How To Calculate Musical Sellouts: The Moby Equation - Page 2

Sellabilly! The descendants of Rockabilly who make music simply for advertisement dollars!

Well, at least Devo has it right.

But Smashmouth was getting airplay before they were being used in ads.

Care to expand on that comment?

Who, me?

No, Kabong.

The use of an already recorded, unrelated song in a commercial doesn't bother me much, unless the commercial is promoting something unsavory.

However if a band records a song about the product especially for the commercial, then I think they've plunged over the edge.

Got any examples for us to chew over?

It's not exactly recording a song for a commercial, but it's close.

And probably worse.

I was thinking mainly of Japan, where musicians have been in bed with advertisers for much longer. In fact for many singles it's their primary exposure. Anyway, here's Southern All Stars (similar to the Rolling Stones in terms of stature) frontman Keisuke Kuwata singing about "my kind of Cadillac":http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RlmPj64rD1k

Closer to home here's Run DMC rapping about GAP: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVaJAwH1-qA

I used to frown on this, but after a lot of my favorite classic rock artists/bands had done it, I had to throw in the towel. I mean - Hendrix, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin...? If I had stood by the position I held as a teenager on artistic integrity, I'd have to deny myself a lot of great music. And then I'd be an idiot. Or one of Fugazi's biggest fans.

Also, there's the downloading issue. It's a neverending debate, but I think it's probably true that artists have lost money over the years due to illegal downloads. Whether that's a big issue or a small one, if artists can recover some losses by making television commercials, I guess it's worth the heartburn that you get when you catch one of these ads as you're channel surfing.

I should admit that, although I thought that I was learning to live with all of this 'selling out' shit, I was still a little bit pissed and pretty surprised when I heard a new Wilco song used in a freakin' car commercial. But, on the other hand, this is the same band that sent out a "Modest Proposal" in their newsletter asking people to buy Sky Blue Sky (a great album, by the way). I think that's admirable enough to give them a pass for selling some songs to Volkswagen.

Devo willingly did it, acknowledging that it was part of their ethos of "de-evolution", where music would be used to sell toys and trinkets, not as art. There's more to it, of course, but I'm not a massive Devo fan or anything.