The "I Can't Believe It's a Marketing Plan!" Marketing Plan. (Originally titled: "What if I Dance for You Like This, Bitch?")

Ha! I found it! They can't keep me down now!

Working out today at my gym (taking almost a week off did more good than harm, interestingly), I finally found some concrete proof in the form of a bullshit little magazine called Stores. Actually NRF Stores. (National Retail Foundation?--even their mystery isn't real). The November copy of this magazine is $75 for a single copy.

Now that's only to get you to buy a subscription (those vigilant around customer manipulation will cry out here, no doubt), but a year is still $120 for 12 issues. Not that much, but considering they are almost entirely full of shit, not bad either. Their paid circulation is 32,000. So 3 and a half mil. before advertising, which is likely premium due to their readership.

As you may guess, Stores is about selling shit. Retail marketing. Fear, baby, fear! (And if you get that reference you get bonus points for X-treme cultural literacy). The ultimate in getting feelings/validation/prosperity/value from the outside in. Like a national conference of cheerleaders, only not half as cute, no fun, and completely devoid of any excitement, hip movement, titillation, sex appeal, enjoyment or emotion.

And I should know. I used to be in marketing. Love my FEAR now, baby!!!

And also now, according to Tom Peters, Malcom and the other gurus of glub, the only thing that customers care about is feelings. Being real. Love. Shit, we've got to add that to all this other junk? There's a reason that POS has two meanings. Piece of S*&t. And, in marketing, Point of Sale. : )

But you don't need me to tell you that marketing is the equivalent of a heart, gut and soul abortion. If you make over $30K a year, you already know. What do you need me to tell you? What do you want me to tell you?

You want me to tell you that there's a magic other way. That once we blink and everyone gets smart and good and liberal, cares about the war in Iraq enough and shops at the co-op instead of Whole Foods, and develops better micro-brews, (or starts reading the National Review, etc) that we'll have a sustainable economy and culture, even though you're tired of everyone at the co-op already and no amount of micro-brews, novel or not, did anything for your sustainability this Christmas. You want me to tell you that you can just continue on as you've been going and things will eventually change on their own/work out/ get better.

You want me to tell you that we can have meaningful and cheap creative and editorial content and not get poisoned by product placement, sponsorship, and advertisers' crass fear and desperation in general while subsidizing it it. Squeek by the cheap, crass and fearful and transcend without changing a thing—without paying for it. That we can live somewhere other than where we work. That we can live other than how we work. That we can live in a hospital and raise healthy and happy kids because we've almost found a way to deal with it and if we just had a little more time to do yoga and ate better and thought more like the Dalai Lama...

And I'd love to tell you that. Only it's not true. Which I know because I committed myself completely to that life and got nothing but depression, lame relationships, unhappy work and fear. I was even afraid of fear!

I had more money than I had ever had. I got checks for $20K. I had my own office that I shared with other artists, got to work at 11 and left at 6. Ate lunch. Skateboarded in my office (and played pool--we had a 7,000 sq. foot loft in downtown Seattle). What else is considered cool--oh, I would go to Sun Valley for meetings where my clients would buy me $50 lift tickets for three runs just so I wouldn't say I had been there and didn't go. And bought me nice lunches on top of the mountain.

Working 5 months a year this way, I covered all my expenses and bought the most killer guitars and bikes and cameras. Then traveled around the world. I was a designer, and so "creative" at work (which as far as I can tell means that managers and VPs get to mess with things you care about rather than things you find absurd--still progress, I guess, just no answer). I rode my purple Masi to work, got paid $1000 a day for photo shoots (that was more money back then), and generally "kept it real" in a kind of 90s post-grunge manner. I didn't even shower every day. I cut my own hair.

And I didn't give a shit. Still don't. The more money I had the worse I felt. Not because of the money, the money was the only slight balm, but because they, "the man", never gives out a fucking dime that he doesn't get ya back with .15 of fear, hatred and general panic.

So what, big whoop.

But I fucked and messed around with objectively gorgeous women!, I insist. I was backstage at the coolest shows! Drinking the bands beer while they played and throwing the afterparty. Had real-life rock stars and millionaire punk rockers (real ones from good bands, btw, not cheesy ones) fucking up my Metallica albums while trying to Dj. (All in the book and more fun, btw). If cool worked, it would have worked for me. I had my own clothing company (T hree) spewing anti-fashion as quickly as it could.

Bloop de-bloop debloop debloop. It doesn't even matter. Cool can't feel cool. Cool can't even feel.

So...., what I have to tell you--and yes, I do have a point--is that the only way out is what we want. We want to be cool, you cry! No you don't. You want to be warm.

Cool is all we can afford, you insist. Life isn't supposed to be fun. This is what reality feels like. This is as good as it gets! Millions before us have tried to improve their lot and found almost nothing. The ones who tried (van Gogh, Basquiat, Hendrix, etc.) went crazy, were fucked up, neglected their kids. We can't do that. We can't risk that.

We can't afford the real thing. We can't pay what a real couch, a real book, a real album, a real magazine cost! We can't make anything more beautiful than Leonard Cohen. Hotter than the Suicide Girls. We have to buy sweatshop goods. Levis should use their profits to pay those people more. Nothing else'll sell! —So, you'll always be in marketing, I reply? Your kids will be third generation marketing masters? Talking about emotional branding ten hours a day, with even less paperwork and fewer consultants? (Or was it more?) Fugazi is the truth, you retort—real holy men do it for free?!? For the kids!

No, they don't. Not for drunk, slumming/sloppy and petulant kids, anyway. Not for cool kids, when there are no warm. Not while the adults were starving. And trying to live through their kids—as if they could get them any farther than themselves. Despite their overloaded bank accounts. After getting used to being empty. And were raising kids to be the empty opposite of themselves. To be forced into punk. To be forced into hate and being against. Their own families. Rich OR poor. Because their parents were empty. And it wasn't about the money. But being present. And the current economy, the richest and most powerful one in the history of all knowledge, didn't allow that. Cringed at that. Hated that. Feared that. Crushed that. And mom and dad had made the decision to get on the bus. While everyone else devoted their life to trying to destroy it.

Real holy men would do it for their own kids! Their own inner kids! Would make a way that people could be more valuable being themselves, now that everyone knows how to go fast, be productive, self-edit, shut the fuck up and be other. And be a brat, question authority, drop out, shock the bourgeoise, and party.

Real holy men would make a culture that was real-the-fuck-sustainable. Enjoyable sustainable, not more prefect meetings and always thinking about recycling sustainable. That motherfuckers enjoyed. No-meetings,-lots-of-trust-and-juicier-fucking sustainable. More love and intimacy sustainable. Doing what you want sustainable. Waking up happy sustainable. To discover you have a beautiful wife and kids sustainable. And were emotionally available for your kids sustainable. Money or no money sustainable! And so were loved to be around sustainable. That kids giggled and laughed for sustainable. That babies felt. That felt babies. And had the time to be sane. To feel their lives, to feel their wives. What this beautiful, perfect shit actually means! You do know that this life means something right? That it is screaming, pounding its fist (or shoe--like Kruschev), insisting, demanding, whispering, and crying lovingly about love and holding to your truest self every microsecond, right? That love asserts itself constantly, completely and whole-ly, right?! Right in front of us, right?

Real holy men would stare down this entire charade of a civilization and say "a-aight". "Fine." "Works for me". I'm happy to do whatever it takes to do exactly what I want. And here's what it cost me so here's what it costs. I can't make it any cheaper and I don't want to fuck with anyone who doesn't believe. Here's a real sustainable economy. Take it or leave it. Come on over when you get tired of Kibble and Bits. The invitation is open and standing. I'll fluff you constantly on my blog for free. But the real thing cost real money. Eventually you'll have to step to it. Get real. Or you kids will. No biggie.

(Krishnamurti, interestingly, claimed that 4 people who really knew what was going on--who were thoroughly present--could, WOULD HAVE TO, change the world thoroughly and immediately. He was wrong, of course, which can be seen by the fact that he was fucking his best friend's wife for thirty years while he managed K's books, but I like the idea. It actually will only take one person. And every time one does, the world does change radically. Just imagine how radical love would be if we all did it. Dude #1 (hey, it's my blog): premium mass culture makes doing what you love pay, Dude #2: integrating personal knowledge and science produces cold fusion, makes rationality warm enough to wield free energy lovingly (you know that's what we're waiting for, right?), Dudette #3: —see I don't even know what women are going to do. That's how limited my big picture skills are. So just imagine what we'll do once we harness the power of inspiration (loving) the way we've harnessed motivation (pushing). Mastered support and magnetism the way we've mastered control and friction (baby). This is all that's left to do! What's up, mi bredren??)

Knut Hamsun went off and did manual labor after writing Hunger. A book that eventually revolutionized modern literature. Changed your life. Allowed you to be a person. More free. If you knew what was good for you, you would hunt down the Knut Hamsuns and make sure their bank accounts were fat. Out of pure greed and selfishness. I would. (And am). In the future, this will be called the gift economy, built lovingly and voluntarily on top of our current material, skeptical economy. People will routinely lead with money. Create with it. Believe with it like there was no tomorrow.

But you don't know what's good for you. And you think that Mssrs. Eggers and Jonathan Franzen are our Knut Hamsuns. Even though their sustainable culture is neither, really. And you didn't even enjoy reading it. Just thought it was cool and heard it on NPR (don't get me started on them--white news and black music, when what we need more than ever is black news and white music—and I don't mean Tavis Smiley and Modest Mouse, sorry Tavis).

Which is the reason the best artist could give away all he or she wanted and have it never amount to anything. Because a fearful public would never buy love—a mature, responsible, fun, honest, dare I say "sustainable" culture—out of fear (the way it could be Radical Chic and Mao Maoed into buying the counter-culture). The way you shop yields what you create. Fear creates fear. But shop in love and with faith (and I mean real love and faith, not Halmark/Protestantism's narrow versions) and you'll create it. How could it be otherwise?

I actually though about giving The Love Artist away. What could be more loving, duh? But then I realized that a leaky pail can take all the water you can spare. And still end up 100% empty. And a crazy person can hear they're crazy every two seconds and never bat an eye. It's the sane one that looses it.

So we'll have to meet in the middle. Unless you know me personally. Not my rules, but I understand mutuality and I don't flinch for two-bit hos, 1 night stands, or really cool, new improved pimps. As much as I'd like to. I know it don't work.

But none of that is really my business. My business is simply to say that in an economy that now understands it relies upon emotion and right relationships to sell (which it always has), that a $75 magazine about statistical sales bullshit necessarily implies the existence of a $300 one about love. And a $350 one. And $3500 movies. And $35 ones. And $200 cds. And $200 songs. Whether or not these products ever make it to market being, of course, a function of how often and how completely you, the creative consumer and master of your own reality, entertain your significant fears. Of love and money.

And, whether or not you buy my motherfucking book, The Love Artist. Honey.

You are now in charge of the entire world's reality. Starbucks, magazines about Proven Solutions for COnnected Retailers, Prada, The Shins. You create and destroy the world with the wake of your loving (if distracted) attention. The world is broken. The question is: will you react in fear, creating a world where the negative is accentuated and the positive is hidden just because a world where the positive was accentuated and the negative was hidden didn't work, or will you create exactly what and how you want with all the faith, love, belief and math you can muster?

No, that's bullshit. The question is not if but when? Cause it will happen. And the question is, will it be you—will YOU say "I can, no MUST afford it no matter what it takes"—or will you leave it to your children (who will then have to make the exact same decision without your approval; against your wishes; rebelling against your values and beliefs to do so; hating what you were unable to be; work to destroy your way of life just to live; and having to leave you, the family, and the clan to find truth and happiness)?

Take your time and consider your answer well. Do the math (I know you're a genius). Cause I'm way too sane to be wrong.

[Note: My friend rang me up over the holidays to ask if there wasn't some middle ground. If it was really all or nothing with me. He works with kids in Seattle and does great stuff. In many respects I was raised to be more like him than I ended up. I don't remember my answer, but I assured him that The Love Artist wasn't an abberation. That there wasn't something else wonderful that I was going to end up doing after getting this love and money stuff out of my system (I'm 38, yo!). No other better, easier application of what I've learned. Another friend I asked for $7 mil. to jump start White G said the same thing: White Gold, no, but keep me appraised of your next project. I like what you're doing. (That was 5 years ago).

I guess my answer now is why beat yourself up? Just buy the book or don't. It's not that anything will be taken away from the world, just that millions will now choose to create a much more loving, real and honest economy on top of what we currently have. The world is what it is no matter what I say. If you're looking for more then go look. When you get tired of new age sooth-sayers and gurus (both marketing and spiritual), then maybe you'll be interested in the truth. It's not that big of a deal. And believing in it or not doesn't change it one way or another. It just is.

All The Love Artist is is the truth. All White Gold is is the truth. All this blog is is the truth. My truth. Beautiful, flawed, perfect, heated, boring, genius, repetitive, inspired, juvenile, etc. And if that doesn't work, nothing else matters, does it? There are plenty of people who say the truth is only valuable when pasturized (otherwise you'll get botchulisme), to which I reply, you must never have had fresh milk. Or patted a cow, or gotten to know a farmer. You only need to pasturize when you insist on living across parking lots and freeways from farms. And in places where you can't trust whoever is selling you stuff. This is just as true emotionally and spiritually as it is physically and culturally.

And just like organic farmers 20 years ago, if the truth don't work, I'll go install rock gardens. Or make the next ad you see for nsbgroup.com really intriguing. Just like that whore in Italy with her shirt off as I drove past at 30mph. Frustrated and lonely. (I didnt' forget her did I?—so compelling was her brand—but I also didn't stop). I'll get medical insurance like my mom suggests and marry someone who'll do. Struggle through the holidays with my mother-in-law with the tastefully done, natural-looking face lift and the banker dad. Fight with the love of my life instead of offending their neurotic sensibilities, get pissed, and eventually end up just like 'em. When's the game on Bobby? Tell my kids that life isn't fair. That they should have a back-up plan if they want to make music. Or paint. Or write. Or make movies. Or do the only things that I ever in my whole life considered valuable. And that they should spend their most formative and creative years, the only ones where they've got a gnat's chance in hell of knowing what it is they love to do, preparing for the back-up plan. Ah yes, life as back-up. Backing up instead of backing that azz up!

Whoops—starting to sound like a broken record—it's all in the book. Only it's more like fucking and not so much like jacking off to the Joy of Sex!]

See ya in the funny pages!