The recent vinyl resurgence has already brought with it innovations like the world’s first 3D printed records (and store) and a company that will press your ashes into your favourite record so you can R.I.V.
But how’s this for a gimmick? A vinyl record you can actually eat – especially tempting if you’re a chocoholic.
The unique marketing trick comes courtesy of Croatian rock star Gibonni, who has issued an edible version of his new single ’20th Century Man’, not on consumable wax (eww) but a delicious 33” worth of chocolate.
The chocolate record itself actually plays on a turntable, but only lasts a number of plays before it needs to be eaten, with both the vinyl and label entirely edible, as Orange News reports. No word on whether it’s available in standard milk or calorie-friendly dark cocoa.
“When I heard of the possibility of making the chocolate version I did not want to miss the opportunity,” says Gibonni, (real name: Zlatan Stipišić) a top selling musician in Croatia and the Balkans region who has a career that spans 20 years.
“I read that chocolate contains a hormone of happiness and boosts your libido, so I thought it was a perfect combination for the rock based on music we loved in the 1980s,” he explains.
Curiously, Gibonni isn’t the first musician to issue music on the chocolate format, that honour probably goes to French artist Breakbot, as Wall To Watch points out, for a limited edition chocolate record release of his album By Your Side. But who knows? Maybe the Croatian rocker’s release is more delicious.
(Image: Gibonni. Source: Facebook)
The ’20th Century Man’ chocolate record precedes Gibonni’s latest album of the same name. Recorded at London’s famed Abbey Road sand Sphere studios with Grammy award-winning British producer Andy Wright, it is the 48-year-old musician’s first-ever English language album.
“I widened my fan base by singing in English. Now perhaps I will widen it even more when they realise they can eat it after listening,” enthuses Gibonni of his tenth studio album.
The chocolate single also got its launch at a ‘mass eat-in’ gig on 29th November at Vienna’s Gasometer hall, Gibonni and band performing to a sold out audience before continuing on a European tour to promote the English-language release.
The music video for ’20th Century Man’, directed by Filip Filkovic Philatz, kind of skips over the chocolate gimmick (and a potential Simpsons-esque Land of Chocolate clip) to focus on the song’s musical and lyrical fascination with the 1980s. Fitting for a song that features the key line: “I’m stuck in the 80s and I can’t get out.”
