The band was Korn, and the record label decided to hold a press conference on Military Island, which is a tiny triangle of real estate in the middle of Times Square. Someone in marketing had the brilliant idea of creating a corn field, for obvious reasons I suppose, complete with bales of hay. All was going well until the mounted police arrived and couldn’t keep their horses from snacking on the aforementioned bales of hay. Not a disaster by any means, but I’m sure that the label’s marketing department did not intend to have the New York mounted police and their hungry horses in the cornfield with Korn as they held a press conference in Manhattan. And so it goes with the best laid plans.…
A clever, successful marketing and advertising campaign is paramount to the public acceptance of any given product. A good ad is akin to the hook of a good song, which sticks in your head even if you hate the song or what it may represent. In the music business, a good record can sell a band and vice versa. Some artists I have worked with have become successful due to enormous airplay of their records, though oddly enough, they were not a big draw at the concert or club box office. Some bands, like Dispatch, have a high profile on the Internet and can sell out Madison Square Garden, yet remain virtually unknown to the general music-consuming public. The Internet has affected the world of marketing on such a grand scale that everyone, especially the music business, has scrambled to maintain their share of royalties in a file-sharing world.
Cutting into Profits
In the past, other than potential record sales, a record label or publishing house didn’t make money from an artist’s live performance. In a move to change this scenario, there are certain deals currently in the works that could enable a record label or concert producer to exploit each live per-formance; however, nothing has been agreed upon. For the moment, the publishers and record companies still need to rely upon CD sales, down-loads and airplay to make their profits.
In an attempt to generate additional income, publishers and labels have explored new territory to generate cash flow, including the sale of ring tones. However, the most prominent trend in recent years is the recycling of old tunes or older artists in product advertisements. Ironically, most of these ads only use the hook of any given song to promote their product, even though the original message of the song may be the total antithesis of the product being sold. For example, Office Depot is using the old Bachman Turner Overdrive hit “Taking Care of Business” to sell office supplies. The original lyric is basically an antiestablishment, antiwork anthem, but this hasn’t deterred the marketing geniuses from co-opting the catchy hook and using it for their own ends.
In the 1990s, Bill Clinton was promoting his Americorp idea, and at one of the ceremonies in Central Park, I was approached by one of his staff and instructed to play John Lennon’s “Imagine.” I got what they were trying to say, but other than the word “Imagine,” I think they were off message, so to speak. Volvo is exploiting “Catch the Wind” by Donovan, another icon of the Hippie generation, and Subaru has used both Sheryl Crow’s “Every-day Is a Winding Road” and Kansas’ “Dust in the Wind” to sell cars. Recently, I heard a Lipton Tea commercial, which used The Doobie Brothers vocal scat from their song “Jesus Is Just Alright.”
I thought this odd, but when I pointed it out to my 15-year-old son, he told me that he recognized the melody, but didn’t know the song itself, therefore —“Who cares?”
Well, I guess he’s right, and he, along with all of his generation, won’t care until years from now, when he hears a once-meaningful song that defined his youth being parlayed into a hook to sell doughnuts, sneakers or some other nonrelated product. Remember Nike and the Beatles’ “Revolution”? Sacrilege! Ronald Reagan wanted to use “Born in the U.S.A.” as an American anthem until either Bruce nixed it or someone told the president what the song was about. Either way, if you would like to see more tunes that have been used (some more appropriately than others) to sell everything from cars to yogurt, go to: http://rockmaven.com/commercials.htm. For a real bit of amusement, look up the original lyrics to each song and see how (if at all) it might relate to said product.
This is nothing new. John Mellencamp realized he wasn’t about to get radio play and sold Chevrolet a song for its latest campaign, “This Is Our Country.” Apparently, the old Bob Seeger campaign with “Like a Rock” was dated, and a new retro image was needed to sell Chevy trucks. Mel-lencamp’s song melds Springsteen’s anthemic “Born in the U.S.A.” with Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land” and gives us a clean, non-communistic approach to selling the patriotic Chevy truck. OK, I get it. Mellencamp, along with thousands of other musicians, want and need to work and will play the game to stay in it. I can’t fault it, but my idealistic side says it would be nice to have something to believe in.
Artists from Clyde McPhatter to the Rolling Stones have had their songs associated with some commercial product and, in the words of my son, “Who cares?” Well, I guess I do since I found such rebellious meaning in many of those songs. I mean, what if they try to sell Axe deodorant with “Smells Like Teen Spirit”? Or maybe try marrying Outkast’s “So Fresh So Clean” with adult diapers. Point is, I guess it doesn’t really matter because people have short-term memories and can’t remember what the songs are about anyway. Either that, or nobody has any real convictions, politically or socially. Nevertheless, the big marketing train keeps on rolling, and if we are to make a living, then we best get on board.
Yes, but…
In the past few years, I have been doing more large-scale mall events with major name artists, as well as providing systems for such esteemed ad-vertising clients as Donny Deutsch and McCann Erickson. The advertising agencies host a small concert in their offices, which is presented by various publishing houses with the hope of selling their writer’s songs for commercial use. Usually a small system will suffice in the office spaces, but for the mall events, some real production is required.
The premise of these mall events is that the marketing folks are concerned with selling products that are tied in with the band, while the record company and the band are marrying their fate with the sponsor so that they can sell their unique “message,” plus a few million records to the masses.
To the marketing people, these mall events are never really about the band’s music, but rather the visibility of a product. The mall people don’t really care about the music either, as their main focus is to get as many people as possible flocking to the mall and into the stores. Therefore, the bands tend to get the grand audio shaft because nobody cares enough to take the time to recognize that when you put on an event that will draw 2,000–5,000 screaming kids, it is called a concert. Concert production is required, and that’s when we, as audio providers, step forward.
Recently S.I.R. was called upon to do three or four mall dates with the Plain White T’s, a band that reached number one on the Billboard charts two dates into their mall tour. When I first got the call from the marketing company, they were asking for a 48-channel board. It seems that someone in charge read the rider and realized that their Mackie 24-channel board would not suffice. Of course, this request aroused my curiosity, and with a little bit of sleuthing, I learned that the marketing company was planning on doing the show with a couple of speakers on stands and their Mackie 24-channel board. In the end, even though they hated the price tag, they and the band were thrilled that we brought a PM5D, a Midas Heritage, a split snake, G2 personal monitor system, 12 AM wedges and a small EAW 850 rig.
The marketing company provided stage and lights, but as with most of these mall shows, I also made sure that we had concert barricade and a real labor crew. Sure, there was a bit of haggling over the unexpected cost but, in the end, if the right choices are made then everyone, including the band, the marketing company, the mall and the 5,000 screaming kids will be happier for it. Happy people are apt to spend more money and tend to associate cheer-ful thoughts with said event. If the band has a superior performance, and the audience’s listening pleasure is enhanced, then these satisfied people will open their wallets. This translates into more records sold, higher profits for the mall stores and more subliminal bliss associated with whatever products are being marketed. Subsequently, a few years from now, after the band has peaked, they may get really lucky and have their image and song attached to a television marketing campaign — all because we, as providers of sound and production, brought the right gear. ¡Viva la revolución!
Send Baker your rider at blee@fohonline.com.
