| September 26th, 2005 11:14 AM |
|
|
| Ten Thousand Motels |
By BRAD WHEELER
Monday, September 26, 2005
The Globe & Mail
The sky was clear on an early May day in 2002. Dominating New York's airspace was a brilliant yellow blimp, prominently emblazoned with a giant red tongue and lips. The gaudy dirigible carried the four members of the Rolling Stones, who, after they touched down, announced plans for a North American tour. And the mouth logo? Only the most recognizable rock 'n' roll branding icon in the world.
The Stones lead with their tongue -- inflatable ones, spiked ones and all-different coloured ones. We've seen tongues with Britain's Union Jack, Canada's Maple Leaf and all sorts of national symbols. The logo is found on records and tour paraphernalia, including T-shirts, posters, magnets, key chains, Zippo lighters and baby wear, even.
Fans at this evening's Stones concert at the Rogers Centre in Toronto will see the mid-show inflation of a giant baby-blue tongue and mouth. The emblem's proliferation is rampant, and, in the music world, completely unparalleled.
"It must be the most utilized music logo ever," says Richard Havers, a pop-culture historian and co-author (with Bill Wyman) of Rolling With the Stones. "Early on, logos hadn't been seen as something that was terribly important -- I think the Stones almost fell into using it. The whole idea was to have something for the record label, and it moved out from there."
There is a mysterious air surrounding the tongue's origin. It is commonly believed that the original design came from Andy Warhol, but that is not the case. Warhol did design the album cover for 1971's Sticky Fingers (the first album on Rolling Stones Records), and it was on that record's inner sleeve that the cartoonish lips, teeth and lolling tongue made one of its first appearances. (The album's first single, Brown Sugar, with the B-side Bitch, also carried the new logo.)
But the emblem's creator was John Pasche, then a graphic-design student at the Royal College of Art in London. Mick Jagger had turned up at the college to see Pasche's final degree show, and later the singer asked him to design a symbol for the band's new record label.
"He showed me an image of the Goddess of Kali," says Pasche, now a 60-year-old freelance designer based in London. "That was the starting point to our discussion regarding the design."
A letter from Stones employee Jo Bergman to Pasche, dated April 29, 1970, formally commissioned the piece. "Further to our recent discussions, I would like to confirm that we have asked you to design a poster for the forthcoming European tour by the Rolling Stones. We have also asked you to create a logo or symbol which may be used on note paper, as a programme cover and as a cover for the press book."
Pasche was paid £50 for the design, which took him approximately a week to complete. In 1972 he was paid an additional £200, in recognition of the logo's success, according to Pasche.
"It was immediately popular, and the Stones kept with it over the years," he says. "The concept was to represent the band's anti-authoritarian attitude, Mick's mouth and the obvious sexual connotations. I designed it in such a way that it was easily reproduced and in a style which I thought could stand the test of time.
"To me, it represents one of the strongest and most recognizable logos worldwide, and of course I'm proud of that."
As well he should be, says York University marketing professor Alan Middleton. "It just caught. One of the key things in those early days of the Stones was one, they're the rebels. And two, Mick Jagger's lips. So it exaggerated one of the key aspects of the starring performer, and then it just got repeated over the years."
According to Middleton, the comic embellishment is the key. "That's what you need to do. It needs to be graphically strong, as well as meaningful about whatever the brand or artist is."
There's no doubting the success of the tongue -- fans of the Stones just lap it up -- but the love of the logo extends even beyond the brand. "Bill and I were on a book signing tour in the U.S.," Havers says. "We stopped in at a diner for something to eat, in the middle of nowhere. The girl who was serving us must have been 19 years old, and she had the lip logo tattooed on her arm. The thing of it is, it turns out she hadn't a clue what it meant! We had to laugh."
The gum-smacking Denny's girl is the exception to the rule, and no doubt the Stones are laughing as well. All the way to the bank.
[Edited by Ten Thousand Motels]
[Edited by Ten Thousand Motels] |
| September 26th, 2005 07:33 PM |
|
|
| Soldatti |
Good read, thanks for posting. |
|
