Face Off?
Listening to Daft Punk has got me feeling a little punk myself. Still from the short film Interstella 5555 by Daft Punk
I got a new sparkling water machine this week and I am embarrassingly excited about it. It’s so sexy and I was thrilled to consider this purchase a business expense.The bottles are these tall architectural steel things with marble knobs on the caps. I know knobs are having a moment right now, but they look like they belong on the counter of someone whose apartment doubles as a mini art gallery. I got them specifically for the Good Boy Wine and Friends festival on June 27 out in the LA Arts District, where FlyBoy will be among the first NA beverages at this event (we’re honored, gobsmacked, and so excited). The moment I pulled these artful bottles and the accompanying machine out of their respective boxes, I wanted to photograph them, post them, tag the brand, and tell everyone I knew. There is something so perfect about a beautiful object in the service of another beautiful thing you’re building.But then I put my phone down. Because I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to show people everything.I drove out to LA from Tennessee recently, which is a very long drive that I would never recommend unless you have a lot you need to mentally process. To break up all those hours, I started listening to Dissect, a podcast that breaks down albums note by note, line by line, with the kind of obsessive care that feels almost liturgical. The season I’ve been in is on Daft Punk: their full catalog, their history, the ethos they built over decades of making music entirely on their own terms. They were, quite literally punk in their process, even though they blew up in the mainstream. They maintained no label pressure, no image management in the traditional sense, and no role as a Famous Person for an audience that wanted one. They gave you the helmets, and they gave you the music, and they said, "Listen to the music and let it be the thing that speaks”.And the music was so good that you did. (P.S., if you disagree, please listen to this podcast. I’m in awe of their technical and artistic talent.)I’ve been in strategy sessions lately with a studio I love and trust, with people I’ve known for a long time. I hired them because I knew I was too close to my own thing to see it clearly. One of the questions that came up was: Where do you see yourself on the pendulum? Are you the face of FlyBoy? Or is the brand elusive enough that anyone could be a FlyBoy? Or do you want the founder behind FlyBoy to be a mystery?My honest answer was a rambling rush that probably ran about four minutes longer than necessary. The truth is, I’ve been feeling off about this tension for a while (re: Building in Secret). This unease popped up again when a marketing agency I spoke with months ago talked about creating a package for founder-led content: template reads, short-form videos, personal branding, and having my face attached to the aperitif. Something in me went rigid because that style of marketing (for better or worse…we’ll find out) doesn’t align with me.If you’ve ever looked at my Instagram, you’ll know that I have maybe four photos of myself total in the entire grid. Mostly, you’ll see film photos I’ve taken of other people, moments I wanted to hold onto, and some old poetry. I am a deeply in-person person. I would take a long walk with you over a phone call, a phone call over a text, a text over a tagged post, every single time. There’s a Dave Eggers novel called The Circle about what happens when transparency becomes total and the self becomes content. This book has lodged itself so permanently in my nervous system that I don’t think I’ll ever fully shake it.I’ve also been reading Lena Dunham’s Fame Sick, which is doing absolutely nothing to make me feel better about the responsibility that comes with becoming a face.Founder storytelling matters, and I’ll show up for it when it counts. But I keep coming back to this: what if the most interesting version of the story is the one where you have to come find it?The sparkling water machine is still on my counter. I’ll photograph it when it’s ready. Come see it in real life at Good Boy Wine & Friends if you don’t want to wait.It’s knowing the difference between an entrance and a leak.Each time Daft Punk went dark, they never disappeared. They were always exactly where they wanted to be, when they wanted to be there. And they never gave you what you expected next. Mile after mile through Tennessee and Texas, that’s what I was thinking about. The helmets weren’t walls. They were a redirection: look at the music.See you on June 27th if you’re in LA. Come find the girl with the steel bottles with the cool knobs (and hundreds of FlyBoy lighters).Wheels up,Margo, Founder of FlyBoy AperitifFlyBoy is a non-alcoholic aperitif in development. Follow along at your own pace. And sign up for our waitlist to be the first to hear about our flavor drops.
