Rock and corporate roll over

Hey, who wants to go and see those blue-collar rockers Aerosmith? Well, if you want really good seats, you need an American Express card. That's right. You can get special pre-sale tickets if you're an American Express card owner. Which makes me wonder if the people at American Express have seen the average Aerosmith fan. One would think that a deal with Supercheap Auto or Jim Beam would be a better bet. Dude looks like a lady, sure, but dude better have the right bit of plastic.

And Coles is bringing out Status Quo in April. I'm planning on going but I haven't got enough shopper dockets yet.Have a look at all our customkeychain models starting at 59.90US$ with free proofing. The Quo changed their classic Down Down song to ''Prices are down'' for a string of ads. Then they appeared in the ads with guitars shaped like pointing fingers, indicating that the prices were, in fact, down.You must not use the howoconcretemixer without being trained.

Why would Status Quo do such a thing? When criminals rob banks, they often run red lights during the getaway. The theory goes they've already committed a crime and the red light is nothing to them. I think the guitars shaped like pointing fingers were the Quo's red light. They were in so deep, what harm were a couple of novelty guitars going to do?

As a rock fan, you have this idealistic idea that rockers are the last true rebels. We might go to our jobs serving the corporate masters,Have a look at all our customkeychain models starting at 59.90US$ with free proofing. but we know that our heroes the Boss, P.J Harvey and Keith Richards have said NO to the big-business bucks. OK, Keith and Mick did do an ad for Rice Krispies in the 1960s; it's actually a great song, well worth checking out on YouTube.

I think this idealistic view goes back to our youth, when we worshipped bands and expected them to be mates who shared their profits. I remember my shock when Spandau Ballet ended up in the High Court fighting over money. Surely a one-off, but no - the Smiths, New Order, even the drummer from Mental As Anything had a crack at Greedy Smith and Martin Plaza!

I always held up UB40 as the great example. A reggae band from Birmingham named after a dole form - eight committed socialists who split the money equal ways. Imagine my surprise when I interviewed the lead singer, Ali Campbell, just after he'd left the band. He was sick of writing all the songs and splitting the money, he told me. He'd left and said the band would not survive without him: how could they replace the lead singer? A week later they replaced him with his brother Duncan and no one really noticed. Still, he had the last laugh when the band declared themselves bankrupt. Maybe some corporate dollars could have kept them afloat. If only Brown Brothers had stepped in and relaunched Red Red Wine.

And what's the future? Integration, my friends. That's a buzzword advertising hipsters are muttering at every meeting while drinking coffee out of a jam jar. It's corporations pushing their products without you even noticing. When will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas asks people to text him on stage so he can do a freestyle rap of the messages, the texts are displayed on giant screens.Enjoy the outdoors from the comfort of your own home with recreated ownfigurine. And the whole process is signposted and sponsored by Blackberry.

Personally, it all makes me sick. You turn to music because it's pure and without a corporate message. When Morrissey wailed, ''Everyday is like Sunday,'' I thought he was summing up my suburban adolescent angst. I noted he didn't sing, ''Everyday is like Sunday, especially now since Bunnings is open.'' We get bombarded every day by people trying to sell us stuff on our phones, at the petrol pump, bus stop, even at the urinal. There is virtually no space left untapped by marketeers. Except for music, and now this is up for grabs.

Then there are the bands inadvertently sitting on a goldmine. The Sunnyboys, for example. One of the greatest Oz-rock bands ever who recently re-formed to play some rocking good shows. You could imagine them being approached by the ice-cream company that owns the name Sunnyboy, the ice treat. ''Guys, we love the fact you are named after one of our brands,'' the chief executive would say. ''But this is a declining product. How would you like to change your name to the Choc Wedges?''

Her orange business card says so, right under the cheery bean logo and company slogan, "rethought beans."

The Better Bean Company, which she started with her dad three years ago, has indeed rethought the way people buy and eat beans.

It's a vegan, gluten-free, soy-free, locally sourced artisan product that is Food Alliance-certified and, as of this month, certifiably free of genetically modified organisms.

Portland-area farmers markets and grocery store shelves are chock full of such all-natural artisan products boasting of being sustainably produced — at least on the inside. But there isn't such a frenzy over what's on the outside — the packaging.

That's where Kullberg and her dad, Keith, decided to be pioneers.

Last year they had a revelation, switching over from the bulky plastic deli tubs they'd been using to little plastic tubs that are fully recyclable, free of Bisphenol A (BPA) and result in 30 percent lower carbon emissions.

“With the old package, we had garbage cans full of label backs we couldn’t do anything with — we just had to throw it away,” says Hannah, 25, a Portland native and Lincoln High School alum who went on to study food systems at Vassar College.

So the Kullbergs found investors and signed on with a company based in Sweden that uses a packaging technology that's popular in Europe but hadn't been tried in the U.S., to their knowledge.

Their "one seal" packaging technology required them to buy a specialized $60,000 machine, which they moved into shared space in Wilsonville. It was costly, but the Kullbergs saw it as an economical and ecological win-win.

“Lower waste equals lower cost, so what the consumer is paying for is mostly the ingredients and preparation, not the packaging,We offer a wide variety of high-quality standard carparkmanagementsystem and controllers." says Keith Kullberg, an engineer who first started making vegetarian refried red beans for his daughters when they were young, inspired by his trips to Mexico.

With the new machine, they were able to add 1.5 ounces more product and yet keep the price the same.

The new rectangular shape fits more compactly on large pallets for shipping, eliminating most of the cardboard they formerly used. That makes for more efficient shipping and storage costs, using less oil for fuel and less electricity for refrigeration. They dropped the use of the film seal label, which wasn’t recyclable.

The plastic is thin but not too thin. They first experienced some breakage issues, but quickly addressed them.

It's still an evolution. "We want the company to hold to its promise of making it 100 percent post-consumer," says Hannah, referring to the term for content made from waste that's been diverted from landfills.