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Pet projects: a glimpse at some of adland’s extracurricular activities

Creative types are restless and often entrepreneurial souls so, once they’ve finished harnessing their powers to sell more baked beans, they often head home to focus on their own projects. Here are three we’ve noticed recently from Cleve Cameron, Chris Williams and Jacqui Lockington. 

Space oddity

 

The Beop, a band claiming to be from the 7th dimension that performs “a style of cosmic-chant-pop sometimes referred to as neo-zonky-jitt” and includes band members Zozzi the Zozz on the Hairy-tailed Jippet, Sister Dep on The Phrove, and Uncle Doog delivering the beats on the Rhythmo-Pole 27t, was recently named as a finalist in the electronic category of the John Lennon Songwriting Contest in New York for its song ‘We Are OK‘. And JWT’s executive creative director Cleve Cameron, who kicked things off for the group in 2005 when he wrote Beop! A fable of hope, is currently running a campaign on Kickstarter to raise funds for the band’s first-ever live show.  

The show will be performed in a specially constructed portal in Auckland, with the exact location and date to be revealed in the coming months. And while there’s a degree of secrecy around the members of the band so as not to ruin the inter-dimensional thrill, the Kickstarter page shows that there are some fairly impressive names behind it (just don’t tell the kids). 

The funding will be used to create a condensed ‘prototype’ version of the full-length live show (specifically building a portal that allows Beop to appear in this dimension, bringing the instruments to life and marketing the show, including a short video ‘rockumentary’). 

As it says: 

Beop – short for be-optimistic – is an idea for the kids of the digital age, otherwise bombarded with the fears and stresses of the world. With the proliferation of screens of all sizes, the live experience has become one of real energetic transfer. 

The Beop show will be an electrifying theatrical experience packed with eye-zapping, hi-tech, special effects, stadium sized sing-a-long songs, dancers, laughs and big electronic dance grooves. 

At this stage, just $325 has been pledged towards the goal of $12,648, so there’s a wee way to go yet. But if you want to help get these inter-dimensional good buzz-bringers to Earth, fork it over.  

In keeping with its fairly fruity philosophy, www.thebeop.com, which was made by Resn, was a runner-up at the Webby’s for weird website and topped the European Design Charts when it was launched. 

Life is a highway

In keeping with The Beop’s musical theme, although in a far more traditional sense, King St’s Chris Williams has spent five years writing, composing and developing a musical called State Highway 48 and the curtains are set to open in July.

“State Highway 48 is a musical based on the journey of middle-age,” says the blurb. “It tackles a lot of the issues we face as we navigate the road of middle-age, while giving us a few reminders of the important things in life. It’s raw and real with lots of laughter and a few tears.”

  • Here’s Williams being interviewed by The Hits. 

Williams has worked in the creative field all his career. Over this time he has developed his skills in writing, music and composition. He has written many songs over the last six-seven years and produced an album ‘Looking for a Song’ under his performing name, Middleman, in 2010

“I was playing my piano one night and developed a riff that to me was more of a TV show than a song,” he says. “Then I thought it felt perhaps more like the theme for a musical. So I said to myself, ‘I think I’ll write a musical now’. The rest, as they say, is history.” 

Rehearsals are now under way and there will be four performances at Hamilton’s Clarence St Theatre on July 10, 11 and 12. This includes one matinee on the 12th.

  • Find out more about the show and buy your tickets here

Hindsight is a wonderful thing

When Jacqui Lockington (right) isn’t running accounts, she’s raising two kids, recording podcasts and writing blogs with her parenting partner in crime, Natalie Cutler-Walsh. And now the pair have just released a new book called If Only They’d Told Me, “a comic look at parenting and all the things you wish people had told you about having children”. 

Between them they had different views, different material and a whole host of stories on parenting that they wanted to share (while Cutler Walsh is “​organised chaos”, Lockington is a complete neat freak, who can’t leave the house without the dishes being done, has an addiction to high-street stores, was pregnant in heels and is disposable nappies all the way”). So they decided to help other mums and dads who were struggling with a blog/podcast site, If Only They’d Told Me (so far they’ve had over 45,000 downloads of their podcast and have over 170 blogs under their belts). 

Lockington, who worked at Colenso BBDO for seven years, Y&R for one year and has been at the The Collective for one-and-a-half years, co-wrote the book in the evenings while working during the day. So, not surprisingly, there are a few well-known ad folk who pop up in the book (it details Lockington’s pregnancy while working at Colenso, so ‘Roger’ makes an appearance). 

The book is now available through Whitcoulls, Paper Plus and on Amazon.com. And its first print run sold out. 

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