Rock Songs in Commercials - Artistic Sellout or Necessary Marketing Ploy?

I love music and like everyone else I have my favorites. I realize that it's the worst form of hero worship to assume that the artists you like the most share the same beliefs that you do. But still, when an artist you admire also shares your principles, how can you not like them even more?

I was always a big Neil Young fan. In 1988 he came out with a song that expressed his contempt for selling out his music like so many of his contemporaries had. In "This Note's for You" Neil sang,

Ain't singin' for Pepsi
Ain't singin' for Coke
I don't sing for nobody
Makes me look like a joke
This note's for you.

Exactly! Neil Young got it. Another band that I really liked was The Who. Unfortunately, The Who has gone in the opposite direction, selling off their songs to both TV shows and commercials. I loved The Who because they provided a cerebral type of rebellion. I feel cheated because all of my memories of "Who Are You", "Won't Get Fooled Again" and "Baba O'Riley" have been blown apart, as they are now nothing more than opening credits music for various entrants in the CSI franchise.

The Who Sell Out indeed.

I prefer my television shows to come up with their own music. I can't be the only one with fond memories of the theme music for "Good Times" or "WKRP in Cincinnati" or even "Laverne and Shirley". C'mon, admit it, you have Sclemeel, schlemazel, hasenfeffer incorporated. We're gonna do it! running through your head right now, don't you?

As bad as bands selling out to television shows are, commercials are even worse. Here is a tiny list of songs that now completely suck because the artist sold out for a commercial

Taking Care of Business
Start Me Up
Lust For Life
Brown Sugar
Mercedes Benz
Rock N Roll
Whip It
One Way or Another

And the thing that gets me is that most of these songs make no sense in terms of the product they're selling. Sure, a literal reading of Taking Care of Business (and working overtime) works for Office Depot, but what does these lyrics from "Lust For Life"

Yeah, I'm through with sleeping on the sidewalk
No more beating my brains
No more beating my brains
With liquor and drugs
With liquor and drugs.

Well, I'm just a modern guy
Of course, Ive had it in my ear before

have to do with going on a Carnival Cruise? And the song "Mercedes Benz" was critical of the Keeping up with the Jones' lifestyle and is now used to pitch the car? It's just insane.

Of course, it is easy for me to be judge and jury in this matter. No one's ever offered me a boatload of cash for something I've written. If Hallmark came up to me and offered five figures for the rights to my It's a Mistake to Encourage Kids to Send Valentine's Day Cards article, would I have the stones to tell them - no, I think you're missing the point. I don't want your money if you're going to use it to promote something that I'm against.

It has to be difficult for rock acts that regularly sold out hockey arenas in the 1970s that now can't sell out run down theatres that seat 500 people. When the commercials come offering the big check, how do you say no? Because let's not pretend that the fellows in Bachman Turner Overdrive are still "Llivin' La Vida Loca" or anything.

So, I am torn out of my mind with the latest example of rock stars selling out. The other night the television is on. I am in the room, but not really watching it. Suddenly, I hear music playing on a commercial and my ears pick up. I know the tune but I can't immediately place the song. They start singing and it's The Kinks, one of my favorite bands.

In a commercial for the store Target, they are using the song "Everybody's a Star" which is the opening track to Soap Opera perhaps the most over-the-top concept album ever made.

The story is how a big star switches places with an ordinary guy and ends up questioning everything about both ordinary people and celebrity.

Here are the lyrics to what is now a come-on for Target:

I am a creator,
Inventor and innovator.
I observe the people,
The ordinary people
No matter what your occupation is
Everybody's in showbiz.
'Cos I'm a Star (gonna make you a star),
And I can make you a Star (gonna make you a star),
I believe that everybody's a celebrity,
And we've all got personality
And individuality.
We all read lines,
And we all act a part,
We all need a script
And an audience to play to.
No matter what you do,
Or who you are,
Everybody's a star.

I'm the magic maker,
I'm the image maker,
I'm the interior decorator.

I can take any man
I see standing in the road
And put rouge on his cheeks
And put some powder on his nose.
I'll teach him how to act,
I'll re-mould and reshape him.
I'll put him in a stage suit
And I'll teach him how to pose.
I can turn the most ordinary man in the world into a star.
I'm a starmaker (gonna make you a star),
Yes, I'm gonna make you a star (gonna make you a star)
No matter how dull or simple you are
Everybody's a star.

I'm the magic maker,
I'm the image maker,
I can make or break you.
I'm a star maker (gonna make you a star)
Yes, I'm gonna make you a star (gonna make you a star),
Gonna make you a star,
'Cos everybody's a star.

It's got nothing to do with merchandise or selling stuff. It was never a hit. Why on earth would a retailer choose this song? Are they targeting the 100,000 die-hard Kinks fans in the country? Have Kinks fans shown a preference for Wal-Mart and is Target trying to win their allegiance by playing a song that classic rock radio stations have turned their backs on?

It makes no sense to me. But you know what? I've decided I'm glad that this song that most people have never heard of is getting played on television in a commercial. Maybe it will convince some kid who has never heard of The Kinks to check them out and they get hooked on their stuff.

I'm sure Nick Drake fans hated that his intensely personal music about pain and suffering was used in a commercial for, of all things, Volkswagen. But that was the first time I ever heard his songs played. And now I have both Pink Moon and Five Leaves Left.

So, if you like that song in the Target commercial, go out and get Soap Opera or better yet Sleepwalker or Lola versus Powerman and the Money-Go-Round. I'd recommend going to the Russian Site I told you about although I guess you could go to Target.com and find it there, too.