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What won’t we do in the name of BBQ?

Lucy Kippist

by Lucy Kippist

12 Jan 10:05am

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Filed under: Advertising, Aqua, Australia Day, Meat, Melissa Tkautz, Sam Kekovic

58 comments

Okay, so Australians love meat. We also love BBQs and Australia Day. Mostly because it means we don’t have to go to work. But could this be the worst advertisement for meat you have ever seen?

Or just a very clever way of getting us to think about what we’re slapping on the BBQ on January 26th?

We’re talking about the Sam Kekovic/ v Melissa Tkautz v Justice Crew Australia Day 2012 video. If you haven’t seen it yet, then watch it up the top here.

According to Sam Kekovich’s Facebook page the re-worked Aqua “Barbie Girl” video is a response to all the anti-Australian pop culture that’s getting around these days.

By un-Australian we’re guessing he means the people getting around in tracksuits and bikinis while rapping about how much money they have.

Thing is, The Punch can’t decide if this ad “works” or not.

Firstly, nobody and we mean NOBODY needed to hear that Aqua song again.  But I guarantee you’ll get an earworm from the first listen. And who knew Melissa Tkautz (ex E Street) was still singing? And looking great BTW. Much better than that strange pink haired chick in the original video.

On the other hand, it’s kind of hard not to watch. All those pouty lips and yummy looking cutlets. Plus, that sauce bit is funny.

Actually, we’ve got a long history of terrible meat ads that we secretly LOVE. In fact, hats off to the meat industry for all their creative campaigns- clearly there’s never a dull moment when you eat meat!

Who could forget this one: (yes, that is Naomi Watts)

Although, there’s no real excuse for this kind of thing is there, Sam Neill?

Now, over to you. Can the meat industry survive this garish Aqua/Barbie ad, or have there been much worse crimes committed against Australia’s favourite food group?

Most commented

58 comments

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    • AFR says:

      09:17am | 12/01/12

      Looks like the Sam Kekovich lamb campaign has finally jumped the shark.

      Reply

    • Ohcomeon says:

      12:18pm | 12/01/12

      An ad campaign cannot jump the shark.

      This campaign always sucked. I dont even find it tacky or offensive, just boring and pointless. Its a bit pathetic that he clearly doesnt even understand the pop culture references the ads based on. He just reminds me of the awkward outspoken grandfather no one wants to be near at the relly bash!

    • Top End says:

      09:34am | 12/01/12

      Excellent ad….just love Sam…and NO ONE can do these adds better than him…..What I call a true blue spririted Aussie…He can cook my lamb ANY DAY!!!

      Reply

    • dancan says:

      09:45am | 12/01/12

      I think that is this was Sam’s first ad I’d dislike it, but since he has a history of these bad/good and tacky ads I like it, although I’d only be able to listen the song a couple of times max

      Reply

    • Redeker Plan says:

      09:46am | 12/01/12

      I haven’t even watched this new Sam K one, and already I can tell you that is is NOT the worst meat ad ever made. 

      That award goes to the new Coles ad.  If you haven’t seen it, it includes Curtis Stone and Normie Rowe with a bad blonde dye-job (who is clearly desperate for cash) singing “No Added Hor-MOOONES” to the tune of Shakin All Over.  I only saw it once on TV a couple of days ago and just thinking about it makes me throw up in my mouth.  I’m too afraid to search for a link to YouTube in case I accidently hear it again.

      That is all.

      Reply

    • Knemon says:

      10:12am | 12/01/12

      Spot on Redeker Plan - Easily the worst advert ever (not just meat). The ads shown above have nothing on the Coles advert.

    • bella starkey says:

      10:14am | 12/01/12

      oh! that thing is horendous.

    • James1 says:

      10:28am | 12/01/12

      It makes we want to cry when I watch that ad.  That issue is directly linked to the discussion over on the “Why have we abandoned our troops” thread as well.  Normie Rowe is a Vietnam veteran, and if the government looked after veterans better, he would not be desperate for money, and would never have had to demean himself and insult us all by doing that ad.

      This government have really dropped the ball on the Coles advertising/veterans’ entitlements issue.

    • Bertrand says:

      10:32am | 12/01/12

      Well if the purpose of advertising is to make people aware of your company and product, the Coles ad was a massive success. It has everyone talking, it gets shown on the news and the morning shows (for free I’m guessing since it is being shown as a news story).

      As far as the Sam K ad goes, I find it incredibly annoying, but again, if it has people talking then it is a success. It also seems to be getting a lot of shares on Facebook, so obviously people are liking it.

    • Anne71 says:

      12:41pm | 12/01/12

      @ Redeker Plan - oh, I could not agree more. I cringe every time it comes on (and hit the mute button)  That one should definitely be a front runner for this year’‘s Gruen Transfer’s “Worst Ad of All Time” Award.

    • Brad Coward says:

      12:46pm | 12/01/12

      Yes.  After listening to Normie Rowe sing I can understand why the hormones !

    • Alicia says:

      02:36pm | 12/01/12

      Definitely agree! It’s even worse than the down, down ads.

    • stephen says:

      04:17pm | 12/01/12

      I remember Normie when he was singing, then he went off to Vietnam, then he came back to start up his ‘career’.
      He, Jonny farnham, Col Joye, (a ‘joy’, he ain’t) and Ronnie Burns, (the only one out of this bunch with any talent) would have made a good quartet of wiggles.
      (Col is the hand-puppet.)

    • Elsa says:

      09:18am | 13/01/12

      The mute button - the world’s greatest invention!
      Seriously, there’s something creepy about Rowe. Can’t sing either.

      Woeful and I hope the person who came up with this advertising gem gets the sack!

    • TheRealDave says:

      09:47am | 12/01/12

      Worst Sam Kekovich Lamb ad eva.

      Reply

    • Jean says:

      09:48am | 12/01/12

      TOTALLY CUTE

      Reply

    • Eva says:

      09:59am | 12/01/12

      Watching it for the first time yesterday I thought it was an exceedingly well made advert that puts many of the other poor quality products to shame.  It is up there with the “bugger” adverts that gave so much enjoyment a few years ago.

      Reply

    • Kika says:

      10:05am | 12/01/12

      It’s amazing how advertising used well and long enough can con us all into thinking that Australia Day means lamb. Since when? Since these ads. I refuse to be conned into thinking that. Australia Day means a day off work and maybe some damper.

      Australia Day = 1 January 1901.

      Reply

    • AdamC says:

      10:21am | 12/01/12

      Well, yes Kika, but that is already a holiday. And it is simply unAustralian not to get an extra day off work!

      Also, you don’t want to discount the 26 January date. According to celebrity communist and eminent historian Manning Clarke’s concise history of Australia, William Charles Wentowrth and other colonial notables had started celebrating the 26 January date within a couple of decades of the first fleet landing there. Which makes it a pretty valid date to me!

    • Kika says:

      12:09pm | 12/01/12

      Only in Sydney… the rest didn’t join in the party until they were told to.

    • Pickles... The Drummer says:

      02:16pm | 12/01/12

      True Kika, but by that time Macquarie was referring to NSW as Australia in official correspondance to England, so it was in fact “Australia” day. It may not have been the “Commonwealth of Australia” day, but then we don’t celebrate that (or federation day), we celebrate Australia day which was invented long before federation.

    • Mahhrat says:

      10:08am | 12/01/12

      I love Sam, but Melissa Tkautz?  I mean shit, I get b-listers going on reality TV or whatever to try and fan the embers of their careers, but…really? 

      And three minutes?

      I don’t reckon the ad will work, because it simply doesn’t make me want to buy more lamb than I would normally have bought, and given I’m mid-30s I must be somewhere near the target demographic.

      If they were aiming younger than me, they picked the wrong song.  If they were aiming older, well if they don’t love Sam K by now, they never will, so they’re either preaching to the choir or the deaf.

      A better idea would have been for Sam to sing it as “I’m a barbie boy/bloke”.  All of Australia loves a boofhead, and he could’ve worked the whole thing on his own.  The addition of an actual bimbo just makes the whole thing silly and quite painful to listen to.

      Reply

    • Rowdy says:

      10:17am | 12/01/12

      “Thing is, The Punch can’t decide if this ad “works” or not”

      You wrote an article about the ad, with a link to the ad contained within, and we are talking about it…..it works.

      Reply

    • Woodsy says:

      11:10am | 12/01/12

      Spot on. Whether it’s liked or not, it’s still being talked about.

    • Chris says:

      09:29am | 13/01/12

      I agree with Woodsy - we are talking about the ad, therefore it works

    • Jane2 says:

      10:22am | 12/01/12

      “what we’re slapping on the BBQ on Monday 26th?” Sorry I cant tell you know what I will be doing in 7 years time. However on THURSDAY the 26th I will probably be having snags not lamb.

      Reply

    • Jessica says:

      10:44am | 12/01/12

      Wow, worst ad ever. How desperate is the meat industry getting that they have to pay a fortune in bad advertising costs to promote the consumption of lamb? Personally I’ll be BBQ-ing it up but not at the expense of a slaughtered baby sheep to fund a desperate industry’s advertising costs…

      Reply

    • AdamC says:

      10:59am | 12/01/12

      Wow, Jessica, you must be a barrell of laughs ...

    • Shane 2.0 says:

      11:48am | 12/01/12

      Yeah. I’m guessing she’s about as much fun as you @Adam C.

    • Tim says:

      11:53am | 12/01/12

      Desperate?

      Bahahahahahahaha

      Yeah, all those supermarkets with massive walls of meat in them are really the signal of a desperate, struggling industry.

      FYI,
      I’m going out to my favourite steakhouse for dinner tonight. Grilled New York cut, rare with some hot English mustard.

      Enjoy your lentils and tofu.

    • Wynston Cruso says:

      12:21pm | 12/01/12

      We’re omnivores Jessica. And because my ancestors ate meat, they developed big brains. With my big brain I am able to make informed decisions, such as my decision right now to agree with AdamC in that you must be a huge bore. I bet you curse the first people all those 10’s of thousands of years ago who developed animal husbandry thus advancing the human race, how dare they. I for one enjoy putting my slaughtered baby sheep on skewers, om nom. Finally, the meat industry struggling? You’re avin a laugh.

    • Ella says:

      03:45pm | 12/01/12

      @ Wynston Cruso

      Current theories on human evolution suggest that brain size is correlated to the size of the group you regularly interact with. This is based on the fact that the only animals that have comparable brain to overall weight/size ratios as humans are elephants and a kind of monkey that lives in groups of 100s of other monkeys. Since both these animals are herbivores, and there are no carnivores with similar brain to overall weight/ratios it seems a lot more probable that it is sociability, not meat, that made us as intelligent as we are.

    • St. Michael says:

      03:53pm | 12/01/12

      “Current theories on human evolution suggest that brain size is correlated to the size of the group you regularly interact with.”

      Suddenly the loneliness of the brain cells in Kim Kardashian’s group of friends makes perfect sense.

    • Wynston Cruso says:

      06:03pm | 12/01/12

      I’ve studied human evolution extensively, and have never heard of the theory that discounts meat in the evolution of the human brain. It was indeed a huge factor and if we’d stuck to vegies only we definately wouldn’t be as advanced as we are now. The building blocks just aren’t there.

      In any case, I particularly dislike the militant vego’s telling myself and other omnivores that we can’t eat meat. The arrogance is astounding, both in that they think they have the moral superiority to tell others what to do (not realising that farming veggies also kills animals) and in the fact that they think they can ever stop people eating meat. Won’t happen, ever.

    • thatmosis says:

      10:44am | 12/01/12

      This is one of those adds that builds on an already recognisable framework that you immediately hate but its like a train wreck and you have to watch until its over and then feel quietly ashamed that you have just wasted 5 mins of your life. But and a big BUT, it gets its message across and is a great piece of advertising that somehow sticks in ones mind for no good reason. Well done

      Reply

    • Fred says:

      11:26am | 12/01/12

      I love it. I love Melissa Tkautz and the cynical and ironic? way she acts these days. She’s great in Swift and Shift Couriers.

      Reply

    • Farken says:

      11:43am | 12/01/12

      i will not buy lamb because i don’t know what Sam Kekovic has done to the lamb! before i buy it

      Reply

    • Macca says:

      11:53am | 12/01/12

      MAKE ... IT ... STOOOPPPP!!!!!

      No-one needed to hear that song ever again!

      What have you done, Sam!?!

      Reply

    • Davo says:

      12:09pm | 12/01/12

      Mmm, suckin back some vitamin VB aaaall night then a lamb kebab flooded with chilli sauce at 3am, Straya Day. Yep, the ad works a treat!

      Get It India!

      Reply

    • Martin says:

      12:32pm | 12/01/12

      Love it or hate it: everybody is talking about this ad. Advertising Mission Accomplished. Australian Lamb Industry money well spent.

      Nothing wrong with this ad. It’s entertaining and it isn’t afraid to take the piss out of Australians unlike many of its bland contemporaries.  Given Sam Kekovic has become the defacto advertising face of Australian Lamb, his appearances ensures the actual message doesn’t get lost amongst the cleverness.

      Just don’t air it to death so we quickly tire of it.

      Reply

    • Peter says:

      12:39pm | 12/01/12

      The chick from Aqua is so much hotter than M Kautz - in a grubby pierced tattooed way that makes you want to spend 15 minutes with her in the bathroom at the pub. Just sayin’

      Reply

    • Brad Coward says:

      12:42pm | 12/01/12

      Thank goodness I don’t suffer from the PC bug affecting one’s sense of humour that poor Ms Kippist is suffering from.  Okay, the advert doesn’t reach 100 on the belly laugh-o-meter scale.  Great comedy it isn’t but it is still clever, amusing and worthy of a smile or a slightly forced grin.

      Yes….I will be eating lamb on Australia Day.

      Reply

    • Kirsty says:

      12:43pm | 12/01/12

      I loved it.  I thought the song was pretty well put together and just seemed like a harmless, fun ad.

      Reply

    • Anubis says:

      02:14pm | 12/01/12

      Here’s an idea for the meat industry - give us some quality lamb/beef/pork at a decent price and your sales may go up. All the good stuff is sent overseas and we in Australia pay premium prices for the butcher’s left overs.

      I really miss the days when I would visit my grandparents and my grandfather (a small holding farmer) would butcher a cow or pig or lamb to feed the family over the holidays. Quality cuts of meat that actually had some flavour. Butcher shop and supermarket meat these days is crap.

      Reply

    • Fezzbo says:

      04:26pm | 12/01/12

      Out of curiosity, have you ever worked in the meat industry?

      Do you actually have any idea how meat is graded? Where it’s from? The different cuts from different breeds? The difference between aged beef or yearling meat?

      You want decent meat, source it. It’s not hard.

    • Anubis says:

      07:52am | 13/01/12

      actually Fezzbo I worked in the meat industry for a while in the late 70’s so yes I do know what I am talking about.

    • Michelle says:

      02:14pm | 12/01/12

      I think it’s catchy and a bit of harmless fun. it’s very clever branding that’ll stick. The target demographic will love it.

      Reply

    • My ears hurt says:

      04:22pm | 12/01/12

      Perhaps Normie Rowe & Meatloaf could do a duet.

      Reply

    • stephen says:

      04:29pm | 12/01/12

      He looks like Geoffrey Edelston, and those chops on the barbie are about 30 bucks a kilo, and I’d say all those movie stars in that adv. are about the only ones who can afford to eat it.

      Reply

    • H B Bear says:

      05:45pm | 12/01/12

      Melissa Tkautz has moved into some post-ironic, self-parody, I’m-a-Celebrity-get-me-out-of-here metaphysical plane that my brain is not equipped to deal with.  I wonder what she puts on her tax return under “Occupation”?

      Go to the bottom of the class if you even know what a Justice Crew is.

      Reply

    • Ripa says:

      07:02pm | 12/01/12

      The ad is very funny, pavlova, jelly, slip n slide, speedos, and two wogs advertising meat for Australia day.

      Reply

    • Stephen says:

      07:59am | 13/01/12

      What more could an ad promoting Aussie lamb want or need. Engaging ad, watched it several times to pick up all the lyrics and background action. Very clever.

    • Matt says:

      11:46am | 13/01/12

      To answer your question Lucy, the industry can most definitely survive this. I thought the ad was very well writen, funny and catchy (regardless of the reason that it was catchy for others). It didn’t take itself too seriously, which was perhaps an underlying theme and a good lead for us all to follow.

      I’ll be burning as much lamb on my BBQ as I can afford on Australia Day as let’s face it, it isn’t the cheapest of meats available. No doubt there’ll be a bunch of snags thrown in there too. Looking forward to it!

      Reply

    • Chris says:

      08:30pm | 13/01/12

      Being a vegan I hate all meat ads equally, just because he does one for Australia Day doesn’t mean its any better than the KFC commercials they play every night. All in all it is animal cruelty to me.

      Reply

    • Angry Fat Bitch says:

      09:03am | 14/01/12

      The ad is cute, and kind of funny…. but it clearly cost a few bob. Lamb seems to get the lions share of the meat advertising budget. And I’d have preferred they’d re-invested the money into the lamb industry. You know, to increase supply, thus lowering demand and also the price, so us regular Aussies can actually afford to eat the stuff on Australia Day.

      I LOVE lamb, I’d eat it three times a week if I could, it’s easily my favourite meat. Not only is it delicious, but the lamb industry has been free-range since before the concept existed, because that’s just how you breed lamb. As opposed to veal, which has to be chained up and force-fed to keep the meat tender. With lamb there’s no guilt factor. But at $28 a kilo it’s been a looooooong time since I’ve indulged in a crumbed cutlet or two.

      Reply

    • stephen says:

      08:51pm | 14/01/12

      Yeah this country is supposed to be bred on meat and bread but I’d like to know why both stuffs are so bloody expensive.
      5 bucks for a loaf of bread ?
      Get stuffed.

    • ago says:

      06:19am | 15/01/12

      to all the fun stoppers who dont like this add
      lighten up

      its a parody, a piss take, its meant to be laughed at, and laughed with

      stop whinging and moaning and have a laugh

      my fav. bit is old mate spinnind the plates as a turntable

      Reply

    • kegaro says:

      11:06am | 16/01/12

      I’m probably being a bit sheepish ... but ...
      when did lamb start costing an arm and a leg? ... sorry ...
      and when did the advertised “lamb chops” start looking more like sheep chops.  Remember hogget and two-tooth? When you had a choice as to the age of the “lamb” you were buying?
      So the lamb industry will have to come up with better choice and pricing - and the ad just a teeny bit more convincing - before I start buying lamb again.

      Reply
 
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