Yes, you read that right. Oscar-winning actor Jeff Bridges will use the Super Bowl to promote an album of relaxing sounds and guided mediations designed to put the listener to sleep.
Is this some kind of goof designed to draw attention to a brand? Squarespace, the website publishing platform, swears it's not. "It's not a stunt, it's a real project," a rep says. "We approached Jeff to do this for many reasons. We wanted to showcase the power of Squarespace, and illustrate that whatever your idea is, no matter how wild or weird, it can be made amazing with Squarespace."
To be sure, this will strike some as weird. The ad will promote DreamingWithJeff.com, where consumers can go and pay whatever they like, Radiohead-style, for the audio. Limited-run tapes and vinyl records will also be available. All of the proceeds will go toward Share Our Strength's No Kid Hungry.
“The album is a legitimate Jeff Bridges project," said David Kolbusz, Executive Creative Director at Wieden+Kennedy New York, in a written statement. "And best of all, it works. His voice is like oak and leather and cigar smoke and the wilderness. I personally have fallen asleep to the recording on more than one occasion."
This is Squarespece's second year advertising in the big game. Last year, the brand ran an ad featuring human metaphors for spammy Internet content - - a strongman, a bikini babe and a guy in a hazmat suit — converging on an everyman web user. This year, Squarespace will square off against Wix, a new advertiser also in the web creation category and Go Daddy, a longtime Super Bowl advertiser that registers domain names.