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[pmcd9]

Are we beyond being righteously indignant that Madison Ave. co-op's our music to sell whatever it is they were selling (I honestly couldn't tell) or should we be grateful that sometimes they have great taste.

~Paul

[CortJstr]

I'm confused.

[andalucia]

No, righteous indignace is key to the discerning music snob.  I find few things more upsetting than hearing a track I like being used to sell boring crap.

Although that ad for Disney cruises that uses 'Lust for Life' still cracks me up:  the way they turn down the volume right before "With the liquor and drugs" line is utterly classic.

[V-Adore]

Maybe I'm insufficiently indie, but I've never really gotten riled up about this. The only time I can remember doing so was when "Charmed" inexplicably quoted random out-of-context passages of "How Soon Is Now?" as something resembling a theme song (le sigh).

Incidentally, am I to assume the subject line refers to the Flaming Lips being used in this way?

[CortJstr]

It does bug me when they use highly inappropriate songs. Like when Wrangler was using Fortunate Son and showing all kinds flags and crap in the background. How did they get the rights to this?

[slink]

How did they get the rights to this?

Because it's the record company that owns the rights, and deals with these deals, and funiily enough, if you hadn't noticed, record companies tend to be, in the words of Bill Hicks, suckers of satan's pecker.

[CortJstr]

How did they get the rights to this?

Because it's the record company that owns the rights, and deals with these deals, and funiily enough, if you hadn't noticed, record companies tend to be, in the words of Bill Hicks, suckers of satan's pecker.

But don't they get rights from the songwriter separately?

[AugustWest]

These things irk me a little, but I suppose I can get over it.

I find it a little ironic that we're worrying about the artistic integrity of one of the hugest AM rock bands ever -- CCR.  I mean, I'm a big big CCR fan and have been since I was a tot.  John Cameron Fogerty et al can flat out rock.  But the music was first and foremost written to sell.  It was made to play on AM radio.  It's a short step to commercials.

Of course, you can't help but appreciate the irony when the corporate yaps completely miss the point of the a song when they use it for a soundbite.  It's bound to be satisfying for the artist(s) involved when the very people being made fun of pay big bucks to spread the song where you skewer them all over the airwaves.

Still and all though, I can't get used to hearing Rock and Roll in Cadillac commercials.

[pmcd9]

should we be grateful that sometimes they have great taste.

~Paul

5 minutes after I wrote that I saw an ad for "The Swiffer" with Whip It as the theme music.  Well sort of, it was actually Swiff it, swiff it good.  That was heartbreaking.

~Paul

[slink]

But don't they get rights from the songwriter separately?

Nope. Once the songwriters sign it over, they have no choice. I mean, hell, some companies might ba less fascistic than that, and some artists might hold out on some rights, but quite generally the artist only holds direct rights to the lyrics and music to the song, not the end product if released on a disc by the label.

[jough]

I love how people say that a band "sold out" when their songs are used to shill floor wax, but they don't consider making shitty albums and doing multiple "Farewell" tours "selling out."

Let's face it, folks, your favourite bands all sold out a long long time before you ever heard of them.  Let them get their money, I say.  If a song is good, no commercial application can sully it.  And if a song is ruined for you because of its association with a television advert, then you're much much shallower than I had envisioned.

[AlohaDawg]

All that moral and philosophical discussion aside, I find that the best possible 21st century use for the song "Rubber Band Man"  (Spinner's version from, what, late 1970's?)) is the Office Max commercial being shown now.

[St_Zartan]

This used to bug the shit out of me back when I was a teenaged elitist prick who actually believed that the Wrong People liking or even being exposed to my favorite shit somehow diminished it. I can't even begin to understand this rationale, now - it's not as though I personally created the Dead Kennedys out of thin air from some pocket dimension and have been carefully screening each and every person to whom they are exposed. Geez. Now I get more of a kick out of trying to get people who are otherwise completely squaresville into good stuff, like slipping something by The Fall into that weird little fundamentalist homeschooled kid's ears.

Even my right-on socialist pals over in Stereolab have had a couple of their songs in commercials, for crying out loud, and that is totally cool with me - the drawling fuckheads on the television stop screaming about Truck Month or whatever for thirty seconds and I get to hear something I like. If The Man wants to give you money and exposure for doing something you'd be doing anyway, take it.

[Carlos del Vaca]

Indeed, the use of "Freedom of Choice" in an ad for an American lite beer is kind of distressing.  On the other hand, these things usually pay pretty well.  It's easy for those of us who aren't professional musicians to think "Sell-out!", but given the opportunity to make good scratch for a song I wrote years ago (i.e. doing no new work), I'd jump at it too.

What I really hate is when they change the lyrics of the song for the ad.  The department store Hecht's has an ad campaign that uses Naked Eyes' "Always Something There to Remind Me," except that for Hechts it's "Always Something There to Excite Me."  I sure hope Naked Eyes got paid a fuckin' fortune for that, because it's painful.  And I suppose that's why it's much less annoying when Stereolab or Moby has music in a commercial--it's just music, the background, and not so much pimpin' per se.

[pmcd9]

If it weren't for ads I probably would have never heard Nick Drake.  It's not like he was ever (even back in the day) played on the radio.

~Paul