Great Looks For Less!

DVArgh

2006-06-26T08:49:00.001-07:00

Hello blog-dience. Long time.

How offensive and disturbing that the Beatles classic "All You Need Is Love" is used in a Chase Bank commercial. People are charging crap on their Chase cards because all they need is love....of buying crap.

I also hate that Comcast commercial with the geniuses in the laboratory and the asian guy makes a pagoda. Argh. Have we learned nothing from Harold and Kumar?

Also, we have cable and DVR now so I can fast forward through commercials during my regular shows, the names of which I am too embarrassed to mention herewithin.

DVArgh

2006-06-26T08:49:00.000-07:00

Famous Favorites

2006-05-24T11:42:00.000-07:00

For the past few years, Honda has been trying out a new approach, its most memorable ads obviously catering to the young, hip family. This is evident purely through the songs they choose. There was a commercial last year urging yuppie moms to buy one of their ugly SUVs ***(see note) by using Modest Mouse's Gravity Rides Everything from the Moon and Antarctica. Yes, it is a disturbing trend (I don't like it when I actually pay attention to a commercial that's obviously meant for my demographic. Makes me feel icky.) but, of course, it's a great song from a great album.

Other notable examples of Honda's Newfound Hip are use of M.I.A.'s Galang and The Postal Service's We Will Become Silhouettes. Yes, I like both of these bands/songs.

I only recently noticed, however, in the latter commercial, the "Pa-pa-pa-pa"s sung on the album by Jenny Lewis (for whom I profess nothing less than hero worship) are not actually sung by Jenny in the ad! Rather, they are replaced by a synth-voice that may or may not be human. The rest of the music is the same but the non-Jenny voice is annoying. I can't imagine why they decided to replace it, unless it was so they wouldn't have to pay the artist as much. Boooooo.

I'm not entirely sure how licensing songs for commercials goes, although I am learning. I think the artist generally has very little to do with it, at least if they are on a major. But I've definitely changed my perspective on bands licensing songs to companies for commercials, particularly since I know what it's like to be broke. Daydreaming about having enough dough to play music and have nice gear and not have to work a dull office job is what keeps me going some days.

Franz Ferdinand recently turned down a huge offer for use of one of their songs in a commercial for an unnamed multinational corporation. Good for them. I think it does need to be decided on a case-by-case basis. On the other hand, The Concretes, whose Say Something New was in a Target commercial, donated a good chunk of the compensation they received to a corporate watchdog organization. I'd say that's even smarter.

*** Ok ok I used to drive a CRV, but it's not actually an SUV! It's got a four-cylinder engine, the same as a Honda Civic. It's just taller.

Cars and other stuff

2006-05-12T22:18:00.000-07:00

While watching the last episode of Conan in Chicago, saw four commercials worthy of commentary-

Toyota: Has a new car called Yaris. Sounds more like an MTV VJ.

VW Passat: People driving around with megaphones out the window saying stuff like "Because I make more money than you" and "Because I'm making up for my shortcomings." Then a woman in a VW drops her megaphone out the window and the voiceover says, "The lowest ego emissions of any German-engineered vehicle." Ha.

GE (unfortunately): Cute elephant tap dancing in the jungle to Singing in the Rain. I like elephants.

Walter E Smithe: Vote for your favorite finalist in the Walter E. Smithe jingle contest! Dude, Lauren totally should've done it. Ok I have to go vote.

Heroes

2006-04-26T07:16:00.000-07:00

This Wes Anderson AmEx ad is pretty sweet. Of course, for me, he can do no wrong.

Also, Amelie Gillette of the Onion's The Hater is totally my new hero. Can't believe I just found out about this.

There's a glare on the screen!

2006-04-25T12:15:00.000-07:00

Coming home from work early = daytime commercials.

I'm pretty sure I saw a same sex couple on a Buy Owner commercial. (Either that or just two dudes who live together in a nice big house.) Thanks, Buy Owner!

This is TV-related... Apparently Corbin Bernsen is now on General Hospital. I was never a huge fan of his or anything, but I'm pretty sure this is a demotion.

Ewwwww

2006-04-22T19:41:00.000-07:00

Ok, this is about a print ad I saw at Union Station. I always feel so weird there with all the commuters. (I do like the huge contingent of brown folks who apparently all live in the suburbs, work in the city, and take the same PACE bus to the Westmont station every weekday morning just a few minutes before the 8:05 train. I try to sit on the same car if I can. Makes me happy.)

Yeah, so the ad! It's for Microsoft Office for PDAs and it says "Is that Microsoft Office in your pocket?" They omitted skipped the second part of that sentence, but if they were trying to be classy ad, they really didn't need to.

This is mostly really eww because I think of like 40+ old dude executives. You know, the Viagra crowd.

B.O.W.

2006-04-22T19:30:00.000-07:00

I know all I've done with this blog is rag on bad commercials, but even I can admit there are some good ones out there. Here I present the Best of the Week (B.O.W.) I'll come up with a better name later.

Sour Patch Kids. An adolescent girl wakes in the morning and looks in the mirror to find that one of her tails has pigtails has been bluntly chopped off. She squeals! Out of her closet comes a red Sour Patch Kid with who's about three feet tall, with muddled facial features just like the candy itself. It sheepishly walks over to the girl and hugs her leg. "Sour, then sweet." Ha. Brilliant.

Visa. This commercial has the best song and I don't know what it is! There is an animated worm that is kinda pop-and-lock'ing to this awesome song. We later see that the dude has made a flip book of his checks because, you know, Visa is so convenient it renders checkbooks obsolete. (Which, for me, is actually mostly true. Besides rent.) But, yeah, mostly the song makes this commercial.

ITunes. Second best song. It's the one where all the album art makes a city. The song rocks in that garag- revival-Brooklyn-sound sort of way that is so popular with the kids these days. Ironically, for a commercial about downloading music, the song's credits are difficult to find; my brother and I independently attempted to Google this song but came up with nothing.

Karm-ercials Pt. II

2006-04-22T19:26:00.000-07:00

Two new brown sightings: A dude in some McDonalds commercial that was too boring for me to actually watch (I only noticed when my brother drew attention to it.) I think it involves some achiever guy in a tie making his slacker roommate pay for lunch. I'm glad the brown guy is portrayed as a slacker because you don't see that very often (unless I'm completely missing the point of this commercial) but then my brother said, "Why does the brown guy have to pay?"

Another more disturbing commercial that I also paid only half-attention to shows a short, dumpy brown guy with a serious accent in the IT department completely brown-nosing his grey-haired white CEO-type boss. Didn't catch the point of that commercial either (Microsoft, perhaps?) but I didn't like the portrayal, that's for sure.

I heart Dentists

2006-04-17T13:28:00.000-07:00

This 1-800 Dentist commercial was nearly a tear-jerker, if you're into that sort of thing (eg. crying during commercials.) Apparently, this woman found her family such a fantastic dentist that now her son looooves going to the dentist more than anything else in the world. What's more, she remembers the name of the operator who set her family up with the dentist she's in loooove with. (Audrey? Unf. I don't remember.)

She's NOT lovin it.

2006-04-11T21:23:00.000-07:00

Note the NOT in the title again. It's cuz it's the same day.

I think Amanda will harm the TV if she hears the McDonald's hook again and I don't blame her.

She also pointed out the weird use of "Waiting in Vain" by Bob Marley on a liver transplant commercial. They just loop the part that goes "I don't wanna wait." Unnnnnecessary.

I want to write a post about the worst of: a)the use of popular songs in commercials, b) the use of popular songs with modified lyrics in commercials, and c) godawful jingles. Yeah, at some point.

Grey's aNOTamy

2006-04-11T16:05:00.000-07:00

Forgive me for the title of this post; I could not help myself.

The Worst Commercial of the Week (WCW) goes to this horrendous bit about some drug that starts with a Z or a K...I think it's Z-something.

Rather than the standard fare of running in a field, fishing, or mountain biking, this one has a team of Residents following their attending around like little puppy dogs. "Who can tell me how to lower cholesterol?" says the grey-haired and therefore more experienced Attending. The smart one chimes in, "How about Z-blahblah? It's proven to lower cholesterol in some cases of blah blah." The "conversation"continues like they're reading the drug label as they walk through the hospital which, for some reason, has attractive outdoor cloisters. They even have one resident say, "You should not take Z-blahblah if you are pregnant, nursing, etc etc," as though he invented the damn thing and knows it all for memory. Of course, the crowning moment comes as they have made their way outside and are ready to break for lunch. The Attending makes some comment about eating healthy when a resident chimes in, "Don't forget to exercise!" And that's the end! What???

I thought I couldn't hate a drug commercial any more than the herpes medication one with that irritating song that goes, "It's a brand new day!"

The moral of the commercial is: when it comes to selling medication, it's actually desirable to be completely boring and to use stock footage visuals.

Minoriteam

2006-03-19T21:09:00.000-08:00

Ok, this isn't about commercials, but I just wanted to express my disappointment in Minoriteam, the new show on Adult Swim. Not too funny yet but hopefully it will be soon.

The Boondocks season finale, however, was excellent.

The Karm-ercials of Brown Folk

2006-03-10T20:26:00.000-08:00

My blog muse Amanda has been away and our internet connection has sucked greatly as of late so there haven't been too many posts.

There's an M. Night Shyamalan American Express commercial. It's kind of long and I didn't really like his last few films but I'm happy to see the guy on TV representing Southies.

There is a VW commercial where the guy is ordering Indian take-out on the phone. I like that the guy at the restaurant on the other line doesn't have a horrendous(ly bad) accent, they're not making some comment about "that curry smell", etc. He could be ordering any sort of food and it wouldn't affect the fact that the new VW whateveritis is apparently really fast.

What or who is this little black "Fast" that I've seen in the very same VW commercials? I've also seen him next to the Sudoku in the Red Eye and I wonder where he appeared first.
I feel like Jackie Harvey trying to figure this out.

Ubiquitous Dude

2006-03-03T21:36:00.000-08:00

There is this dark-haired fellow who I've seen in about 20 commercials in the last year or so. I've seen him in McDonalds, Dentyne Ice and FedEx or UPS. Roommate Lauren recently spent some time in LA with actor friends and said they get paid $20,000 or more for a national commercial. The commercial actor is the new rockstar. I bet he gets tons of groupies.

Gum Disease

2006-02-28T17:31:00.000-08:00

She saw a little pink in the sink.
Eww.

Universal Studios Escape. "I want to get closer to my kids," says a mother sentimentally as she squeezes the children that flank her during what I can only assume is a scary 3-D movie. There's an earlier version of this commercial with the woman getting a massage from Frankenstein or something, saying dreamily, "I want to get pampered by natives." I hope I don't have to say anything about this other than that is seriously fucked.

Manifesto

2006-02-27T23:06:00.000-08:00

At the inspired suggestion of Roommate Amanda, I'm starting a blog about commercials. During our late-night tv sessions which most notably feature oprah and TWO episodes of elimidate, I apparently have a lot to say about ads, the worst of which seem to be local. I was going to begin this first entry with some sort of essay or manifesto but just thinking about it puts me to sleep. Let's just see how this goes.

Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich is running for re-election and thinks his constituency wants to hear that he "added a second child." This has to be the strangest way to let people know about your family addition

Peter Francis Geraci's Bankruptcy ((Info Tapes)). Why has this guy insisted on being in his own commercials for ten years? A friend's young daughter said it all when she would look at the screen and say, "moonnnnster."

Roommate Amanda and I have a favorite commercial that, sadly, they just don't show anymore. Harlem Furniture's Room Place with different awesome dancers every week! They were so excited to be in the showroom and it made me excited to see them. They've kept the jingle "Great Looks For Less" but I guess the dancers have moved on to bigger and better things.