Another year, another video of Ken Block tugging his hydraulic handbrake from a million different angles. Right into our collective faces. Has the shark been jumped?
Maybe it's too easy to be cynical. In an age where a million new videos are vying for your click it's easy to miss something. Especially if you're sure that you've already seen the same thing six times before.
Your logo here, possibly obscured by tyre smoke
But we'd contend that this video isn't just a gloriously and utterly irrelevant orgy of V8 noise and smoking tyres. It's not only an ode to the original 1965 Ford Mustang (albeit with a space frame,
845 horsepower
, all-wheel-drive and that aforementioned hydraulic skid handle). More, it's a snapshot of our day and age. It's a calculated way of bringing some big brand logos to our screens in a carefully orchestrated context.
Ford, Need For Speed, Monster Energy, DC Shoes. Once upon a time these brands would have spent big money on 'normal' racing. Except they probably wouldn't! Only Ford (and possibly DC Shoes) is old enough to really remember a world before the internet, YouTube and viral marketing.
Because a video like this is a far cry from the original GoPro fest that Ken and his crew shot on a quiet desert airfield. It's a megabucks production with a bigger budget than many Hollywood films of yesteryear. Block, and DC Shoes, have come a long way from their original VHS skateboarding videos.
It says a lot about internet marketing that on the same day this video is launched, Ford has revealed the new 2015 Shelby GT350 (more on this shortly) in a weird future-past celebration of Mustang heritage and the all-new pony car.
You could, of course, ignore this attempt at deconstructing what Gymkhana Seven stands for and just enjoy the video.
Ken Block Gymkhana Seven