Friday night. Glasgow. RAYE, the South London singer from the same BRIT School stable as Amy Winehouse, Adele, Olivia Dean and countless others.
We expected to hear the current earworm hit, Where is my husband?. Within five minutes it was out of the way, leaving us open to new songs, new ideas.
A moment of pure joy was witnessing the collective euphoria of 12,500 people recognising the same tune even though we’d never heard it before. The song is about people sitting on the edge. Even if you’re lucky never to have sat there, statistically, you know someone who has.
And you will recognise elements of the story she sings in both your highest highs and lowest lows. And that was what everyone recognised at the same time.
Since then, I’ve gone online to find it. It’s a cycle of three chords, played over two bars. That’s all: D, F#m to E.
In the last verse it modulates up a tone. Same sequence.
The whole song is felt deeply, lyrics sung like plainchant, orchestra and band playing quietly - piano - or fortissimo. Nothing in between.
And the whole audience weeps their eyes out. Author included.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zba1mHO2IvQ
RAYE is an independent artist. There’s no record label telling her how to play, what to do to please the crowds, or recommending what she should do.
In the live production, she has to fluff through five minutes as the crew sets up an intimate, temporary jazz club at the front of the stage, complete with heavy door and bouncers.
She lets us know that the whole band and crew say that this interlude is the weakest part of the show - but it’s her favourite. The crowd swoon. And of course, we love what follows.
When an artist like RAYE has a vision, and an implementation strategy (hers is “we’re doing this”****), magic happens. When too many producers get involved, everything becomes harder, longer and there’s a temptation to drive back to average.
This matters to all of us in the work we do this week.
On Thursday last week, I was in conversation with my mentor David Hieatt. We were talking about how the over-reliance on weak prompting and lazy thinking paired with AI was dragging so many people to the average, vanilla, magnolia middle-ground.
By definition, AI can only regress to the mean.
David’s view: “Being average is incredibly dangerous these days.”
Then on Friday I was catching up with an old pal and brilliant brand strategist, Phil Adams, over coffee in the Royal Scottish Academy. They’re exhibiting around 450 watercolours at the moment, and we were both there to learn about the process of bringing together such a vibrant, modern exhibition.
I loved how abundant everything was: there was room for everyone, and the mix of style and tone in the paintings was incredible (I’d always thought of watercolour as a bit flaccid - I stand corrected).
What a comparison to the world Phil and I work in, where the gravitational pull in strategy meetings seems to be reductive, rather than expansive, desperately attempting to head towards the apparent safe ground of average.
Phil told me about what he was sharing in his own newsletter over the weekend, describing that kind of ‘averaging’ meeting in an unexpected place.
Russell T Davies describes the “tone meeting” for the Christmas Special for legendary sci-fi series Doctor Who:
This is what tone meetings are: everyone is gathered together in an almost wholly airless room at the BBC in Cardiff. We have the heads of make-up, costume, photography, lighting, practical effects, publicity, prosthetics, personnel, and representatives from an independent special effects company, The Mill. Everyone is gathered around a gigantic conference table. Here, tea is drunk, a box of sad-looking doughnuts is attacked, and industry chit-chat is made. Then, one by one, every head of department explains why the show can’t actually be made.
Behind the scenes of the Doctor Who Christmas Special, starring Kylie, The Times, 15th December 2007.
Getting teams to avoid the dangerous world of ‘average’ is what I think we earn 51% of our fee on. The other 49% is getting them to the point of having a vision that stands out in the first place. Or maybe it’s the other way around.
Creating the vision is the fun part - light, pinch-me moments of creativity. Avoiding the trap of average costs about the same financially, but is emotionally and mentally exhausting.
But that’s the work we must do, every one of us, every day.
I want to work with schools brave enough to choose three chords over thirty committees.
Schools that will say, “We’re doing this,” and mean it.
Schools that would rather move people to tears than drift safely into beige.
Who’s in?