I’m supposed to reflexively raise a stink when pure artistry is adapted in the name of capitalism. Tainted! Ruined! Encouraging an evil. Yet Levi’s “Go Forth” commercial spots have such beautiful urgency, a haunting narration, that I cannot help but love them. Walt Whitman in any form, s’il vous plaît.

The cinematography is top-notch, cinéma vérité mixed with home movies. Sullen exposure that showcases the inky blackness. I’m reminded of Pavement’s album Terror Twilight, named after that uneasy time between sundown and complete darkness. Backed by both Whitman’s own reading of “America” (from a rare wax cylinder recording) and Will Geer‘s salute-worthy rendition of “Pioneers! O Pioneers!”, these spots make me lust for more Whitman.

Purchasing new jeans is a mere secondary effect, as a clear message emerges that Levi’s are built for certain things: trouncing about uninhibited, relishing nature, carpe diem.

Do the feasters gluttonous feast?
Do the corpulent sleepers sleep? have they lock’d and bolted doors?
Still be ours the diet hard, and the blanket on the ground,
Pioneers! O pioneers!

Has the night descended?
Was the road of late so toilsome? did we stop discouraged nodding
on our way?
Yet a passing hour I yield you in your tracks to pause oblivious,
Pioneers! O pioneers!

Till with sound of trumpet,
Far, far off the daybreak call–hark! how loud and clear I hear it wind,
Swift! to the head of the army!–swift! spring to your places,
Pioneers! O pioneers!

There’s much joy in comparison. Inara George has a new online-only album about to drop this month titled Accidental Experimental. She has two previous albums under her solo belt, including an orchestral romp bearing the name An Invitation with arrangement stud Van Dyke Parks (remember the lush Beach Boys orchestrations?) On this brand new LP, she rehashes a Parks collaboration on the song “Accidental.” It flits and slides from key to key, a likely nightmarish sound for the general populace, but an aural treat for a difficult man like myself. And so, ladies and gentlemen, let’s get down to brass tacks:

[audio: https://ofadam.com/blogaudio/inarageorge_accidental_old.mp3] Old version: Orchestral arrangements automatically add a few points of musical karma to even the trash produced by the Lars Ulrichs and Metallicas of the world. It’s frantic, maybe detrimentally, but each listen rewards with a new discovery. Layers slide aside, revealing such brilliant dissonance that certain wrong notes resolve into something very right. It is a wild garden, untamed and unkempt.

[audio: https://ofadam.com/blogaudio/inarageorge_accidental_new.mp3] New version: The “remake” reminds me of an edited manuscript. The chaff is boiled away, leaving a malty substance that gets right to the point. Harpsichords enter at minute one, and the initial impression is extreme pleasure; this is musical velvet. It saunters onward, until the 2:50 mark, when the carousel runs out of gas and those with decent audio systems are gently massaged with a bass line stepping downward into the basement.

But like any contest, there must be a victor. You iron your cotton shirts, stack your dishes in neat piles and generally stay within the dashed lane markers while automobiling. That’s enough order in life; go for the pandemonium.