"What happened to you?"

In ZMET interviews, we frequently hear how certain heritage brands enable people to return to their youth and escape the stultifying adult world.  However, these nostalgic feelings can be difficult to execute on creatively.  You can make a bunch of ads that are sappy and maudlin, but for most brands that doesn’t work very well.  It makes the brand feel outdated, and not terribly relevant.

However, this ad for Rolling Stone leverages nostalgia beautifully, and is intended to remind people of their youth, what they have lost, and what Rolling Stone can help them get back.

The imagery in here is wild.  It starts with a depiction of childbirth, and goes on from there to weave in breast milk, screaming infants, wall graffiti, guitars, and office cubicles. All in a blistering, psychedelic, highly metaphorical 30 seconds.