Courtney Love has slammed a Doc Martens ad campaign depicting late husband Kurt Cobain wearing the shoes in heaven as ‘despicable’.
Love, who is not often right about anything much at all, stressed she had not given permission for the ad, which features Cobain perched atop a cloud with a stupid martyr-ish look on his face.
The grunge icon appears as part of a series of ads run by Saatchi & Saatchi which also feature Joey Ramone, Sid Vicious and Joe Strummer in similarly ludicrous poses.
David Suddens, chief executive of Dr Martens parent company Airwear, denied the brand had commissioned the ad and announced that Dr Martens would no longer be working with Saatchi & Saatchi as a result of the campaign.
Saatchi & Saatchi spoke out in defence of the campaign, calling it ‘edgy but not offensive’. DiScuss...
That is possibly one
of the most ludicrous ideas I've ever heard!
At what point did they think people would be ok with this?
It's not even a particularly imaginitive use of the dead.
Compare that to that fantastic adidas(maybe) advert with the likes of zidane and beckham teaming up with beckenbauer etc
JJB SPORTS ALERT!
Chav in our midst ... fat person wearing tracksuit alert.
horrid, just horrid.
how can Dr M's have an ad acampaign and not know about it, yeah rrrrright. lair, lair pants on fire....
that's amazing.
Why didn't they do Richey Edwards?
Richey is ALIVE
I used to have some Doc Martens when i was at school...
However, i never shot myself in the head or died of a drug overdose. I did get a nasty blister on my finger at the weekend when i was getting some cauliflower and broccoli cheese bake out of the oven. Still hurts a bit today. Is there a link between pleasure / pain / Doc Martens which i have never realised before?
.
Why not do one of the dead Feeder drummer, dangling from the garage rafters with his shiny new DM's on display, wife distraught in the background? Does that count as 'edgy but not offensive', Saatchi & Saatchi?
^Uncool...
...even as a joke.
.
That was my point, it wasn't a joke I was making a point about their glib ad campaign. If they use dead musicians to flog shoes how are some acceptable and some not? I think the families of the people in ads would be/are fairly offended.
probably
because nobody knows what the dead guy from feeder looked like, so it wouldn't make sense.
i know what he
looked like, so your wrong :p
Wow.
Strangely...
Doc Martens are claiming they knew nothing about the ad, didn't commission it, and have fired Saatchi & Saatchi as a result.
um...?
sure.
Wayne: Is that bacon?
Garth: I definitely smell pork product of some description
etc.
The kids sure love the dead...?
Classic campaign Saatchi & Saatchi... Idiots.
they should have
done a saddam one
i dont see
what the big problem is
i think the ads are pretty cool
however i object to wearing their shoes as their are leather.. otherwise it wouldn't put me off buying them.
they knew about it.. but said it wasn't meant to see the light of day.
i thought these
were hilarious. who's the real sick man?
Kurt Cobain's the real sick man.
I've heard he's not very well at all.
he has
an anger problem.
always shooting his mouth off.
heh!
that is all
Ugh
Worst of all the positioning of "Saatchi" and "Joe" made me read that Joe Satriani was being featured in an ad. Even worse!
while the ads are fucking tasteless
Doesnt courtney just basically trade off Kurts memory anyway?
Pot meet kettle.
S&S
Its freaking GENIUS.
Doc Martins press coverage - Minimal
S&S - Not quite best Ad Agency in world, M&C Saatchi are better (supposedly)
put together, send out, cause offence, deny on all fronts, bask in the warm glow of free press coverage and see Doc Martins and the adverts pretty much everywhere for around a week.
Their brand managers have done a sterling job. Kudos
plus
get Courtney Love to get involved spouting off about not using her late husbands name to promote stuff.
Gets some more press coverage, she gets some press coverage and then some controvesy as people say she's been living off his fame ever since his death, and a fair bit before he died.
Leads to discussions, talks, anger, and word of mouth.
Brilliant!
I commend your farsightedness
I however, shall NEVER buy Doc Martens, And ive never personally bough a nirvana record or merchandise.