Yuppie Rock

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Given recent Volkswagen commercials with Spiritualised and Stereolab are we to assume taht the same shivering wetfaced pricks that drive Volwswagens listen to hip indie music? Is indie music becomeing some sort of Gourmet bullshit, like in the 1980s when suddenly everything was 'Gourmet". I recently noticd MCDonalds coffee cups say "Gourmet Coffee". Will the avante guarde of the next decade be way into Ricky Martin?

― Mike Hanle y, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Spiritualised always did create yuppie music for under-achievers. It doesn't surprise me on jot that their music is being used in car commercials: Jason long gave himself over to being the Phil Collins of the NME set. (And Richard Astley is the Eric Clapton, but without having made any decent records in his past.)

But really, I'm surprised you're surprised. Marketing men have no idea what the country wants or listens to: so what easier than to shove some music on a commercial that they and their smart London friends listened to 10 years ago?

― Jerry, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Sorry.

Did I really just say 'yuppie music for under-achievers'....?

The Thornton's chocolate must be really kicking in. No, think that's right. The terminally lazy can still be aspirational and braying in their own hearts.

― Jerry, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ah this has more to do with marketing as oppossed to whether indie is becoming "gourmet", and not the pissy cider, doc martin hell I always thought it represented. I like the idea of Ricky Martin going Avant-Garde, yeah, with his pet orchestra performing Can covers on a revolving turntable covered in astro-turf.

― tom, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What about that Heineken ad that uses "Love will tear us apart" and Lee Perry is on a Guiness ad now for Chissakes. "Hip" music will always be targeted by the MAN. The "hipper" the better for them. "We got Lee Perry, lets see someone top that!" It does make my blood boil but then i think maybe I'm being too precious about the whole thing.

― Michael Bourke, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Actually Mike, there was an article (i can't remember for the life of me where) that was about how alot of indie-bands are being signed for ads (and not just VW) - even before the singles hit airplay - it's almost turning into a 2nd career for many of them. Factors for this trend were that songs could be bought for less money, and (yes, Jerry - even though those marketing types tend to be 10yrs behind) some of them are young and/or have personal ties to their local music scene (LA, Madison Ave, London, etc)... The problem remains however - what does this do to the band once they associate it with VW/GAP/MCDONALDS/WIN/NIKE?

― Jason, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Wait: there's a difference between thirty seconds of a song being used to sell you car and actually liking the artist. In fact, the specific assumption when placing a new indie/fringie song in an ad is that the listener (a) has not heard anything like it and (b) will be surprised enough by its sound to pay attention to the commercial for thirty seconds. Surely plenty of musically-clueless folks have had their minds somewhat opened by that thirty seconds, and have gone out to buy the records -- which they may well like, or may well be scared by and never really listen to. But I do not, by any stretch, think that many 40 year olds are watching television and saying, "hey, that's my favorite Stereolab track they're using!" The music is just used to signify that which is hip and futuristic, as the average slightly-informed person conceives of it. The message is that buying the car makes you as hip as those people who actually know about and listen to said bands.

― Nitsuh, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Cocteau Twins actually made music FOR Fruitopia. Specifically! In a sense I can't blame them for wanting to eat and its practical and all. I am more suspiscious of the corporations than the artists. Oh well. Maybe I'm being a bit too purist or something.

― Mike Hanle y, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Plus: perhaps the thing is that the music in a commercial needs to signify a particular mood or lifestyle or whatever feeling the advertiser is trying to get across, and it needs to do it quickly and effectively. Run-of-the-mill pop music sucks at accomplishing this, which I imagine is why most of us here listen to "better" material. So perhaps advertising is really the ultimate triumph of innovative music -- it can communicate more of interest in a thirty- second space than pop can, whether it's using Stereolab for a sedate futurism or the Buzzcocks for that SUV-blazing-through-the-wilderness enthusiasm.

― Nitsuh, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Levi Strauss tried to use the Dead Kennedys's "Holiday in Cambodia," except Jello Biafra refused. (Would be pretty fitting, tho', considering that they like to use Chinese and Indonesian sweatshop labor, but I digress.) Maybe Anheuser-Busch should try to buy the rights to "Too Drunk to Fuck."

― Tadeusz Suchodolski, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Interesting point Jason, you have to realise what a poor financial situation most bands are in when they sign. Steve Albini has written quite a bit about the subject on the Net which is worth hunting down. I don't blame these bands accepting these contracts after all if it enables bands to work on music full time its got to be better than doing it part time and actually working in Mcdonalds/Starbucks. Are they whoring themselves, yeah sure. I never bought that "Henry Rollins, I'm so anti corporate" bullshit thing anyway. Rollins went off and built a publishing empire on the fact that he was an angry and pained individual. Plus he let Al PAcino bust his head up in Heat which is made by the King of the Evil Empires, Time Warner. I don't know, I was on a record put out by an Internet record label and even though I don't get any royalities cos they just started out the site is in real trouble because they have to move on to a bigger server which is going to cost loads. They have not broken even and may even lose money, but we all feel artistically pure.

― tom, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Tho' I must admit to being surprised to see Steve Malkmus in Vogue magazine advertising Marc Jacobs handbags. Does this mean he is OUT and PROUD about carring around a purse?

― junichiro, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

It's not a purse, it's a European carry all.

― Ally, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Eh, it's just a pretentious name to make men feel better about carrying around a PURSE! Which is silly, because purses are lovely anyway and carry round a lot more kool stuff than a crappy wallet.

MEN, don't be ashamed to love a purse by dressing it up with the name carry-all. It's only acceptable in reference to Kitty Carry-all, Cindy Brady's long lost doll.

― junichiro, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Tee hee! Wussy pursey! He hee! real men use a fanny pack. Now that I know the english meaning of fanny, I wonder what the brits call 'em.

― Mike Hanle y, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Not surprising at all, and a key to the artist's future. In other words, whenever you hear a song used on an advert, DISSOCIATE SELF FROM ARTIST IMMEDIATELY. Retroactively. This artist is now down the Orwellian memory hole. Reason? As i stated in the 'AOR' thread, the yuppie bore Virgin Radio artists everyone wants to kill are chosen - canonized, if you will - and it can happen to ANYONE. Simply Red was an 'alternative' band once (featured in first issue of Spin), Bryan Adams was once a 'rock' artist (featured in Creem), and Bon Jovi were once thought of as HM (featured in Kerrang). All respectable-in-these- circles genres. So SOMEBODY who followed these scenes must've bought something by these artists, the ones who become 'Yuppie Artists'. Even the yuppie OG Huey Lewis got his start in the business from - Elvis Costello!
So if you immediately condemn these artists NOW, you'll be able to say "I told you so" 10 years from now.

― tarden, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

All this is part of why I don't watch TV. Or something. If yuppies like something I do, sure. I don't lose sleep.

And surely Richard Ashcroft and not Richard aka Ric Astley. Though I like the image of him fronting Verve.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ric Ashcroft is never gonna run around...and hurt you. Or make you cry or even say goodbye. Good call on Jerry's part.

― junichiro, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Flava Flavs all mad about fruit rollups yo!

― Mike Hanle y, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I drive a Volkswagon.

― Kris, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I'm sorry, Kris.

― junochiro, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Honestly, at least 75% of the men I see on public transportation or walking around downtown (San Francisco) have "shoulder bags", some have back-packs. Fanny packs? Ugh. Not only haven't I seen one in a long time (thank god), even the very name makes me queasy.

The songs used in ads are picked by the creative team at the ad agency, by the way.

And I've owned 3 Volkswagens.

― Sean, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

In Italy the dudes all walk around wearing fanny packs around the shoulder like purses. What's up with that? And I love my Volkswagon a lot more than I love Stereolab or Spiritualized.

― Kris, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i thought this subject was going to be about dave matthews.

― keith, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

only yuppies listen to rock anymore. good rule of thumb: you should only listen to that's music too unlistenable/obscene for broadcast television. otherwise there's the constant 'threat' of rogue vw ads.

― ethan, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I don't have a problem with people licensing their music for ads, it just depends on the kind of ad. If it's "Times They Are A Changin'" being used for the Bank Of Montreal, it's pretty nauseating. If it's a song like "Song 2" that thumbs its nose at the meathead set in a beer commercial, one has to feel a little queasy. On the other hand, who gives a damn if Moby's bland blues deconstructions are used to sell cars? It's no more offensive than the music itself.

My sister, who is a newly-minted lawyer, asked me to make her a "hip" mix tape. "You know, one that'll fool my friends into thinking I'm cool, when in reality I'm old and out of touch". I bought her a trance compilation from about three years ago and told her to tell anyone who asked that it was the hip new thing. No results yet, but I'll keep you posted...

― Dave M., Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I think it's good when songs you like are used for ads: you get to hear them when you don't expect and you don't have to get up and dig them out of your LP/CD piles, by whic time you;ve stopped wanting to hear them. Who cares what the ad is "for"? If the song is good, it overrides what the ad is "for". Get a grip.

― mark s, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

what the fuck is with this trance stuff? it's pissing me the fuck off. all these stupid fucking rednecks are all of a sudden into the worst techno ever. i was in the record store and some hick gestures to his hick friend (looking at 'TRANCESPOTTING' and 'TRANCE-EUROPE EXPRESS' comps) to say 'hey, dude, you know like, that swordfish movie? well, guess who did the soundtrack....PAUL OAKENFOLD.' and the other guy is like 'day-amn!'. i wanted to murder both of them. this asshole across the hall is constanly playing what i assume are HORRIBLY LOUD TRANCE MP3S because they can be heard all over the entire hall interspersed with the 'pluenk...plunk' aol instant messanger sounds. it's absolutely deplorable.

― ethan, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I agree constantly would be a mess. As a stand-in for country-fried beer rock, though, it's a wonder.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ecstasy in the 90s = Acid in the 60s = love drugs for slumming frat boys

― Dave M., Friday, 20 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

What you mean "becoming some sort of gourmet bullshit"? It always has been--specifically Stereolab, whose kitsch reclamation project I've long failed to take as seriously as I'm doubtlessly supposed to. I mean, they've always made music for Volkswagon commercials--they just didn't have the commercials to go with them. Now they do. So everything's in order again. (Hey, wait a minute--aren't they supposed to be Marxists or something? What the fuck is THAT?)

― M. Matos, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Accepting a commission to compose ("compose") something for an advert = some kind of kneejerk rock-thin crime....

Why? The crime is if it's rubbish, not why you wrote it. Plainly if yr cool post-dot ice- cream company turns out to be using Soylent Green as main ingredient you have moral egg on face (is it less sexist to say sperm on face?) but the chewn will still roXoR...

Stop listnin with yer bibles, foax. Car ads = mostly terrible = but still better than actual live cars.

― mark s, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Cars are better than songs. I love cars. No song will ever be as good as the wind whipping through my hair with the windows down, accel pedal down, kicking it up to 110 on the San Mateo Bridge as I'm pulling from the flat section onto the arch and the whole bay is spread before me, the road seeming to fall away on all sides. I'm flying baby. No song can beat that, tho there are great songs, as discussed elsewhere, to accompany that.

― Sterling Clover, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Companies my band is looking to provide music to for adverts - Philip Morris, GEC, Huntingdon Life Sciences, JobCentre (Djakarta branch)

― tarden, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Tho' I must admit to being surprised to see Steve Malkmus in Vogue magazine advertising Marc Jacobs handbags.
Isn't Jacobs friends with Sonic Youth? I seem to recall reading an article about Jacobs in Vogue mentioning Kim Gordon.

― nathalie, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Look, man, I could give a fuck whether a musician writes music for his own personal enjoyment, or just so he or she can get paid. I have a sneaking suspicion that the former produces better music, but I'd have a pretty tough time building some sort of convincing argument for it, so I won't. But when a major national bank that's been dicking people around for a long time starts a new omnipresent ad campaign using the lyrics from a protest song that once gave people hope that they might change the world, and as the worst insult of all, gets a children's choir to rerecord the chorus, I feel just a tad put off. The fact that the hippie dream died a miserable death under the weight of a generation's selfishness is really quite depressing, and when a bank seemingly thumbs its nose at that, I reserve the right to be offended.

― Dave M., Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

The banks are playing a game with you and letting you know that there are weaknesses in your strategy. Are you going to become more resourceful/devious and invent something that is more difficult to co- opt?

― tarden, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

heard on tv ads in this country recently - snapper, king loser, scavengers. & the songs (1st couple times anyway) sounded fresher & more surprising & just like, HEY CHECK THAT OUT than they had on anyone's stereos for a long time. it was cool. plus, i can't even remember what the ads were for, i tune stuff like that out. in the bummer column - (1) the ad industry is an enemy of just about everybody , (2) i know some of those people, oh that's right actually am 1 of those people, they're mostly poor as hell, & i never heard of anyone of 'em getting paid. i don't suppose this problem occurs in more efficiently-run societies tho'.

― duane, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Nathalie -- it was the handbags part that confused me, not Marc Jacobs. I could see if old Stevo was shilling for trousers or shoes, but purses? Using "carry all" as a euphemism is no excuse.

― junichiro, Saturday, 21 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I wonder what is the difference between art and ...entertainment, advertising, design... I mean sometimes it seems like its art if most people dont like it. At knee jerk I want to say "The Cocteau Twins are ART, not Frutopia!" but then again thats not to say that art has to be seperate from the ...secular? I mean art isnt the church after all. Jazz was once considered "pop" but now its art...

― Mike Hanley, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ten years ago, Superchunk did music for British Knight sneaker ads. Their reasoning for doing it was, the ad company was going to hire a studio musicians to recreate their sound if they didn't get the real band, so either way the ads were going to sound like them, they might as well be the ones who got paid for it. Maybe that's what's happening here.

― Vic Funk, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Since none of those artists have a snowball's chance in hell of ever getting any kind of airplay on hyper-corrupt commercial radio, I don't blame them one bit for looking for alternate sources of income and broadcasting.

― Patrick, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Tarden: the only thing that can't be co-opted by the existing establishment is successful revolution. True or False?

― the pinefox, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

PINEFOX IDENTITY RIDDLE SOLVED! P-FOX V. I. LENIN SHOCK!!

― mark s, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

a)the 'only thing' part - False
b)the 'can't co-opt part' - False

― dave q, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Yes, indie is a fad among those who haven't joined the ranks of rap, metal, and punk zombies. It's easier if you expect that everyone will "sell out" and just enjoy the music. A car commercial's not so bad, really. Bikes are better but slower.

― Acia, Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Remember those New Beetle Volkswagen ads a couple of years ago? I loved the music in one of the commercials and went on the website to figure out what it was. Jump to next scene, confused Dave frantically flicking between tracks on Spiritualized CD and wondering why none of the tracks line up. Return to website, discover I fucked up and it's actually Hurricane #1 that did the song I want. Also go out and buy Hurricane #1 CD, enjoy both of the ones I bought. Who lost out in that situation? Nobody, which IMHO is a good thing.

― Dave M., Sunday, 22 July 2001 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

eight months pass...

There's a new BMW commercial that uses BOC's "Kid For Today". Some googling reveals the director's "blog", where he says of the commercial: "I’m very pleased and the music is good as well a new group called Boards of Canada, composed it especially."

― Mitch Lastnamewithheld, Tuesday, 2 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

the fact is, it's a good or great deal for the artists, unlike muych else in the music biz. As long as we are living in (if not necessarily always buying in) to our capitalist commercial society, it doesn't bother me at all. I have never bought a product based on the music in an add, but I have bought maybe one or two CDs based on hearing something in a commercial (I think I got Badly Drawn Boy based on a Gap add but it's not my cup of tea really) - so it's really a win-win situation for the artist. I have also admired some spot's incredible finesse with music and imagery in 30 seconds. The "Pink Moon" VW commercial was beautiful, some of those Gap adds were great, I even dig some of the mitsubishi music based ads. Sometimes it seems like commercials are the most artful thing on TV (network at least). I think we are basically to assume that the folks who work for the add agencies listen to hip indie music, and not the "shivering wetfaced pricks" who buy the products. VW, for what it's worth, seems to make fairly well engineered cars from a safety standpoint but not from a reliability standpoint...

― g, Tuesday, 2 April 2002 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

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