Music merchandise sold your soul
Posted by Vicki on 25.10.02
It appears that I recieve endless offers by bands to promote them, recieve free mp3s, street team, e-team, exclusive tickets to shows (if only I lived in the US I could take advantage of more of these) , random spams from record companies despirate to recoupe their promotion costs and inevitably invitations to buy their merchandise.
The quality of this mechandise varies hugely, both in the quality of thought that went into it and the physical form of the overpriced stuff. Today I recieved one of my scariest offers yet... A pair of Vans shoes with a bit of plastic saying 'AFI' stuck on. The tagline proudly read "designed by AFI, made by Vans". While AFI have been one of my favourite bands since 1995 and while I will happily buy CDs, t-shirts and possibly even the lunchbox, I am not buying the shoes.
I have seen the shapeless baggy jeans with the little 'offical' patch reading Slipknot, Linkin Park and the rest of the made for MTV bands and laughed out loud. I have seen the look in the eyes of younger friends when they have seen the Blink 182 star shoes - which are ok simply because they are creepers and glam is a good thing.
AFI shoes make Tenacious D's 'offical cum rag' look positively desirable, although I do wonder if an AFI cum rag would be profitable, I am sure the scary people at the Church of Havok would buy several, I wonder if they would have them laminated? A question just been put to me "is onisism agianst the straight edge ethos?" Answers on a postcard please.
As if the shoes were not enough the email also included a reminder that a 10" is coming out soon, it is an exclusive numbered batch of 5,000 and available exclusively from everyone's favourite pervayour of overpriced bandrelated junk.. 'Hot Topic'. Of all the stores it had to be them. To me it epitamises the greedy grasping wannabe brats who have mommy and daddy buy them everything they want. Hot Topic sums up the vacancy of the MTV generation, kids dressing like sluts, not a thought in their heads, eyes empty and waiting for their next entertainment to be brought to them. Although some of their t-shirts are mildly amusing, their choice of models hysterical. I will resist meantioning the plus sizes section.
