You can trust your car to the man who wears the star,
The big, bright Texaco star!
I know a lot of jingles from before I was born, but that may be the oldest one I remember that I actually heard on TV and radio.
The theme song for Gillette’s Friday Night Fights. (Apparently officially Gillette Cavalcade of Sports.)
Lyrics seem hard to come by. From the video ~“You look sharp, and you’ll feel sharp, too.”
Ai yi yi yiiiiii
I am the Frito Bandito
Geev me Frito’s corncheeps and I be your friend
The Frito Bandito you must not offend
“Tippecanoe and Tyler too!”
A local spot that ran virtually forever:
Stay on the right track to Nine Mile and Mack,
Roy O’Brien trucks and cars something your money back
“I’d like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony.
I’d like to buy the world a Coke, and keep it company.
That’s the real thing.”
I’d thought that commercial dated back to the '60’s, but according to Wikipedia it debuted in 1971. Some interesting trivia:
-
It cost $250,000 to make, the most expensive TV commercial ever made at that time.
-
A studio group The Hillside Singers, named to identify with the commercial, immediately recorded a version with Coke references removed. It reached #13 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US.
-
The group The New Seekers recorded their version that same year, selling 96,000 copies in one day, and eventually 12 million total. It reached #7 in the US and #1 in the UK.
-
The Coca-Cola Company waived royalties to the song and instead donated $80,000 in payments to UNICEF.
“It’s the real thing.” was a marketing slogan that goes back to 1969, so I guess this jingle doesn’t beat a lot of the contributions here.
[quote=“DrDeth, post:41, topic:821531”]
[/QUOTE]That is scary!
From the land of sky blue waters,
Comes the beer refreshing,
Hamm’s, the beer refreshing
Non-jingle from school, 1965 or 66:
Roger Ramjet. When I learned it was actually Yankee Doodle somewhere in that period, I learned something important about music.
Probable oldest jingle: The Oscar Meyer Weiner song.
It is a little, yes.
‘Shave and a haircut - two bits’ was used as a jingle for shampoo in 1939:
My early childhood was spent in Cleveland, home of the Lawson’s convenience store chain, and its TV commercials featuring Big O, the truck carrying fresh orange juice up to the frozen wastelands. Everybody sing now!
*Roll on, Big O, get that juice up to Lawson’s in forty hours.
Now the oranges ripen in the Florida sun
Sweet on the tree they stay
Then they pick 'em and they squeeze, just as neat as you please
and the Big O leaves the same day.
Roll on, Big O, get that juice up to Lawson’s in forty hours.
Now one man sleeps while the other man drives
On the nonstop Lawson’s run
And the cold, sweet juice in the tank truck’s caboose
Stays as fresh as the Florida sun.
Roll on, Big O, get that juice up to Lawson’s in forty hours …*
And also about royalties.
N-E-S-T-L-E-S,
Nestle’s makes the very best
Choooooooc’late.
as sung by Farfel the Dog.
My dad’s version:
You’ll wonder where your teeth all went
When you brush your teeth with crushed cement!
The earliest I remember off my own bat is undoubtedly Happy Little Vegemites
Not the oldest I remember (those were already all mentioned):
Virginia Slims:
You’ve come a long way baby
To get where you’ve got to today
You’ve got your own cigarette now baby
You’ve come a long, long way
A cigarette called 101:
A silly millimeter longer - 101
A silly millimeter longer - 101
Binge drinking encouraged:
Schaffer
Is the
One beer to have
When your having more than one!
and
*When it’s time to relax
One thing stands clear
(Beer after beer)
If you’ve got the time
We’ve got the beer
(Miller Beer)
*
Does your shoe have a boy inside?
What funny place for a boy to hide.
Does you have a dog there too
A boy and a dog and a foot in in a shoe!
Well the boy is Buster Brown
And the dog is Tige his friend
And they’re really just a picture
But it’s fun just to pretend!
It’s not even a jingle for me, just a line in that soothing NPR-announcer voice. “Entek International, makers of microporous membranes and battery separator materials.”