I hate commercials when they...

…use a really GREAT song, particularly a romantic song…and it winds up trivializing the song!!

For instance, “Sometimes When We Touch” is one of the best romantic songs of all time (IMHO), and GEICO went and hijacked it for their own nefarious ends…

Anyone else got any examples?

friend drkgntly

i wonder how john lennon would feel to hear instant karma pimping nikes

Burger King is notorious for ruining many songs with their commercials from a couple years back. Once they started using Judas Priest’s You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’ I knew they had taken things too far and were running out of songs to bastardize in their ads.

I like the GIECO commercial with “Sometimes When We Touch”. I forget if that song made it into Dave Barry’s Book of Bad Songs, but it should have. So wretchedly sappy. I’m glad the GEICO gang found a good use for it.

I hate commercials that advertise a new product, but don’t give any description of the actual product.

The only example in my head right now is for M-Life. Before it came out, they had all of these commericals with people saying how great MLife was and how it helped them get organized and do all sorts of things. Then the commercial would say for more info go to MLife.com. It was for a cell phone. By AT&T. (Cell phones annoy me and AT&T is one of the most difficult communication companies to get through to, but that’s a rant for another day.) The commericals could have given a hint about cell phones somewhere.

I swear that I saw a commercial use Creedence’s Fortunate Son in a “flag waving” context. I’ve managed to blank the product from my mind, but it was horrendously wrong-headed.

Similarly, Mercedes used the Janis Joplin song (Lord Won’t You Buy Me a) Mercedes Benz. Once again, how frikkin’ clueless and misguided can advertisers be?

The Levis commercial that uses Playground Love by Air at least uses it in a proper context, but it’s always annoying to hear a song you like used in a commercial…

I hate when a commercial’s sound volume is twice as loud as the volume of the television show you are watching. I know it’s done on purpose to get your attention. I find it annoying as hell and makes me hit “mute” which is counter to what the advertisers should want.

I hate commercials when they…

are on the TV.

are on the radio.

at at the movie theaters (especially!).

C’mon, when would you like them?

God, I remember that being on all the time, and I’d always think “WTF were they thinking?” Wasn’t it for jeans or something?

Pepsi used Born to be Wild in one of their commercials. My mom was pissed.

And I first heard Led Zepplin on a Tide commercial.

Yeah, any company that uses classic songs for their products is damning themselves to the deepest pit of Hell.

The Nike Ad that used Bittersweet Syphony by the Verve, while it was still in the top 40 on the charts freaked me right out.

I think Bittersweet Symphony was in the Top 40 because of the Nike ads. IIRC, the song was released several years before the spot aired and didn’t become popular until people heard it during the commercial.

That one bugs me too. They only play one particular part though “Some folks are born made to wave the flag. Ooh that red, white and blue.”

This doesn’t quite fit but I haven’t found a place to say it yet. Skittles should go ahead and begin making mystical softcore porn. They’re almost there already.

AFAIC, advertising crossed a line that just shouldn’t have been crossed when they put a Clash song in an ad for Boomermobiles. That was just so wrong. As far as ads using old classics and ruining them, there are hardly any left that haven’t been tainted. I’m just getting into old funk and R&B, and man, have they pissed on those songs. Bastards.

It’s for Wrangler jeans. The mind boggles.

Personally, I hate commercials with alarm-clock sounds in them…

[slight hijack]

The Today show had a back-to-school fashion show recently, and the background music they used was “My Old School” by Steely Dan. IIRC, that song doesn’t really display any ideals for grade school children…

I’m not so sure about that. The Verve’s Urban Hymns was released in 1997? When were these Nike ads aired?

FWIW, “Bittersweet Symphony” and Urban Hymns were critical and popular hits in the UK and in Australia in the year of release, without the benefit of those Nike ads, which I presume aired only in the US.

Actually, IICR, there was a news blurb about how The Verve sold the song right when they released it as a single- the point of the news piece being that some people sold their songs before they were even famous on their own merits. The ads started less than two months after the single hit the radio.

I don’t know if it’s always so bad. There’s this car commercial, filmed in a slightly fellini-esque town center. The music is the guitar and flute intro (no words) to “Thick as a Brick” by Jethro Tull. It gives the ad a nice, cheerfully gaelic atmosphere. Hopefully it left a few viewers forgetting about the car and wondering if they could get the music on CD.

Then a couple of years back there was this ad for one of those companies that help families with their finances. A familiar folk song is playing in the background. The ad ends, though, before it gets to the most famous line:
“Even though we ain’t got money…”

Every now and then I still see commercials for a cruise line (I think it’s Carnival) with Lust for Life as the soundtrack. Somehow I doubt the ad execs have really listened to that one.