“Set the controls for the heart of the sun.”
“we’re being pushed to design humanity back into the economy of thought.”
Greetings from the frontlines of the war against bad design. A place where I explore the connection between art, and faith and all other things that pique my interests. Good news, I’ve finally had some time to polish some ideas that I have been carving out haphazardly for the last several days. One of them is that the Pink Floyd film, Live in Pompeii is must-watch TV for designers and design students, and possibly one of the finest marketing efforts ever put on film.
There is this scene, and I will post an image below if I can find a way to steal one off the internet later. The camera pans upward, from behind the band, from behind the black amplifier stacks that are pitch black and bare, and each one has the words “Pink Floyd. London” In starkly contrasting white stenciled letters. As the camera rolls upward, it clears from the obstruction of the amps to reveal a muted but visceral setting sun from the inside of an ancient Greek ruin of a small outdoor colosseum. The year was 1971. But of course now, it’s the year 2025 and I was sitting in an Imax watching a limited screening of this film that is celebrating it’s re-release and also a remixed soundtrack album to go along with it.
Let me first say, that the imagery in this film is basically everything Wes Anderson has ever tried to achieve but without the pretentious kitschy-ness, because it’s authentically filmed in that time period and also is a legitimately ironic concept: a larger than life rock band performing in an Pompeiian ruin. If it was creatively ironic in 1971, then how much more so in 2025, when the band has basically come and gone, but is still almost as relevant today among many different groups, from Hi Fi music enthusiasts to vintage album collectors and pop culture fans worldwide. Consider it.
As I watched the film, I thought about the dead Greek gods. About Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy. I thought about the eruption of Mount Vesuvius and the petrified remains of the people who were killed in that eruption and buried in volcanic ash. I thought about technology, sound technology, and guitar amplifiers. I thought about technological advancement and how far we have come since 1971, I thought about artificial intelligence and drone warfare. I thought about font choices and color correction, psychedelia, and the modern age. I thought about how I need to take my white Mexican Stratocaster to my friend Daniel for a string replacement and a setup. I thought about how I am getting older. I thought about the new business Urban Bison that I have just started and how I so desperately want to create art and good design that can inspire others to think and to create and to be just as inspired as I was at that moment watching this film.
As designers, we talk a lot about creating “inspiring” work. But when was the last time you were truly inspired by graphic design?
I’d bet that moment of inspiration wasn’t about the design itself—for design’s sake—but something deeper. Something in you connected with what the design represented.
That’s what happened to me watching Live at Pompeii. There’s something about witnessing the passage of time—sitting in a theater in 2025, watching a band perform in 1971, inside a colosseum buried in volcanic ash, way back in 61 AD. It felt like some kind of reverse-anachronism. A collapse of eras. And somehow… that really moved me.
So here’s the point—before I drift too far into fanboy territory:
Good design is timeless. And timeless design moves us because it’s simple, real, and brave.
That’s both a truth and a challenge.
Especially now—when AI threatens the individuality of design—we’re being pushed to design humanity back into the economy of thought.
It’s no coincidence, I think, that the high-water mark of rock & roll (say, 1960–1979) overlapped with a golden age of design. Especially graphic design, which has always been a marriage of creativity and tech.
There’s a scene in the film where Roger Waters defends his use of early synths and mod gear. He says something like, “It’s not like the machine’s playing itself—we still have to play it.”
Well, Roger...
Now the machine can play itself.
AI can make music, design, art—by pulling from everything we've ever posted and mashing it into something “passable.” Something that’ll blend into the endless scroll of “content” and feed our insatiable desire for more dopamine.
But here’s the difference: “Passable” once had a much higher threshold of acceptability.
Artists like Floyd lived on the fringes. They pushed the tech. They made something lasting.
I like to think we will never lose the capacity creatively to do just that.
I hope that from within our generation, new sonic and visual explorers will emerge—artists who, in the spirit of creation and bearing the image of God, will press into new frontiers of creativity while staying rooted in what makes them human.
Like the ancient Greek heroes carved into the ruins of Pompeii, creating legacy, and not just content.
