Hasta La Creative!

Advertising creatives love to harp on a good pun, but rarely do they push it so far into bat-shit territory that it turns into a form of genius.

A new summer intern recruitment music video from Mother takes the “Fresh Meat” metaphor to its event horizon—pounding its hook into a juicy, irresistible mess, just like any good pop song should. 

Enjoy a psychedelic trip through a world of dancing, flying, spinning raw cuts—hamburgers, chickens, steaks, and roasts, to name a few. There’s homage to Lady Gaga, in the form of a meat wig. There are affirmative lyrics aimed at boosting the self-esteem of sausages. There’s even a meat kaleidoscope. There is so much more (including, in all likelihood, Illuminati references)—but drenched in epic 1980s-style staging and visual effects, the whole thing is basically a Gen X butcher’s acid fantasy.

Sure, it’s a brazen grab for virality, but it’s so funny and rich in ostentatious insanity, who cares? It also probably helps that it’s a near-perfect metaphor for the advertising industry—you might walk in as a choice piece of wagyu, but once you’ve gone through the grinder, you’re sure to come out the other end as a sorry, charred, and over-salted beef patty.

Or maybe that’s just life, in general. 

Some major publishers are dropping their unpaid internship programs in the face of complaints, but they might be missing the point.

The case could upend a long-held practice in the film industry and other businesses that rely heavily on unpaid internships.