Wanna Know What I Hate?

I am an emotional man.

I wear my emotions on my sleeve and on my pants ( I did not say "in my pants") and on my face and in my writing - my emotions see more of the light of day than my soul or my tortured personality or my truth.

Goddamn advertisers know exactly what they are doing and this pisses me off. They compromise my intelligence by superceding my defense mechanisms.

Even as time passes me by, many commercials are still aimed at my generation. I can be seduced by beautiful women hawking products that I think I need or want, but in my heart of hearts I know the message is not directed towards me.

I can tell by the women, I can tell by the product, I can tell by the music.

Yeah, the music.

Brief aside: I have been a fan of Playboy for most of my life. You can read whatever you want to into that and it doesn't really matter to me - I don't give a damn about your opinion. I have always been a fan of the culture of Playboy - the lifestyle the magazine represented.

It was always a bonus to look at these gorgeous women, but you get to a point in your life - very quickly - where you are older than they are. And you keep getting older while their age remains the same.

You can appreciate the beauty, but if you have half a brain in your head you understand that their reality can never be your reality.

I feel the same about the women I see in ads - if they are too young and too beautiful, they are not trying to sell me a goddamn thing.

However, the music is more important.

If they are playing music that I grew up with, music that I love - they are trying to connect with me.

And I get sucked in.

I hear a song that I love, a song that I can connect with and - kaboom - I am there. My brain connects with my past, my emotions respond appropriately and I am lost.

Until reality sets in, I get to the end of the commercial and it is some goddamn monolith of a company trying to trick me into understanding how badly I need to spend my money on their product.

I hate that moment.

In 1968, Jim Morrison blew a fucking fuse when his band mates sold "Light My Fire" to Buick for $75,000 for a commercial selling the Buick Opel. Jim was out of the country at the time and had no input into the decision.

He contacted GM and told them that if they ran the commercial he would sue them and destroy an Opel in public with a sledgehammer.

As far as I know the commercial never ran.

The first time I heard a Beatles song in a commercial I was stunned. It seemed like a horrific betrayal.

However, I understand Pete Townshend's opinion on the subject when he was criticized for selling his music for commercials and TV shows. He said: "They are my fucking songs, I wrote them and I will do whatever I want with them."

Brief aside: I have not done the research but I firmly believe that "Eminence Front" by Pete Townshend is the most frequently used song in commercial TV.

Anyway......................I have a difficult time reconciling my emotional connection with the music I love with commercial whoring and artists' right to make money.

I want my relationship to the music I love to remain pure.