer. It’s my job to stay fresh, to keep my creative capabilities from growing tired. I love my role at The Barbarian Group, a company in which our motto is to find the bleeding edge of the internet, and see how far and how successfully we can bring out clients towards it. I am proud of every project that has gone out the door that I have worked on, but there is always room to improve. That’s where bitchin’ times that have nothing to do with a paycheck come in. Sometimes, you need to be able to step away from the task at hand and tap into something that client work cannot supply: a lack of purpose.
New rule: Take some time out of every day to step back and create a quick sketch. Experiment. Rock and roll. Open my mind. Keep it fun. Love every minute of it. It’s never going to be a work of art, but it’s always going to be worth it. Hitting reset on your brain from time to time, no matter what it is you do, can be a pretty good idea.
Interested in seeing more? Follow the rest of my daily sketches here
on July 23, 2009 at 12:24 PM
filed under: Rock and Roll
I made a cool music discovery last night. Actually I can’t really take the credit for it as my husband pointed it out to me over a Gossip Girl rerun last night. He is the music snob in the house, I am lucky if I listen to anything besides Dan Zanes these days. Anyway, he showed me this iPhone application that is similar in concept to the site we launched for Getty last year, Moodstream.
It is essentially Moodstream for music and as an iPhone app. Not saying they ripped us off or anything because we can’t claim rights to the use of moods and dials. It just made me recall what I liked so much about the Moodstream concept. It was so simple and elegant that you couldn’t help but play around with it. The same is true for this application from Ghostly International. This might be just what I need to help me explore some music outside of the kiddie world.
on June 12, 2009 at 06:10 PM
filed under: Rock and Roll
Memphis, Tennessee.
Population: 677,272 Climate: Humid, subtropical Nicknames: The River City, The Bluff City, M-Town Water Area: 15.4 sq mi Backpacks: Awesome
Ask any great Memphian (preferably Booker T. Jones) what their city means to them and you will illicit the same response – Music and Backpacks. You can imagine our excitement then when we were presented with the opportunity to work with fūl.
on January 15, 2009 at 01:39 PM
filed under: Rock and Roll
Neko Case is awesome. To promote her new album, she’s asking people to post an MP3 of her new track, People Got a Lotta Nerve. Pretty painless. But Neko sweetens the deal. For every blog that posts the track, Neko and Anti will donate $5 to Best Friends Animal Society. Pretty nice of her. If every Barbarian blogged about it, well, that would be near $500. I’m just saying.
I had the pleasure of meeting Neko once. I was wearing a shirt with a drawing of a dog on it, and she approached me and told me she liked it, and told me about her dog. Stand up lady.
Also, you should really go see her when she tours this Spring. My friends in Crooked Fingers will be opening, and when I saw them open for Neko at Central Park, well, let’s just say it was the best night all summer.
(Also, if you add the song on iLike, they’ll donate $1. Do it.)
on March 11, 2010 at 11:21 AM
