In Lieu of Privacy...

P.J. O'Rourke apparently had it right; not about the February 9th anniversary of The Beatles on Ed Sullivan (that would take no guesswork), but about the avalanche of "one more 1960s changed-the-world-forever thing" that we're destined to endure for the next six years. 

First I Have A Dream, then JFK, and now the Beatles.  It's getting old.

Now I've never had Jeppson's Malort, nor had I ever heard of it until very recently despite a seven-year residency in Chicago...where it is evidently from...a fact clearly obvious to those intimately familiar with the Second City.  As is commonplace in Chicago, Jeppson's has appropriated design elements of the Chicago flag in its logo, clearly signaling its point of origin.  Seems a pretty smart play for what I assume to be a purely regional brand; I myself would have had no interest in this bottle had it not been for the logo.  

This all serves as further proof of why the Chicago flag is among - if not the - best civic flag in the country, and should further serve as an exemplar of the civic branding possibilities for all other municipalities looking to create or entrench a brand identity. 

And in addition to a smart logo design, they're able to throw together a nice little print ad to boot in what I take as a wink and a nod to its apparently extremely bitter taste that only "1 out of 49 men will drink ...after the first 'shock-glass.'" (Their claim...not mine.)

Japan...often light years ahead of the States in all things fashion and design...has seemingly turned The Civil Standard Theory to The Civil Standard Ass-Kicking Reality.  Evidently, Japan uses abstract logos like the above to signify respective municipalities. Not having witnessed this myself, I can't speak on their daily visibility, or even what each of these mean (if anything) and how they're formulated.  Civil Standard calls for more traditional civic branding in the way of flags that tell a story, but is not opposed to the idea of completely abstract and arbitrary design to serve the civic branding purpose.  Corporate logos, of course, are often completely abstract at conception.

"Robin Williams iPad Ad Reminds Us the True Meaning of Humanity."

"Apple's Latest iPad Ad Is Probably Going to Give You Chills."

So say the Huffington Post and Time, respectively. 

 Personal anti-Apple bias aside, I might agree that this new spot was a stirring piece of advertising, complete with a Robin Williams monologue from the epic 1989 Dead Poets Society which contains a snippet of Walt Whitman's Oh Me! Oh Life! In fact, I would consider it an ad that seemingly manages to achieve a hard-to-pull two-fer: resonating on an emotional level while yet managing to clearly showcase the product's benefits.

I might think those things...if I didn't also think the ad was a blatant rip-off. 

One of my favorite advertising campaigns from the past few years is Levi's Go Forth campaign, with its first ad airing in 2009:

Look a bit familiar? Or better posed....sound a bit familiar?  And whose magnificent written work is that...you might ask...set to the visuals??  (I thought you would.)  Why those not only belong to Uncle Walt, but they're actually recited by Walt himself.  So if nothing else, Levi's has that over Apple.  Not that Levi's needed that edge...I mean, how inspiring can Robin Williams really be? Don't get me wrong; he was amazing in Dead Poets, but these days he's mostly a parody of himself.

Levi's followed up this piece of magnificence with yet another, this time with Whitman's Oh Pioneers! Oh Pioneers!:

And then this gem featuring Bukowski's The Laughing Heart:

Now, it's not lost on me that there are many who don't share my enthusiasm for this campaign; those who think the spots are too artsy for artsy's sake, at the expense of good product marketing.  Indeed, I can understand that viewpoint and think it's debatable with a proper argument supporting as much.  And I fully admit that much of my fascination with these spots is on account of the artistic merits.  But I do think there's more to it than that.  

First, I think it's a smart strategic play by Levi's as a response to the high-end designer denim fad that had by then taken firm root with many, and its influence ever-growing with previously fashion-phobic men. These ads position the brand as the anti frou-frou denim:  Not pretty; rugged.  Not bourgeois; proletariat. Not for display; for life. Not European; AMERICAN motherfucker. (Suck it Euros!)

At the time, in 2009, this could have been considered a bold move, bucking a well established fashion trend still gaining momentum. But I think the concept has aged well, and today seems rather prescient as (in my view) the high end denim fad among men will soon fade, to the extent that it already hasn't.

Secondly, emotional brand building is precarious work - as is any sort of emotional transaction - with more misses than hits in my opinion.  But done properly...at its best...the intended affect is barely discernible to the target audience (which is not everyone) and hardly quantifiable. To those outside of the target audience, the effort will be largely dismissed, or even mocked. But for (some) brand managers, and (all) brand planners, successful emotional brand building is an art...the pinnacle of their trade.  

And not having any data or evidence to back it up, I'd suggest the campaign has resulted in - or contributed to - a commercial (as in business, not T.V.) success for Levi's and re-established them as an iconic - and still relevant - American Brand.

"America, why are your libraries full of tears?"

As the devout readers of ILOP are well aware, I have been preoccupied with the idea of the next great hipster beer for some time now, as evidenced here and here. 

To summarize, I first placed my bet on Rolling Rock way back in October 2012, and further hedged my bets on Session Lager in June 2013 following a piece on Time.com ruminating on the very same issue I hold to be so important.  I still feel good about my predictions and was recently encouraged when the soon-to-be-next-hipster-hotspot in Cambridge recently opened. As you'll see if you're so inclined to peruse the menu...right there in the brilliantly conceived "Shot & A Beer" section...is a Rolling Rock served up with one of their specialty shots.  

All the same, the road to next hipster beer champion is long and arduous, littered with the empty cans of impostors, poseurs, has-beens, and never-haves.  Until PBR loses the belt, it's a revolving cooler door of challengers.

Spike Lee reveals that his inspiration for this mind-blowing opening credit sequence in "Do The Right Thing" was inspired by the opening credits in "Bye Bye Birdie."

In Spike's words:

Speaking of product placement, this scene really caught my eye....but less so for product placement reasons per se.  Now...sheepishly, I was way late to "Do The Right Thing," finally watching this 1989 classic in 2013.  (But hey...what's a mere 24 years?)  Given its age then, I was quite surprised to see a six-pack of Brooklyn Lager hanging out in that cooler, for several reasons.  

First, Brooklyn Brewery was founded in 1988, just one year before this film was released.  So if it was an intentional bit of product placement, kudos to the Brewery for the forethought.  It would have likely been in vain, however, being way ahead of the craft beer trend.

If, on the other hand, it was a mere coincidence and they took the shot with whatever beer was in that cooler, then that too seems a bit remarkable.  It seems such an unlikely product choice for a corner convenience store in the Bed-Stuy neighborhood of Brooklyn in 1989. 

But really, I think the most remarkable consideration is the BB package design....same as it is today....juxtaposed with the dated (albeit beautifully retro) Lite, Pepsi, and Mountain Dew cans.  It seems so out of place from today's perspective that it almost seems to be a time-travelling six-pack, sent back in time to show the way in good beer and good design to other breweries.

Whatever the case may be, it proves the acute brand and design acumen by the good folks at BB, who hired the distinguished Milton Glaser to design the logo, and further serves as a reminder on not only the importance of design in creating lasting and respected brands, but also on the imperative to do it from the very beginning, and to do it properly.  

P.J. O'Rourke wrote a nice piece for Time magazine detailing the Baby-Boomers' inability to let go of the sixties.  As evidence, he points to the current deluge of all-things-sixties, commemorating the 50th anniversary of every significant and tragic event occurring in the sixties.  Most recently, the non-stop two week coverage of the 50th anniversary of the assassination of JFK.  Occurring in 1963, still the early part of the decade, O'Rourke fears many more years of ad nauseam commemorations to the sixties. 

Not a Boomer myself - too young to be a Gen X'er and too old to be a Millennial - I am still old enough to have a healthy fascination and respect for the decade (as are scores of other folks too young to have lived them) in part because of its chaos, tragedy, and overall consequence to our nation's history and trajectory.

O'Rourke posits that this fascination, teetering on the verge of unhealthy obsession, results from an absence of "tragic catharsis, the moment when we are frozen between pity and terror and experience a purging of emotions."  There was no closure, no rock-bottom, no metaphysical lesson, no national or geopolitical event to shock a battered generation to a new trajectory.  To the witnesses, in O'Rourke's interpretation, the tragedies and confusion of the sixties linger as a some form of generational PTSD.

Like many my age, I look at the sixties with utter incomprehension of what it must have been like to live it.  But as Civil Standard is concerned, it had me thinking about yet another (and quite significant) of the many forms of identity we assume, struggle with, and attempt to reconcile in the greater cosmic context.

How then, I wonder, will our current still-infant millennium be remembered and commemorated fifty years hence?  What are the moments that will come to define it?  

Clearly it starts with 9/11.  But also two wars that like Vietnam seem a mistake and impossible to win, albeit two wars quite unlike Vietnam in their failure to affect the national consciousness, mood, and outrage in a similar tragic manner, seemingly forgotten to many. And what then of the housing bubble, its ensuing collapse, and near collapse of our country's (and therefore the world's) financial markets, followed by five years (and counting) of stagnant - followed by anemic - economic growth, high unemployment, and the risk of a Lost Decade akin to Japan's?  Or maybe it's the gridlocked and broken government system we're subject to, with its failure to accomplish and solve much of anything small, much less a gargantuan issue like the growing wealth disparity that threatens to affect our politics, economy, global competitiveness, and standard of living for generations to come, as articulated here, here, and here. 

And who then - which generation - to claim victim to the many (and counting) traumas of the last thirteen years?  Who will come to bear the ugliest scars from our current wounds? The Gen X'ers who bore witness to the horror of 9/11, ensuing wars, and lingering geopolitical unease and anxiety?  The Millennials who bore the brunt of negligent policy and financial practices (much at the hands of the Boomers themselves) resulting in lost jobs, lost wages, and lost hope for a better standard of living than their parents?

Conclusions await.  And while not alive during the sixties, the one inference I can draw between that era and this one - as it relates to Mr. O'Rourke's hypothesis - is that there appears to be no "tragic catharsis" in sight for our own ailments. While the events of our current tragedy-in-making may not on the whole be as acute, cut as deeply, and wound so critically as those from the sixties, ever since that fateful day and tragic blow in 2001 there has ever been an unrest, anxiety, and collectively painful simmering...a slow burn...of pessimism, hopelessness, and despair over our future.  The punches just keep on coming, and there is little hope of action or finality.  Stagnancy and inevitability seem to be the new norm, of which we are unable to break free.  Catharsis for our neuroses, I fear, seems impossible.

The January 2nd, 2014 edition of the Wall Street Journal had an excellent essay written by British-born Philip Delves Broughton, who decided it was time to become a U.S. citizen after ten years of residence, an American wife, and two American children.  Mr. Broughton offers an enlightened take on both his rationale for - and experience of - becoming a U.S. citizen.  In his decade of U.S. residency, Mr. Broughton observes that the collective American morale is in the doldrums.  And while maybe for good cause, Americans, he feels, fail to appropriately put the rewards of their citizenship in a greater context.  In short, in fretting over the bad, we fail to take gratitude in the good.  He further realizes that the more time spent in the States, the more financial and (more importantly) emotional investment he was making, he was being shortchanged the emotional rewards of proper citizenship. 

Upon being sworn in, the presiding judge (89 years young) urged the new citizens to "vote and to preserve whatever culture and heritage [they] had brought with [them]."  And what an excellent thing for that judge to say!  In other words..."this is yours too now, so help us shape it...but be sure not to forget from where you came.  Its okay to preserve your culture and heritage, even now as Americans."  And not only is it okay, but it's rather expected...because the richness and diversity of other cultures in a singular geographic place is one of the many rewards of being an American citizen.  For immigrants to abandon their culture and heritage would not only be an affront to their identity and ancestors, but it would equally rob us - Americans several generations entrenched - of the very things that make the world interesting, colorful, and magical. 

Mr. Broughton further details the conclusion of the ceremony with some parting thoughts:

We received our certificates of naturalization and a yellow envelope marked "The White House." In it was a "Dear Fellow American" letter from President Obama. "Since our founding, generations of immigrants have come to this country full of hope for a brighter future, and they have made sacrifices in order to pass that legacy on to their children and grandchildren," he wrote. "This is the price and the promise of citizenship. You are now part of this precious history, and you serve as an inspiration to those who will come after you."

The U.S. does this language so well. It is an antidote to cynicism. It revealed to me what a frail and incomplete thing it had been to live here as an observer rather than a full participant in civic life. I wish that those Americans who trash their country for its failings or doubt the value of their citizenship could give it up and reapply for it, just to see with fresh eyes what an astonishing gift it still is.

And this is refreshing, no?  That an outsider can see the hope and optimism in ways that we insiders cannot?  And it further speaks to his notion of citizenship as defined by his experience; whereas before he was a mere observer, only now has he been imparted the power of full participation.  Mr. Broughton has been privy to what is by most accounts an amazing and life altering experience.  His notion of citizenship is arguably elevated compare to many of us who were born into it and take it for granted.  

"Pettiness cannot be allowed to stand in the face of such overwhelming problems; so today we're not being petty. We are trying to be big, because the task we have before us is a big one."  - Rep. Barbara Jordan, delivered in front of the members of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee in her opening speech on the President Richard Nixon's Impeachment hearings.

Good Lord....where are these politicians today??  This is such a magnificent piece of public and political rhetoric.  (For the time strapped, the crux of the speech is delivered in the first 7 minutes.)

I am unsure of the credibility of 'American Rhetoric,' but they list this performance as number 13 on their list of the 100 most significant American political speeches of the 20th century.   (Note that Ms. Jordan also holds the number 5 spot for her keynote address at the 1976 Democratic National Convention.)