Raggo

I found this link on the Palace Waywards site the other day. Could this section represent the pinnacle of raggo steez? As it says on their blog: 'Darren Harper - he can definitely link a draw in his ends'.

Speaking of raggo, last week In Your Face conducted some detailed research into YouTube tagging. As we all know, in this day and age YouTube 'hits' talk. And in order to wring out every last precious 'hit' from a video your tagging needs to be on point. Otherwise how's anyone gonna find your shit when they search?

We started by studying one of our own videos. Here are the tags for Alesha Dixon's new jam 'Breathe Slow'.

Alesha, Dixon, Alicia, Breathe, Slow, New, Video, Single, Brand, The, Show, Tracks, Album, Boy, Does, Nothing, Strictly, Pop

Average. Nice inclusion of 'Alicia' - a really common misspelling of her name. But why tag the word 'The'? Definite and indefinite articles aren't gonna improve your search-ability.

We were then curious to see how one of the biggest videos of the year was tagged. So obviously we looked at Blackout Crew's 'Put A Donk On It'.

The, Blackout, Crew, Black, Out, Put, Donk, On, It, AATW, Clubland, TV, Itunes, Download, MP3, Now

Disappointing. Really disappointing. I would have expected more from All Around The World. If this tagging was graffiti it would be the equivalent of Alex Funtzi lining a DIET throw-up in Gunnersbury Park when I was 14, and then having to hide in the toilets everyday after school for 6 months because he was so scared of getting beats. Toy.

Finally we wanted to know how a powerhouse like universal do it, so we analyzed James Morrison's 'Broken Strings' video.

James, Morrison, Ft, Nelly, Furtado, Broken, Strings, Official, Video, Rihanna, Rehab, Justin, Timberlake, Timbaland, T.I, Katy, Perry, Pink, So, What, The, Killers, Katharine, Idol, Xfactor, Lady, Gaga, Britney, Spears, Womanizer, Xtina, Christina, Aguilera, Keeps, Getting, Better, Kanye, West, Simple, Plan, Canada, Ottawa, Hot, Cold, Polydor, Girls, Aloud, Sugababes, Kaiser, Madonna, Alternative, Pop, Blues, Rock, Soul, Indie, Folk, Acoustic, Guitar

R to the A to the G to the G to the O. Universal win hands down for the most ghetto, opportunistic, thugged out tagging around. If this was graffiti it'd be TOX going all city, running amok, battering trains with a need to vandalize like a crackhead needs rocks. Ugly. Beautiful. Relentless.


As a matter of interest why has no one released a song called 'Porn'? Even if you tagged it like a retard, you'd still get bare hits.

Next week, In Your Face will be taking an in depth look at Fizz TV.

Truth Tube

Next week Theo from YouTube is coming into our office to do a presentation. They have developed some new reporting tools that will help us further understand the behavioural patterns of YouTube users. The most significant of these will be able to tell us at what point viewers switch off our videos. Or to put it more bluntly, exactly at what point our videos get boring. The initial findings are interesting. Imagine that the horizontal flatline of an electrocardiogram represents viewer interest.


Then imagine that this flatline runs alongside your video from the start. The line stays nice and flat for the first 30 seconds. No electrical activity. Viewer interest is steady and high. You hit 52 seconds. Oh shit. The line plummets into a deep dark trough. What the fuck happened? Everyone switched off your boring video, that's what happened. According to YouTube statistics, 52 seconds into a video is the average point at which viewers are liable to turn off if their interest starts to wane. That's the 'Danger Time' (DT).

Back to our electrocardiogram. At 2 minutes 38 seconds the line triumphantly shoots back up; that is apparently the average point that viewers skip forward to. And if they like what they're seeing, they'll wind back to 1 minute 43 seconds on average and watch until the end.

So what have we learnt?

Basically make sure that something 'good' happens in your video at 52 seconds and at 2 minutes 38 seconds. Write it into your treatments. Tell your editor. Tell the fucking DOP. And no one cares about your visual poem in homage to Tarkovsky. They want boobies. And dancing robots. And fighting. And Ketamine trips. Viewer interest is key. We want a nice flatline throughout the video. No drop off. Every video has to be a 'Flatline Banger' (FB).

Statistically Geo Da Silva's 'Do It Like A Truck' is the least boring video ever made. It is a paradigm for how videos should be in this new era of 'Flatline Bangers'.



Atlantic is currently developing 'Flatline Banger' software to replace the now obsolete Harding Test. Moving foward all videos will have to pass a rigorous FB analysis before they are finally delivered. We don't care if someone has an epileptic fit while watching - we just don't want them to turn off.

Said It's Too Late To Apologize

Some of you may recall that a few weeks ago we ran a post about Gordon Kenney, the actor who had a cameo role as a TV presenter in the James Blunt 'Love Love Love' video.


Well Gordon found the blog. And posted a comment.

It turns out that we may have been a bit too hasty to judge. Unbeknownst to us, Gordon actually went all 'My Left Foot' for the role and stayed in character even when the cameras weren't rolling.

I have transcribed his comment in full:

Hi!

I'm the actor who appeared as the Disc Jockey/Presenter in James latest video! ('Love, Love, Love')

I would like you to know that as an actor I prepared myself in the Green Room and decided that my character (The Presenter) was an egomaniac, bordering on megalomania with the self delusion that he was some kind of a lothario!

As an actor I sustained this character throughout the shoot!

My mischievous use of the word "Darkie", which is now I think a redundant word, comes from the fact that I have spent the last two years researching, writing & composing a Musical - profumothemusical.co.uk

This as you know was a global political scandal in 1963 that eventually brought down the Tory "MacMillan" government & still resonates today having changed the public perception of our political landscape forever!

You will also know that this was a derogatory term used to describe the West-Indian "economic slaves" of this period for whom I have great sympathy! I never intended to cause any offence by what I thought was a harmless reference that my character would have said in the 60's on what I mistakenly thought was a private & secluded film set!

Oh! the irony here is that I did actually appear in the T.V. Series "In Sickness & In Health" (This series written by the great Johnny Speight who helped to break down the racist barriers of the time by making the viewers question their own prejudice!) And to add another footnote, I played a porno-shop manager! I hope you can share this response with Tim Nash for whom I have nothing but the utmost respect!

And finally, here's DJ Ironik wishing you all a happy christmas exclusively on In Your Face TV.


Real Christmas from inyourfaceTV on Vimeo.

Flipmode or What Happens In Vegas Stays In Vegas

It's 5.00am in one of the casino bars at the Mandalay Bay Hotel. Neil Gordon, from Big Balls Films, and I are drinking Heineken, Captain 'n' coke and Patron - mostly at the same time. The beautiful African American hooker that was sitting behind us has just left with the short Mexican guy with the Hitler moustache. It's two and a half hours since we wrapped on the Alesha Dixon video shoot, and approximately one hour since we left directors Max and Dania at the Planet Hollywood casino. Producer Phil Barnes had just thrown the last of their chips on black at the roulette wheel. It landed red. Home time for them.

Neil and I get talking to a young brother and sister from Oregon State. They're drunk. The brother wears the signature slug-like goatee on his chin so beloved of American teenagers. The sister's face is red and blotchy. She's been crying. But she instantly takes a shine to Neil. 'You talk funny' she says as she strokes his hair. Neil runs through his repetoire of comedy English accents. They laugh enthusiastically. He then shows them his Big Balls Films business card. The brother spits his drink: 'No way man. My construction company's called Balls Deep Construction'. Two kindred spirits from other sides of the planet united by a shared sense of humour. It's a beautiful, tender moment, pregnant with erotic possibility.

Neil has to go and pack. His plane is leaving in an hour. He asks the sister if she'd like to come with him to the lift. 'You're really cute, but I'm engaged' she says.

It's 8.00am. I stand in the shower for half an hour trying to sober up before I have to meet Alesha in the lobby. I eat my last Vicodin and some sudafed. The next two tortuous hours are spent talking to Alesha about her album midweeks while trying not to seem drunk.

At 11.00am a distressed Neil calls. He's been rolled at the airport. He put his camera bag down for a second while ordering a coffee and some crackhead made off with it. Piff puff poof. We've lost all the b-roll rushes and all the stills. Luckily I documented the entire shoot on my Flip camera, which comes with inbuilt editing software. Basically you load your selects into a computer and press the Movie Mega Mix button and the program automatically edits your footage.

So here it is. In Your Face TV proudly presents the Alesha Dixon 'Breathe Slow' offical 'making of':


Breathe Slow 'the OFFICIAL making of from inyourfaceTV on Vimeo.

While waiting for our flight connection in LAX, Alesha decides that she wants to go to the nearby Marriott hotel to find a swimming pool to sit by. We eventually locate it on the second floor terrace. It's been drained. As Raymond Chandler said, 'there's nothing emptier than an empty swimming pool'.

Di Wig

Di profile, a wha da gal fool man a wid
Di wig
The latest style we a lik

When General Levy first hiccuped these lines on Dance Energy in 1992, I had no idea how significant they would become for me. I now know. Putting a female solo artist on screen is the hardest work I've known - harder than when I temped at Manpower. On Friday I fly to Las Vegas with Alesha Dixon to shoot the video for her forthcoming single 'Breathe Slow'. So far I've attended 4 wardrobe meetings, 2 hat fittings, 2 choreography rehearsals, 1 nail session and today we have a hair 'trial'. This is the most important part of the process. This is when we fit the Lace Front Weave.


Yeah I hadn't heard of one either until a week ago. If the weave is wrong you might as well pack your bags and go home. If you fuck this up your artist's gonna look like, in the words of the General, a 'picky head'.

And getting the right wig is only the first hurdle. Fitting it is a whole other story. If you glue it too much, it's gonna look like this:


Glue it too little and it might start to slip, leaving you with that authentic bald head eagle, cracky look:


So you have to ask yourself one simple question: what's it worth to get it right?

For some people (including Gwen Stefani) the answer is celebrity hair stylist Danilo. He is apparently the world's leading exponent of the Lace Front Weave. I looked into his availabilty for the Alesha video and was told that his fee is 14 thousand dollars a day. Really.

Sweet Jesus. Give me the wig and some Copy Dex and I'll stick it on. How hard can it be?

New Era plus Campari equals

Idiot.


I just want to take a moment to explain the Campari thing. It has long been recongnized by connoisseurs that Campari is the best drink in the world.

However, that obviously wasn't enough for the CEO of Campari. In classic hubristic fashion he wanted to extend the reach of the brand - he wanted the world.

So he paid a bunch of money for a bottle to be featured in the video for Atlantic's biggest single of the year - T.I's 'Live Your Life'. I'm not joking. At the end of the video, while in 'The Club', T.I. lovingly handles a bottle of Campari for about 10 seconds.

And now kids think Campari is the new Patron. But they've been given no real indication of how you're supposed to drink it. The video certainly doesn't tell you. How fucking irresponsible is that? Kids are probably rolling into the Stratford Rex trying to drink it with Coca Cola or mango juice or some shit.

Unless you handle Campari right it's gonna taste like medicine. So kids - here's an exclusive In Your Face guide to drinking Campari.

In my opinion you've got two options if you're gonna fuck with Campari.

First up: the Negroni (one part gin, one part sweet vermouth, and one part Campari, mixed in an ice filled shaker, garnished with burnt orange). If it doesn't look like this, send it back:


Be careful though. You drop two of these and it's gonna be drunk time. And if you let drunky get on top of you, you're gonna embarrass yourself. It's the alcoholic equivalent of being made to do P.E. in your pants because you forgot your kit.

Second up: the Venetian Spritz (two fingers of dry white wine, ideally a little prosecco, one finger of Campari, a splash of mineral water, and a little slice of lemon to top it off).


This one's for all my civilized, romance loving homies. Girls drink this like it's water and it makes them feel nice. If you can't afford the Easy Jet flight to Venice, you could always try drinking it by the Limehouse Canal in Hackney.

So remember kids - enjoy and respect Campari like a lover and try not to puke on the night bus home.

New Era

On a historic day during which the people of America ushered in a new era of hope and change, New Era in London sent us a product package. Heavy.

They hooked up Stitchthat Bob too. Aaron in our digital department brokered the deal and Samantha Fogden at New Era came through with the 59Fifties - seven and a quarter of course. Very nice of them and very appreciated.

Speaking of New Era, anyone see Dizzee on Newsnight last night? Go to 50mins 30 secs and feel his wisdom.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00frmj1/Newsnight_05112008/

Free product is one of the bedrocks of life. One of my favourite memories is of all the Zoo York pros bum rushing Union Square and selling all their product for hydro and hubba within minutes. That was in '94 when life was better, Chad Muska was still skating, and people were doing these: