TITLE: STOP Playing It Safe! The Michael Jackson Rule That Etches Icons Into Memory (visual identity)
VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9uliLxhQFQ

Some of the most unforgettable artists never showed their face and everyone still remembers them. I wonder why. Image or visual identity might matter just as much as the music. >> You know, it's all about personal expressions. You know, these clothes are just tools to sort of make a collage about yourself so that people can sort of understand what you know. >> The mask is a huge part of Doom. Think of why superheroes wear a mask. Then you have people like MF Doom or Da Punk. They both don't allow you to see their faces. Both of them have this aura around them. This mystic kind of feeling about them. Yeah. The whole mask thing really. All right. It's a time in hip-hop where things from my point of view started going more to what things look like opposed to what things sound like. You know what I mean? Once it started getting more publicized and you know it started being hip-hop started be more of a a money-m thing then you get these corporate ideas where you want to put what it looks like to sell what it sounds like. We dealing with music. So what I did was I said all right look I'm going to come with the angle of it don't matter what I look like. You know it don't matter what the artist look like. It's more what the artist sound like. So the mask really represents the the whole like to rebel against the trying to sell the product as a human being. You know what I mean? >> The interesting thing is Da Punk wearing the helmets make you focus on the music more because you can't see their faces. >> This is a bit unusual. You have to tell me why do you wear this black bags on your heads? Uh, we're wearing these black bags because as Daft Punk, we're not showing our faces in pictures or television. >> A mask does add assumptions and tension and I believe that's good. It gives the audience something to talk about. Most artists who do wear a mask, these rumors start that these artists are not really on stage. That's how much mystery a mask adds to your persona. Sometimes the intention of the mask is not to hide the artist, but it's to reveal the art. Something as simple as coloring your hair can be very memorable. Yayoi Kasama colored her hair. There was a connective logic between Miss Kusama's hair and her art. And the same with Dennis Rodman. Coloring his hair in the NBA. It just wasn't a normal thing. When you find non basketball fans, he's the one that's top of mind that you remember because of how he expressed himself. Michael Jackson is so ingrained in our memory that you could see a silhouette of him and you would know it's him. And it's because he has a very strong visual identity. I often ask people this question. If Michael Jackson broke into your house and you were describing him to a person that doesn't know who he is, how would you describe Michael Jackson? Maybe curly hair, glitter glove, high waters, white socks, a jacket with many zippers on it. So the bigger question is, if you were to break into a house, how many things can they mention about you? There's another artist that came out around the same time. He was on a small boutique label with Michael Jackson's sister, Latoya. He put out an album where he tried to look like Michael Jackson. I think the song did pretty well, but he didn't have a career because people are not looking for another Michael Jackson. They already have one. >> Aren't you Mike Tyson? >> Mike Tyson. Mike Tyson. There is a picture of Mike Tyson before he figured out his visual identity. And it's not the same Mike Tyson you remember. It's not the ferocious guy in the ring. He hadn't reached his level of becoming one of the Avengers. He hadn't found his Superman outfit yet. The black trunks, the black shoes with no socks. That's the Mike Tyson people remember. Rick Owens [snorts] as a fashion designer. It reminds me of the same thing. You really only see Rick Owens in black. It's always black. Almost like a uniform. >> I wear me. I only wear this. I mean, I I have a uniform. Um I'm busy doing other things. I kind of don't care what I do care what I look like, but I mean I find one thing that I like and I just stay with it. And then besides that, I think the gym is more important kind of I mean I go to so I go to the gym every day and that's kind of my couture. >> Identity is the material that you house your talent in. >> There are no ads for banana ball. >> We spend zero dollars on advertising. Zero. We've never We've never spent a dollar on traditional advertising. You got to look at it differently. You got to invest everything on the experience. Jesse Cole, I wouldn't necessarily call him an artist, although I would say he's creative. His uniform is recognizable no matter what crowd he's standing in. The first thing you say when you see him is, "Who is this guy with all this yellow on, before he shows you his product, you still have to be interested?" >> The the the power of of being on stage, the power of um thinking differently on how to connect with an audience. I mean, I was thinking so much about how to perform. So, in in baseball, while it is a performance, you're just playing a game. You're not thinking about how do you perform to a crowd. You're thinking about getting that batter out when you're pitching. You're thinking about driving a double in the gap. That's what you're thinking about. I I'm thinking about how am I presenting to how uh the the the audience, how's my blocking, how's my tone, how's my energy, every single thing. And how does it all come together to at the end get a standing ovation because you made people feel something. You know our mind is made to find patterns. So we notice patterns very easily and then someone interrupts the pattern and we pay attention to that person. This is something I call expectation violation. It's when you go against what people expect from you. >> I can see an image and already know what the comments are. To me that's a valuable design skill. >> Liquid death. They didn't change the water. They changed the housing which is their identity which putting water in a can that automatically separates you from all the other waters. Now to me liquid death looks like beer. It looks like beer cans and it kind of triggered a memory of mine when I was a kid. They used to have candy cigarettes and you used to blow in them and it had like this powder that would come out. But Liquid Death reminds me of the same thing. It looks like beer, but you're actually drinking water. Visual identity is being expressive with intention and being consistent enough for people to identify you based on your expression. It's just you have to establish it. >> Nobody wearing no hot ass suit and a little ass club sweating for 7 hours a night. >> Well, that's why a lot of Japanese don't have an identity. >> I sound like a waiter. >> It It comes with a dress code. Yeah, jazz comes with a >> sound like a waiter, man. top of me. >> Yeah, >> let me see my time. >> Because there's so many talented people, a lot of times talent is just not enough. You need to be top of mind. Everybody hates commercials. Everybody hates ads. Ads exist because of a lack of visual identity. The reason they have to run an ad is because people don't remember you or you're not top of mind. Strong visual identity allows the work to speak for itself. You don't have to persuade. I know a lot of artists will say that means I have to wear the same thing for the rest of my life every day. No, that's not the case because even breaking the pattern is something that lasts in people's memory also. So establish a pattern and break it. Patterns are for people who want to be remembered. Put your favorite artist that has a strong visual identity [music] in the comments. I can make you look, but I can't make you see. Seeing is a choice. If you like this video, please subscribe, hit the notification bell. Until next time. The appointed hand of the king. [music]