Always Something To Remind Me
Know what really grinds my gears?
Hearing a favorite song become cannon fodder for commercials, bumps, and other corporate messaging.
Most people within the reach of the moving image have seen Intel’s ‘Multiply’ campaign. As the infectious bassline and glam jangles of New Young Pony Club’s ‘Ice Cream’ hit the screen, an androgynous female gyrates about in kaleidoscopic fashion. For more examples of songs bent over and tore up on TV, see Royksopp’s ‘Remind Me’ flirt with cavemen for GEICO, or Spank Rock’s ‘Bump’ blast during the beginning of an episode of last season’s Entrouage.
Hearing songs move from the personal to the public can be unnerving, but this ‘dismay’ is really self-loathing envy for well-timed creative direction.
The intersection of art and commerce, for all the dismay on the part of artists or the fans, is a very real, very necessary threshold. With or without relevant aesthetic quality, brands interact with society, and too often poor messaging or management leaves the intent far from the understanding of the consumer.
Companies choose a target demographic that is communicated to creative directors, who work with trend consultants that come up with a barrage of styles, shapes, and sounds that they can use to form new ‘directions’ for the brand to present itself. Assuming the band is making money and all the invested parties are presumably content with the final product, should I not tip my hat at the happy marriage as well? Should I not be happier that a company at least is choosing music I like?
The point of all this is that in this haze of genre overlap and freelance everything, a certain amount of ‘letting go’ is necessary. At the risk of repeating the premise of every post ever made on this blog, you, or your company, or your friend, or some idea you stole from someone else, may be the hotness, and that is a bona fide edge in the market, but not for long. Be prepared to let it go, because with so much ‘everyware’-ness, your favorite song/smell/design is bound to be picked up with the quickness. Beyond being prepared for it. Be OK with it.
I suppose so-called ‘trend-seeking’ professionals can separate their own likes with that of the general marketplace, but I still sigh and get teary-eyed when I see my baby, no matter how poppy the material, blow up.
I’m just surprised no one from Intel or anywhere down the line used that one song by Jamie Lidell with the coincidentally similar lyrics…
