Kellogg's has created a new breakfast cereal after reading a tweet by Tim Burgess. The Charlatans' frontman inadvertently inspired Totes Amazeballs, which will be sold exclusively at the Kendal Calling music festival in July.
It started last month with an innocent, joking tweet: "Just invented a breakfast cereal called Totes Amazeballs™," Burgess wrote. "Kellogg's are interested."
Of course, Kellogg's weren't really interested – Burgess had just made the cereal up. "I heard someone use the expression 'totes amazeballs', and it sounded like something from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory," he told the Manchester Evening News. "But within an hour [Kelloggs had] got in touch."
Within weeks, Kellogg's had produced a mock-up of Totes Amazeballs, replete with Burgess's grinning face. "They're schhhweet!" he says on the box. But this isn't exactly a healthy bowl of Weetabix: the contents include Coco Pops Rocks, shortbread, raisins and "squidgy marshmallows". "It was just something that was funny, and it just kept moving," Burgess told NME. The cereal tastes "like Rocky Road", he added. "It's the Jazz Odyssey of breakfasts ... Something you'd eat at a festival that'd get you back on your feet."
Though Amazeballs will never be available in shops, Burgess will be selling them at the cafe he is organising at the Kendal Calling festival, which will be called Tim Peaks. Proceeds will go to the David Lynch Foundation.
Burgess is completing work on his new album, recorded in Nashville with Lambchop's Kurt Wagner. He plans to release "something pretty special" for April's international record store day.
