I am reading a book that was first published in 1923, which feels exhilarating. I learned about it via one of my new favourite podcasts called Founders. The host honours lineage and how the greats of today build upon, remix or create from the work and ideas of those that came before us. Not such a wild concept, but so often the past is lost or dismissed in the modern era.
So when the host is doing their deep dive on say Warren Buffet, and Buffet praises the impact of David Ogilvy, that endorsement is taken seriously. And then in a future episode he goes and deep dives on Ogilvy and in that research, he learns about Claude Hopkins, and so he does an episode on Hopkins. So on and so forth.
So here we are. With the 1923 published book - Scientific Advertising, by what some say is the greatest copywriter in history. He was paid $185,000 USD in 1907, or about the equivalent of $5 million today. And here I am, with all my "years of writing" and only just now learning from one of the greats!
There's an overarching theme in all the episodes of Founders, irrespective of your discipline, domain, craft or interests, it's never too late to learn from the best who've done it before you.
I've talked so much about it in person the past month, I realised I never wrote to you all about it. But I watched Interstellar, and it “changed my life”. Ha! I use this phrase loosely, figuratively and literally!
I "should" have watched it when it first came out in 2014 and I often think about what it's like to experience something the first time it was ever released or performed. Obviously with a film, trailers and media around it - the stage is sort of set before you even go to the theatre or stream it. You've heard about it from a friend or read a review encouraging you to see it. My motivation with experiencing the film when it was first released is around the chance to have seen it on the big screen, big sound and with my undivided attention. It's about having missed out on the chance to have experienced at its absolute best.
But at the other end of the spectrum, there's this desire in me to have experienced something before it was a “thing”. Like, you won’t know how good it is or the impact it will have until later, but you were there at the beginning.
For example, Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit. For the last few months I have been listening to it regularly, watching Youtube videos on how it was produced; reading up on how/why its ranking on Rolling Stone's Top 500 Songs of All Time continues to rise; and even taking the point of view and articulating to others how the case can be made it's the greatest song ever made. When I watch a recording from April 1991 of their first live performance of the song, I think, "Wow. To have been present in the moment that shaped history."
I would have been a bit young to have been at this show, but it's this example that I think about in all the great things I enjoy or have become my favourites in my life.
To be a part of a moment that creates the future.
Just realised while writing this, how the algorithm/recommendation engine of the internet allowed me to create the above. It was a clip with Hans Zimmerman that said his soundtrack for Interstellar was his favourite. So I watched the movie. And the other was of a guy skateboarding down a hill in the rain. And the soundtrack? An electronic remix of Smells Like Teen Spirit.
So there you go. Some photos below. February 2023.
Best.
Jamie