Fact #165891
When:
Short story:
Rock censorship rears its ugly head again when MTV in the USA refuses to air the Neil Young video for his current single, This Note's For You. In the video, the hair of a Michael Jackson lookalike catches fire during filming of what appears to be a Pepsi commercial. The blaze is extinguished by 'Whitney Houston' pouring Coke on Jacko's head.
Full article:
Johnny Black briefly surveys the history of commercial product sponsorship in popular music.
What exactly was it that caused MTV to refuse to air the Neil Young video for his July 1988 single, This Note’s For You?
In the video, the hair of a Michael Jackson lookalike catches fire during filming of what appears to be a Pepsi commercial. The blaze is extinguished by 'Whitney Houston' pouring Coke on Jacko’s head. Was MTV concerned that impressionable kids might set fire to their own hair in emulation of Michael? After all, Whitney can’t be everywhere at once.
Or could it be that MTV was scared witless of offending two major advertising accounts? Neil Young, of course, had made his position clear in the song with the lines “Ain’t singing for Pepsi, ain’t singing for Bud”. Young felt that musicians compromised themselves and betrayed their fans every time they took money from corporations to help promote their products.
It’s a valid point of view, but the link between popular music and advertising goes way back, probably further than even Neil Young realised. In 1903, the words of Waltzing Matilda were adapted to sell Billy Tea, and there’s no record of anybody objecting to that.
In early 1958, Jerry Lee Lewis convinced ad agency Young And Rubicam to incorporate the title of his single, Breathless, into a new slogan for Beechnut chewing gum - ‘Beechnut leaves you Breathless’. It’s worth noting that Lewis approached the agency, not the other way round. Soon after, Lewis appeared on tv inviting his teen audience to remit five Beechnut wrappers and fifty cents to obtain a copy of Breathless. Within three days the wrappers numbered tens of thousands and the link between rock and an ad placement was never again in doubt.
Starting in July 1965, another agency, McCann-Erickson masterminded a successful $10m Coca Cola radio campaign employing Ray Charles, The Supremes, The Coasters, Tom Jones, Freddie And The Dreamers and others to warble the unforgettable ‘Things Go Better With Coke’ in the style of their then-current hits.
But the relationship hasn’t always been plain sailing. In UK session player circles, the tale is oft told of the top vocalist called in to give a rockin’ new edge to Kellogg’s Country Store, but whose unfortunate diction left the product sounding too much like Kellogg’s C**t Restorer ever to be transmitted.
Things moved into a higher gear in 1985, when ad agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty shifted 800,000 pairs of Levis by having Nick Kamen remove his 501s in a launderette to the sound of I Heard It Through The Grapevine. In the following decade, with variations on the theme using hits by Sam Cooke, Reef, Babylon Zoo, Prince Buster, Johnny Cash and more, Levi sales overall increased by 15% in the UK, while 501 sales notched up an unbelievable 1,300% sales boost.
Paul McCartney is one of the highly principled few who still believe that pop music and commercials make strange bedfellows. He was very publicly displeased when Michael Jackson allowed Beatles’ songs to be used in American tv ads.
The Rolling Stones, however, had no qualms about accepting $2.8m for the use of Satisfaction in a Snickers campaign and, these days, even the most unlikely artists licence their music to commercials. The cultish and credible Cocteau Twins, for example, allowed their song Cico Buff to be used on an Aqua Libra ad. Twin Robin Guthrie justifies the decision, saying “I thought it was quite a tastefully shot commercial,” before coming closer to reality with the observation that “It’s money for old rope, really.”
It rankles, though, to hear the spirit of Levi Stubbs defiled by a re-write of The Four Tops I Can’t Help Myself as a hymn of praise for Honey Smacks, and it’s hard to sleep some nights, knowing that an entire generation has grown up thinking that Desmond Dekker’s reggae classic The Israelites was actually sung by a giant sunflower in praise of Vitalite margarine?
Still, perhaps there remains a glimmer of light in the land of Mammon. Shippam’s Sandwich Paste, clearly an honourable institution, is reputed to have turned down its ad agency’s proposal for a campaign based on the ultimate love-song desecration - You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Filling. Neil Young would be proud of them.
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What exactly was it that caused MTV to refuse to air the Neil Young video for his July 1988 single, This Note’s For You?
In the video, the hair of a Michael Jackson lookalike catches fire during filming of what appears to be a Pepsi commercial. The blaze is extinguished by 'Whitney Houston' pouring Coke on Jacko’s head. Was MTV concerned that impressionable kids might set fire to their own hair in emulation of Michael? After all, Whitney can’t be everywhere at once.
Or could it be that MTV was scared witless of offending two major advertising accounts? Neil Young, of course, had made his position clear in the song with the lines “Ain’t singing for Pepsi, ain’t singing for Bud”. Young felt that musicians compromised themselves and betrayed their fans every time they took money from corporations to help promote their products.
It’s a valid point of view, but the link between popular music and advertising goes way back, probably further than even Neil Young realised. In 1903, the words of Waltzing Matilda were adapted to sell Billy Tea, and there’s no record of anybody objecting to that.
In early 1958, Jerry Lee Lewis convinced ad agency Young And Rubicam to incorporate the title of his single, Breathless, into a new slogan for Beechnut chewing gum - ‘Beechnut leaves you Breathless’. It’s worth noting that Lewis approached the agency, not the other way round. Soon after, Lewis appeared on tv inviting his teen audience to remit five Beechnut wrappers and fifty cents to obtain a copy of Breathless. Within three days the wrappers numbered tens of thousands and the link between rock and an ad placement was never again in doubt.
Starting in July 1965, another agency, McCann-Erickson masterminded a successful $10m Coca Cola radio campaign employing Ray Charles, The Supremes, The Coasters, Tom Jones, Freddie And The Dreamers and others to warble the unforgettable ‘Things Go Better With Coke’ in the style of their then-current hits.
But the relationship hasn’t always been plain sailing. In UK session player circles, the tale is oft told of the top vocalist called in to give a rockin’ new edge to Kellogg’s Country Store, but whose unfortunate diction left the product sounding too much like Kellogg’s C**t Restorer ever to be transmitted.
Things moved into a higher gear in 1985, when ad agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty shifted 800,000 pairs of Levis by having Nick Kamen remove his 501s in a launderette to the sound of I Heard It Through The Grapevine. In the following decade, with variations on the theme using hits by Sam Cooke, Reef, Babylon Zoo, Prince Buster, Johnny Cash and more, Levi sales overall increased by 15% in the UK, while 501 sales notched up an unbelievable 1,300% sales boost.
Paul McCartney is one of the highly principled few who still believe that pop music and commercials make strange bedfellows. He was very publicly displeased when Michael Jackson allowed Beatles’ songs to be used in American tv ads.
The Rolling Stones, however, had no qualms about accepting $2.8m for the use of Satisfaction in a Snickers campaign and, these days, even the most unlikely artists licence their music to commercials. The cultish and credible Cocteau Twins, for example, allowed their song Cico Buff to be used on an Aqua Libra ad. Twin Robin Guthrie justifies the decision, saying “I thought it was quite a tastefully shot commercial,” before coming closer to reality with the observation that “It’s money for old rope, really.”
It rankles, though, to hear the spirit of Levi Stubbs defiled by a re-write of The Four Tops I Can’t Help Myself as a hymn of praise for Honey Smacks, and it’s hard to sleep some nights, knowing that an entire generation has grown up thinking that Desmond Dekker’s reggae classic The Israelites was actually sung by a giant sunflower in praise of Vitalite margarine?
Still, perhaps there remains a glimmer of light in the land of Mammon. Shippam’s Sandwich Paste, clearly an honourable institution, is reputed to have turned down its ad agency’s proposal for a campaign based on the ultimate love-song desecration - You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Filling. Neil Young would be proud of them.