It’s something we’re all accustomed to in this day and age and which we probably rarely give much thought about, unless it annoys us or grabs our attention. Advertising, and its evil twin sister/brother/father/whatever you want to call it marketing, is most definitely here to stay as capitalism continues its voracious global expansion. And while I tend to agree with theories and opinions that marketing and advertising are incredible wastes of money when you consider the sums poured into them in the last 20 odd years, fact is they serve a purpose in the world we live in. Whether or not you agree/like the purpose they serve is an entirely different barrel of fish.

When I lived in Europe I remember TV adverts were the things that irritated me the most - something I’m pretty much free of here, what with the fact that I don’t really watch TV anymore. The other thing that soon started to make me cringe and or despair was the increasing appearance of adverts on every available surface of everyday life. In London this took the form of adverts printed on the back of travelcards, bus tickets, people in the streets etc… Having studied marketing and advertising at uni, in one way I was interested by it, because it’s such a testament to the relentless push to shove consumerism in any way you can into every possible hook and crany of someone’s life, and in another I was also pretty pissed off - just because it’s annoying. I don’t need to be advertised to everywhere I look. I’m pretty selective in my consumerism, I knows what I wants and I goes and gets it, advertising rarely comes into it unless it’s talking to my inner geek/fan. It’s becoming difficult enough to browser the webanet with all the crap in it, I don’t need it in the real world as well.

Earlier on today I stumbled upon a really interesting article on the adbusters site, which details the plan of Sao Paulo’s current mayor to rid the town of all its outdoor advertising. Which when you take the time to think about it is pretty crazy/impressive/insert adjective here. As the article points out, this is the first non communist city to do so and while it might not be a bastion of capitalism, this move does have some interesting implications. Which got me thinking about Tokyo.

When I first moved here I didn’t really think about the advertising so much, appart from the usual appeal of Shinjuku’s and central Tokyo’s bright neon filled streets at night. I had more than enough to keep me occupied. And then it slowly started to dawn on me as time went by. Advertising in Tokyo is literally everywhere you look. Visually the city is already a pretty serious experience, when you add the advertising, the neon signs, and everything else it becomes a total visual overload, especially at night.

But where Tokyo takes the cake is that it doesn’t just overload you with adverts visually, it also overloads you sonically. Whether it’s in the main shopping areas of central Tokyo, or in your local town centre, in the supermarket, on your train, bus, or during election time in your own backyard, you’re never getting away from the sonic onslaught. On the streets of central Tokyo, and in the big department stores or electronic stores like Big Camera or Yodabashi, the sonic onslaugth is relentless from the moment you approach the shop - staff outside are blurting welcomes, goodbyes and promotional offers into loud speakers, the shops are blarring out announcements and assorted things on the P.A system intertwined with the shop’s theme tune every once in a while, and the staff are, as is standard here, constantly talking to customers, in one way or another. Which all combines to give the experience of shopping a totally surreal and alien feel - at first it’s too much, and just concentrating on what you came to do can be hard.

After a while you get used to it though, and now I find myself not really registering most of it when I’m out shopping (a portable music player of some sort also helps, though it becomes totally pointless once you’re in the shop). The other day we went to Big Camera and I realised afterwards that the only times I paid attention to the sonic assaults going on around me were when the shop’s theme tune came on.

Which is one of the most interesting and remarkable points about sonic advertising in this town. When my friends visited last month we were riding the Yamanote Loop line and as we stopped in Takadanobaba I pointed out to them that the station (along with Niiza and Nerima) plays the theme tune from Atom (aka Astro Boy) when people alight and board instead of the standard JR tag, as the anime was set in this part of town. To which my friend noted that it was a truly unique and interesting case of sonic tagging - it’s not advertising at that point, it’s literally just tagging your subconscious with something you’ll automatically respond to. Being an Astro fan from my early years, her comment made me think about my reaction to hearing this the first time. It took me about 4 months before I realised what the little melody was - my brain had registered that it was different at certain stations I kept going through, and then one day a ligth switched on - it was the theme tune to Astro, and I remembered reading that the original story were based in Nerima and some surrounding areas. It all clicked and started making sense. In a really weird way.

Since we had this discussion I’ve been thinking about this sonic tagging a lot more - which brings me back to the shop’s theme tunes. I first realised that a lot of shops here have their own theme, aired over the P.A system in between announcements and promotional adverts, a few months in. The whole thing took on a new dimension after my first proper visit to Akihabara when my mate took me to the Yodabashi store there and pointed out that the theme tune is not the standard Yodabashi one but an Akiba remix - taking the whole concept of sonic advertising and tagging to an entirely new level. Since then I’ve found that the theme tunes are pretty much the only things I respond to when I shop. Everything else I pretty much blank out unless I’m listening for something specific, until the theme tune comes on and I switch on for however long it lasts. It doesn’t actually make me want to buy anything, not that it’s designed to (unless I’ve missed some sort of genius subliminal capitalist plot), it just makes me think and a lot of the times smile as well. Simple and cheesy melodies are so hard to resist amidst the chaos that can be shopping in Tokyo.

To the average Japanese person/shopper this sonic onslaught is pretty standard. The Japanese are accustomed to background noise/music in pretty much every aspect of their lives, and as I’ve learnt in recent readings, they seem to cherish it quite a lot too. The noise of the semis (Japanese cicadas) in the summer is enough to drive any sane man nutty but to most Japanese it’s sweet music to their ears. And the same goes in every part of daily life - coffee shops playing the most mentalist free jazz CDs as background music, announcements, jingles and other assorted voice overs in conbinis non stop, people in the street shouting slogans, offers and more to get people to do/buy/whatever something, bus drivers constantly muttering/talking/thanking people who get on/off into a mic broadcast in the bus, train drivers giving constant, accurate info about your journey, simple transactions which would only require a few words in any part of the world involving long, drawn out sentences full of politeness, staff shouting hello, goodbye, thank you collectively in restaurants, and during election time, a constant stream of vans and cars with loud speakers mounted on top with political messages blarring out of them catching your ear wherever you are, even in bed.

Which is definitely something I’d find hard to imagine anywhere else in the world. In Japan people seek privacy, and time alone, to escape from the collective spirit of the society and culture, and I reckon this constant sensory onslaught of advertising as well. In Europe I just can’t imagine people putting up with it in the first place - my mind just starts conjuring up images of people brawling in the streets. While visual advertising, in an increasing variety of forms and shapes, is totally standard in Europe, whether it’s open or covert, here they’ve mastered the art of sonic advertising to an amazing degree. One which may not be possible to replicate anywhere else, but which I’m sure is already being tried and tested. We do have a certain amount of sonic advertising in our everyday lives in Europe, but this is truly next level.

Going back to the adbusters article and the mayor of Sao Paulo’s campaign to rid the city of what he called visual pollution, it made me think about what would happen if someone tried this here? Trying to imagine Tokyo without any sonic advertising, no sound pollution, is pretty difficult and when I do I’m just not quite sure what it would be like. It’s a nice thought though, one that would make such base consumerism as shopping for things I don’t need a lot more enjoyable. But then again it would also make Tokyo into something totally alien. I wonder how long Sao Paulo are going to be able to pull that one off for.

Popularity: 2%

written by Laurent \\ tags: advertising, Japan, musings, noise, society, thoughts, writing