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Welcome to The Beat by Rockstar CMO. I’m Ian Truscott, a CMO, trusted advisor, strategy consultant and Chief Bottle Washer at Rockstar CMO. In this newsletter, I’d like to share a mix of what’s caught my eye, topics from our podcast, and our street knowledge blog.
Hello there!
LL Cool J is in the UK this week. After appearing at the European MTV Awards, he was on the BBC news show this morning promoting his new album, The FORCE. A track on the album is The Force, which is the subject line of this newsletter issue.
As you probably know, I am of a similar vintage as him and a fan of his early work, so while I don’t usually do morning TV, I paused to watch.
His album title, The FORCE, is an acronym that I suspect many hustle porn marketers or creator ninjas would have loved to have coined; it stands for Frequencies Of Real Creative Energy.
The interview was an interesting and reasonably deep conversation. It didn’t just focus on promoting his latest music, but it explored his relationship with creativity. It referenced long-form content (albums), the importance of being engaged in the story (song/rap lyrics), and the temptation of the one-liners that work on social media (the hook).
Not only were there these references to form if you squint at it through a content marketer’s lens, but I also thought it was very on point with all the post-AI conversations we are having around content creation: Frequencies of Real Creative Energy.
Maybe I was reading too much into this, but it does remind me of a conversation on one of my favorite podcasts - The Extraordinary Business Book Club - where, in episode 424, host Alison Jones, chatted with author Patrick Dixon about his book How AI Will Change Your Life.
I doubt Patrick Dixon, who’s written 18 books and whose website says he is “often described as Europe's leading Futurist,” has ever been in the same conversation as LL Cool J, but he talked about the concept of connection and energy.
Both in terms of being a writer and what you are putting into the world and being the reader - as he says in the interview:
…. why did you buy the book? The only reason you bought the book was not a collection of essays written by AI. You can get that online. The reason they bought the book is because they want to connect with the spirit of the writer.
The spirit of the writer.
I like this description.
As Patrick also points out in this conversation, books are held in a reverence that digital content isn’t. You could print out 400 pages of a blog and burn it, and nobody would care. Burn a book, and well, that’s quite a different thing.
We’ve all been talking about what humans bring to content creation. We’ve talked about storytelling, innovation, and invention. We've also discussed the fact that all machines can do is reframe and regurgitate what has gone before.
But this spirit thing - that connection - that’s what generative AI won’t give you.
Or even my love/hate relationship with Grammarly, as it tries to iron out my f’in’ spirit.
I’m curious what you think as I try to inject a bit of spirit here today, tomorrow in my LinkedIn Tuesday 2¢ column, and on the Rockstar CMO FM podcast at the weekend. Do any of these connect with your spirit :-)
Thanks for reading this far! Have a great week.
Cheers!
Ian
Ian Truscott | Chief Bottle Washer Rockstar CMO
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The week’s street knowledge….
Get your Monday Marketing Mojo Working
Yes, I mentioned his new music, which is splendid for a fan, but let’s dip into the classics….