Let’s discuss any and all music here. Got a new artist who’s rocking your boat that you want to talk about? Post a video! Found out about that unearthed Coltrane album that has the jazz freak in you losing your mind? Lay it out for us! Have a theory about what your favorite band might do for their next album? Let’s hear it! Anything and everything music-related goes here.
This week’s discussion prompt: Music in Commercials
Have you ever discovered any songs or artists you’ve come to love via a commercial? And if there is a song or artist you’ve loved for years, how have you felt upon hearing one of their songs used in a commercial?
As a “card-carrying member of Generation X” (to quote The Avocado’s very own Julia Krellis) I’ve long been cynical about advertising, and used to judge artists who allowed their music to be used in commercials harshly. That said, I do realize that even back the nineties few artists made a significant amount of money selling albums alone (relying mostly on live performances and touring) and that getting a company to pay a huge sum of money to use one of their songs in a commercial would provide them with a huge financial incentive to “sell out”, as well as additional exposure. Around the turn of the century one Richard Melville Hall realized this, and went on to license every single song from his critically-acclaimed 1999 album Play for use in films, television shows, and commercials. At the time Hall received a certain amount of criticism for this move, though in subsequent years the stigma attached with licensing music for commercial purposes has all but disappeared.
On some deeply ingrained level I still dislike this practice, though I’ve come to accept that it remains one of the easiest ways for an artist to get paid. And in addition to artists making money, it can also be a good way for them to expose their music to people who may not have heard it otherwise. I’ll be honest with you: I am one of undoubtedly many people who was first introduced to the music of Nick Drake via a Volkswagen commercial:
On the other hand, the first time I heard “Blister in the Sun” by the Violent Femmes being used in a Wendy’s commercial for a fish sandwich, a little piece inside of me died (and apparently the rest of the band was also unhappy with Gordon Gano’s unilateral decision to license the song this way):
As always, any and all music-related posts are welcome. Have fun, and rock out with yr guac out!