The Case For Forced Creativity
I never gave myself a deadline for this post. I had the idea to write about this notion of “Forced Creativity” for two weeks.
It marinated. It went nowhere.
Today I said, I’ll write this before 11am.
This is forced creativity.
Forced Creativity came up recently when my buddy Glenn Sanders wrote about our old TBWA\Chiat\Day process called, “5×5’s.” That creative process? When you’re on an assignment, come up with 5 ideas by 5 o’clock. And share it with your creative director.
My friend Nancy Tag, who runs the successful integrated communications program (BIC) at City College, liked Glenn’s article. In fact, she liked the 5×5 process so much she had the two of us guest lecture at one of her graduate classes.
Her students needed inspiration and, more importantly, they needed to breakthrough their self-consciousness and produce in volume. After all, the secret to getting to a good idea is to have a lot of ideas.
Speaking of having a lot of ideas, my pal George Tannenbaum is the poster boy for forced creativity. He’s writes a blog post every day and posts it on LinkedIn. That’s his forced deadline: A post a day. Some of his posts are brilliant. Some are merely good. Some are foul balls — and he would know. He hit plenty of them as a player for the Seraperos de Saltillo in the Mexican Baseball League. (It’s something you will read about should you read his blog, “Ad Aged.”)
All of which brings me to The Dandy Warhols. I was listening to a recent podcast featuring Courtney Taylor-Taylor, the leader and main songwriter of the indie band.
Courtney told the interviewer about an experiment he was doing.
He calls it “Fast Friday.”
It goes like this: He writes a song a week. He gets the band together to produce it with a video. And then they upload it to YouTube and all of the Dandy’s social channels.
He calls these “30 Second Songs.” And for the most part that’s what they are. No less than 30 seconds in length. Rarely much more than a minute.
Courtney Taylor-Taylor refers to this project as a kind of journaling. The songs capture where he is at a given moment. What he’s seeing? Thinking. Feeling.
Some of these “30 Second Songs” are exuberant. Some thoughtful. Some political.
And as far as quality is concerned, the quantity has yielded some excellent ones. There are also some clinkers.
The point is he creates them. Each Friday.
Production without preciousness.
More fuzz guitar. Less fuss.
As Courtney says, “It’s become…sometimes frustrating, sometimes cathartic, sometimes…just a nuisance. But it’s always satisfying.”
I’ve listened to and watched all 56 of these “Fast Friday” videos. I’m no A&R man, but I’ve heard at least 15 gems that, further developed, would make for a wonderful new album.
There is inspiration and learning here.
So often we are “waiting for inspiration.”
Well, I’ve got news for you. Inspiration takes her own sweet time.
As an advertising person or communications professional, you don’t have time to wait for a muse. If anything, you have to be your own source of inspiration. And the way to do that is to add some structure. Add some pressure. Put a deadline out there and watch the work come to life.
You also have an incredible laboratory for your ideas. It’s called TikTok and YouTube. (And WordPress, too!) You can actually make stuff. Upload it. And get feedback instantly.
So if you’re working on a project now, or you have one coming up, look no further than the Dandys to get creative. As Courtney Taylor-Taylor says, ”…it’s not your job to be inspired. It’s your job to get it done…”