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!