Story #6 "Superfreaky Memories" -- Luna

"Now the years are rolling by and you don't get any wiser
And the years are rolling on but you're going round and round
And these superfreaky memories have put me in my place
But my superfreaky memories are gone without a trace."

At the end of last millennium we thought were were going to revert back to the stone age thanks to the media's paranoid over-hype of Y2K which not only showed how little the majority of the world really understood computers, but also the sheer lengths the media would go to manipulate our fears. Compared to today's constant twenty-four hour outrage peddling, coverage of Y2K looks positively quaint. I actually explored this topic in a different story which I'll get to later.

Suffice it to say, we did not revert back to the Stone Age. And at first, the millennium started off quite well. 1999 saw the release of "The days of our nights," and some time in the following year (I think) Britta Phillips joined the band.

I first saw Luna play in the parking lot of the Andy Warhol Museum around that time, probably in 2000. I can't remember if there were multiple bands in a quasi-outdoor music festival that day or what, but if I remember correctly, they went on before sunset.

"The Days of Our Nights," had some standout tracks on it (Superfreaky Memories, Four thousand days, Hello Little One, and The Slow Song in particular) but other tracks seemed to meander a bit. Whereas albums like "Bewitched," and "Penthouse," had an offhand, aloof sort of sexiness about them, "Days," had a weariness about I hadn't noticed previously. On most of the album it felt unintentional. "Superfreaky Memories," was the exception. The song builds slowly and Dean's opening lyrics paints a vibrant scene "Well, we're swapping pharmaceuticals in Mussolini park, and wigglin' and wobblin' and dozin' in the dark." That's how you paint a picture.

As noted elsewhere, I've spent 18 years in advertising an industry that, Mad Men aside (which was more of a soap opera anyway) is very hard for outsiders to comprehend. It's filled with smart, kind people who are great problem solvers. It's also also filled with incredibly narcissistic assholes who are hacks.

Over the past few years, advertising has seemed to have moved away for the tried and true method of coming up with an idea that works in any medium, and instead jumped on whatever new bandwagon there is in digital in an effort to be first. Who cares if there's an idea. We were on Snapchat first. I'm generalizing obviously.

Considering how ADD most people are when it comes to their online life, this would actually seem like the worst place to reach someone, and more and more people are realizing how fraudulent ad traffic is,as well.

At some point I got to thinking about what the most absurd "next big thing," in advertising would be. The idea of putting ads in your dreams straddled the line between plausible and implausible, At first, I had a premise that started with a presentation at Cannes, but no story to back it up. Then after a few months of hitting a wall, I asked myself, how could something like this advertising go wrong in an unexpected way? Once I had the answer, the story took on a life of its own.

It was the last story I completed for the book but I didn't end with it. It seemed to work better coming off of "Feed Me," and before "Eye of Fatima." Or at least it did to me. All I know is, "oak pussy," will probably get stuck in your head after you read "Superfreaky memories," which is exactly the point.

A-Sides and B-Sides is available on iBook as well as Amazon and also Kobo and Nook. You can preview a nice chunk of it, too. Hope you'll consider buying if you like what you see. Here's what the cover looks like.