IF NEWS OF IMMINENT SUV entries from Bentley, Maserati and Lamborghini was
the wave that knocked me down, late-breaking word from Rolls-Royce that they’ll
build a ute of their own for 2017 was the amphibious landing craft that drove
on to the beach and backed repeatedly over my waterlogged person to make sure I
was a goner. And
still,
I fear, I’ve not been put out of my misery yet as all the world is on a
king-sized SUV tear that promises to put all the tailfin and petrol-guzzling
chromium excess of the 1950s and 1960s that
which our forefathers once righteously decried to shame. For excessive modesty.
I
read about the long-bruited Rolls SUV’s receiving the dread green light, a
travesty of brand management yet no doubt a unique temptation for product
planners, while perusing CAR on a speeding train through rural England on a
recent visit. It added special poignancy to fleeting visions of what I, a
visiting American, imagined to be ye olde England flashing by.
It
also helped remind me: long before the 24-hour news cycle came along like some
nitro-burning funny car to supercharge mankind’s most glaring neuroses and ever
since, there’ve always been seemingly minor items which pop up to stop even the
most grizzled veterans of the Fourth Estate in their tracks. Moments when
you’ve realised, times you just knew, something had changed, ever so slightly
perhaps, but somehow importantly just the same. That’s your Rolls-Royce SUV,
for you.
I’d
always figured Rolls, in not entering the sport utility fray, was taking a
principled stand in service of a brand whose name was synonymous with the old
ways and blue-blooded British reserve. I was wrong; in truth, they were just
waiting for BMW to get the cash and the giant platform technology that might
help justify some jacked-up fright-mare with a £350,000+ pricetag. (I made that
number up, but who fails to raise their prices along with their ride height
when they bring their SUVs to market?)
Like
the ‘Parking’ detent pin on an old automatic transmission quietly snapping to
send the unpiloted, detent-less car rolling down the hill, the arrival of Rolls
into the crowded SUV field is the sound of something snapping. It encapsulates
the moment when greed, cost accountancy and the utter vulgarity of the popular
culture collided with a hyper- concentration of wealth and the too often
crushing lack of imagination of giant automobile combines, especially German
ones. In the resultant wreck the casualty is not just good taste but also
whatever worthwhile thing the company’s best engineers would have been working
on were they not busying themselves readying another ridiculous high-riding
conveyance for sale to the world’s most tasteless ultra-rich.
No
one doubts they’ll sell Roller SUVs by the gross load, however expensive or
painful to look at they may be. And that, I suppose, is a strong argument for
Rolls- Royce SUVs. Or the Aston SUVs that are surely headed our way. But one
must ask, at what price? Far from leading the market, which Rolls did only
yesterday, by tomorrow they’ll be following, albeit from a higher than ever perch.
Remember
when new money wanted nothing more than to be understated and stylish, just
like old money? Me, neither.
With
gusto, Giles Taylor, Rolls-Royce design chief, credits the Chinese for his
company’s decision to go where it had once mercifully feared to tread, a not
unfamiliar plaint with a positive spin.
‘Many
customers are now Chinese entrepreneurs savvy and self-made with a young spirit,’ he
has been quoted as saying. ‘They are interested in authenticity, Chinese
heritage and prestige.’ You might ask what authenticity and Chinese heritage
have to do with Rolls-Royce SUVs. But Taylor’s larger point the Chinese made us do it is plain. I’ll stake him Chinese demand, yet
references to authenticity are inapposite.
Perhaps
it is presumptuous to suggest that Rolls parent BMW should school the Chinese
in the western art of automotive good taste. They can’t even control outbreaks
of appalling taste among their customers at home.
I’m
not against upscale SUVs per se. Range Rovers, when they debuted, were actually
intended to venture off road, and were still fairly spartan vehicles which made
sense for use on farms. But we’re not talking about old Range Rovers. Once
you’re never going off-road because who
in his right mind would take a £350,000 car off-road the whole exercise becomes slightly
embarrassing. It’s the automotive equivalent of false-bottomed shoes to make
you appear taller. An ultra-hyper- luxury SUV can’t be authentic because it’s
inauthentic, at its core. To paraphrase a famous old Rolls ad, at 55mph the
loudest thing you can hear is credibility going out the window.
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