Meow Mix Question

Factual Questions
1

When I was little, I always had what I now recognize to be the Meow Mix tune (without the meows, of course) floating around in the back of my head. It was in good company, sharing brain space with such classics as Turkey in the Straw, Yankee Doodle, Oh Susanna, Happy Birthday, Mary Had a Little Lamb, and other such folk tunes that our parents, teachers, and schoolmates sung to us.
I always assumed it to be one of those songs that our music books would label “Traditional”. But now that I have grown up and heard the commercial, I suppose I should reconsider.

My question, of course, is was the Meow Mix tune written specifically for that commercial, or was it based of a pre-existing ditty? Nobody I have asked could give me a definite answer. Please answer my humbly submitted question, for I fear that my very immortal soul may be at stake.

Greyson3

“Jewish like the wind, baby!”

2

I’m sorry your immortal soul is at stake. Which Devil have you been dealing with?

AFAIK, that jingle is not any kind of pre-existing ditty, no “traditional folk tune”; it was written (if “written” can be applied to something as lightweight as an advertising jingle) just for Meow Mix.

You have my sympathies–I’ll trade you my Pepsodent jingle for your Meow Mix. “You’ll WON-der where…the YEL-low went, when you brush-your-teeth-with PEP-so-DENT!”

3

I don’t know.

I’ll just add this off-topic comment:

My gal feeds her cat outside, and we noticed a number of times that all of his Meow Mix had been eaten except the brown ones.

Now as Cecil has said, cats do recognize some colors, but they don’t seem to care too much about it–so the question was “What’s going on?”

I found the answer one day.

I caught a blue jay at his dish, just a-peckin’ away at the Meow Mix, picking up all of them except–the brown ones!

4

Cats have a very limited vocal range; those that choose to pursue singing careers are often thwarted. The Meow Mix folks had to compose an extremely simple tune, or they would never have been able to find cats able to perform adequately in the commercials.

:wink:

On a related note, who remembers the Meow Mix ad in which a kitty who meowed backwards (“Woem… Woem…”) recorded himself, then reversed the playback, so he too could be famous?

5

I remember the “woem” cat. Pretty classic.

What’s up with the current spokescat’s (Baxter’s) owner? Does he forget to feed him, necessitating Baxter to call? Why is everyone so PO’ed when the dumb schmuck answers his cat’s phone calls?

6

CATS have a very limited vocal range? How do
you account for the phenomenal success of the
musical?

7

Greyson, Mama’s right. I used to know the guy who actually wrote the tune (it was my ex’s stepdad).

Sorry about your soul.

8

That’s okay, I didn’t really use it much anyway.

Again, thanks for the feedback. For some reason, nobody else considers these kinds of things important. Now if only the experts could agree on the rice and pigeons thing, I’d be all set and ready to meet God.