(Hunky men in minimal swimsuits, but nothing actually X-rated. The posting is about the presentation of self in photographs, via clothing, stance, gait, facial expression, gaze, and the like. Not much about language here.)
11/9 Daily Jocks sale ad for Marcuse underwear and swimwear:
(#1) Come Wander With Me
He came from the sunset
He came from the sea
He came from my sorrow
And can love only meHe said, “Come wander with me, love
Come wander with me
Away from this sad world
Come wander with me”
The garment. It’s the Marcuse Arrest Me swim brief, available in at least the following colors: in lime, pale blue, white, grey, red, black, marine (blue), pastel green, yellow, orange, pink, blue.
The DJ ad offered:
20% OFF MARCUSE THIS WEEKEND
If you want to look good and feel great, you might not be able to resist the sexy designs and enhancement features of a pair of Marcuse underwear or show off by the pool with a pair of their very low rise swimwear
Super low swim briefs for people brave enough to bare some skin and look super sexy! Simple design with embroidered gold Marcuse logo at the back.
The model in #1 appears to be striding out of the surf. He’s loose-limbed, very loosely (as well as minimally) clothed, with fly-away hair and a complex expression: narrowed eyes, slack open mouth, maybe half-smiling, maybe flirting, maybe teasing, maybe cruising. More on reading faces in a moment, but right now study the way his body is presented, and compare it to a standard presentation for men in premium homowear — here’s another model, posing statically in a different color of the Arrest Me swim brief:
(#2)
#1 is (staged as) informal and unposed, while #2 is a male-art formal portrait, with the subject holding a conventional pose I’ve called pitsntits.
The facial expression in #2 is also conventional, a variant of the Cruise of Death, a penetrating, dominating stare. In #1 we get something more like a snapshot taken unawares, and the model’s face can be read in many ways; it’s intriguing in a way that #2’s is not (I’ve posted dozens of underwear ads with facial expressions like #2’s).
The background. Nevertheless, #1 probably isn’t just an informal framing; it’s likely an allusion to the landmark gay porn film Boys in the Sand, and more indirectly to the whole mansex on the beach genre of male art, gay porn, and gay cartooning.
On the first, see my 9/25/15 posting “Boy in the sand”, about a DJ TeamM8 swimwear ad, with an AZ gay-erotic poem; also about Cal Culver / Casey Donovan in Wakefield Poole’s Boys in the Sand, where the central character rises naked out of the sea.
On the second, see my 6/30/17 posting “In the dunes, in the dunes”, with a take-off on the song “In the pines” and some reflections on the genre of mansex in the dunes, on the beach.
The song. The accompaniment to #1 above is (verse 1 and the chorus of) the song “Come Wander with Me”. Despite appearances, not actually a folk song, but instead a haunting folk-like song written for a tv show. From Wikipedia:
“Come Wander With Me” is the final-taped episode of the American television series The Twilight Zone. (The Bewitchin’ Pool, however, was the last to be broadcast.) This episode introduced Bonnie Beecher in her television debut.
… The “Rock-A-Billy Kid”, Floyd Burney, arrives at a small town in search of a new song. … Next to a lake, he encounters the singer, Mary Rachel, who reluctantly plays a song for him about two [doomed] lovers who meet in the woods.
(#3) The Bonnie Beecher recording
The singer. And a note on Beecher, from Wikipedia:
Bonnie Jean Beecher (née Boettcher, April 25, 1941), later known as Jahanara Romney, is an American activist and retired actress and singer.
Bonnie Jean Boettcher was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota to Art and Jean Boettcher. She knew Bob Dylan during his early career, and may have been the inspiration for his song “Girl from the North Country”. Some of Dylan’s earliest recordings were recorded at her Minneapolis home in 1961.
… Beecher married Wavy Gravy (born Hugh Romney) in 1965; the couple has one child. She has worked as Administrative Director (under the name Jahanara Romney) of Camp Winnarainbow since 1983. Her husband (under the name Wavy Gravy) serves as director of the camp, which is located near Laytonville, Mendocino County in Northern California.
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