Well, I never…
Burpo! You bad bad bad man😏
Love this
Remind me to tell you my Johnny Cash story sometime, Beck.
Now we all want to hear the Johnny Cash story, kenobi!
Beck, I had to deal with my brothers’ insistence that we watch Daniel Boone way back when. I haven’t forgotten the original lyrics.
OK, it’s a little long, but it’s pretty cool.
I work in advertising, as a strategist; twenty years ago, we had Applebee’s as a client. We had created an ad campaign in which we used popular songs, which could somehow be tied into whatever menu item was being promoted, either with the lyrics as-is, or with a rewrite/re-recording of the lyrics. (Applebee’s resurrected the campaign, and the tagline, a couple of years ago, though they have a different agency now.)
So, for this campaign, we were constantly trying to find songs which would fit well with the promoted items. Sometimes, we’d find a perfect song, only to find that the writer, and/or the performer (if we were going to use a specific recording of it) weren’t interested in licensing it out, or were asking for a ton of money for it – at one point, we approached Tim McGraw, to use “I Like It, I Love It,” and he said “sure, for $1 million.” (We didn’t bite on that one.)
In 2002, we were developing an ad for a promotion called “Fire-Grilled Favorites.” The art director on the account (a huge music fan) and I both agreed that Johnny’s “Ring of Fire” would be a great song to use. We were able to get permission from the writers (Johnny’s wife June, and Merle Kilgore), as well from Johnny himself, to use one of his recordings of it. We made the ad, and it started to run on TV.
A couple of days later, our talent coordinator got a call from Johnny’s manager. “Johnny wanted me to call, and let you know that he and June saw the ad on TV, and they love how you used their song in the ad. But, Johnny noticed that you have some voiceover person in the ad. He wanted me to ask you if you would be interested in having him re-record that voiceover?” Our answer was, “yes, of course!”
This was about a year before both Johnny and June passed away, and they were both quite frail, so they didn’t travel anymore, but the manager said that we could record the voiceover at the studio that Johnny had at his farm, where he had recorded his last few albums. So, our creative team flew down to Nashville (alas, no, they did not ask the strategist, who is a lifelong Johnny Cash fan, to come along 
), and went out to the farm.
They discovered that Johnny’s “studio” was a shack, which contained a stool, a microphone, and a mixing desk. Johnny and June came out to meet our team – they were tremendously gracious, and said that they were really happy to work with us, and that they were excited about the fact that people still recognized and loved their music.
They knocked out a few takes of the voiceover for the TV ad, and Johnny then asked our team, “as long as you came all this way, is there anything else I can record for you?” Our copywriter said, “well, we do have some radio ads…” Johnny asked for the scripts for the radio ads, and re-recorded those for us, too.
Though I didn’t get to go along on the trip, my art director did get me a autographed photo from Johnny.
This is the recut ad, with Johnny’s voiceover.
Kenobi, that is a terrific story! Thanks for sharing.
Wow. Great story.
You are one sick son of a gun.
They were looking at Playboy magazine.
Jesus.
Damn you, I was going to post that! I saw it on the Tonight Show 75 years ago.
dammit.
I like the way your sparkling earrings lay
Against your skin so brown
And I want to sleep with you in the desert night
With a billion stars all around.
That ‘voice-to-text’ is gettin’ pretty good, ain’t it? Trick is to whisper right up next to the phone.
Time to drink a Rolling Rock. Oh, one ‘33’
‘Cause I got a peaceful easy feelin’
And I know you won’t let me down
‘Cause I’m already standin’
On the ground
OK, now I have an ear worm, curse you!
@kenobi_65, great story, and a really well done ad, too.
Thank you! I have a lot of strange and funny stories from my career, with more than a few relating to clients who made strange decisions, or who were just generally unhappy human beings, but that story is one of the best, and most charming, ones.
It’s a nice earworm, too. I was thinking of Glenn Frey just a few minutes ago.
One of days
It will soon be allover
Cut and dried
I won’t have to go all bottled up inside…
One of these days…
lol funny when i see ol fess the davey crockett theme comes into my head … ( and the dasy duck parody of it )
Okay, something got screwed up. Instead of Daniel Boone, I have the theme to Davy Crockett in my head…
Ah, now I know why… hey, nightshadea, it’s cause Fess Parker played them BOTH on Saturday mornings! C’mon, Disney, have more imagination than that…
the davey crockett theme stuck with me. not so much the daniel boone.
The Daniel Boone theme stuck with me because of a racist version we sang when we were kids, which I won’t repeat here because I’ve grown up and now I know better.