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All-Time Worst Use of a Classic Song in a TV Commercial

Office Depot uses "Taking Care of Business" in their ads. They even play that song when you call one of their stores and they put you on hold, at least they did in February--the last time I had to call my local store on a computer issue.

Staples always had the slogan, "That Was Easy." But I don't remember if they have ever used any classic songs in their ads.

And while not really a classic song (at least not yet) I am getting tired of seeing and hearing the Chrysler 300 ads with the Dr. Dre soundtrack. They were on almost every other commercial break during the World Series and of course they are overplayed ad nauseum on Sundays during the NFL.
 
dhett said:
Back when Microsloth introduced Windows 95, they used the 1981 Rolling Stones' hit, "Start Me Up". It was meant to imply that the new operating system was more stable than anything they'd offered before, i.e., didn't crash, but a following line of the song was more appropriate - at least during early days of Win95: "You make a grown man cry."
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Microsoft still makes grown men cry--particularly when Patch Tuesday rolls around (second Tuesday of the month when they release lots of security updates, some of which have been known to cause more problems than it solves).
 
landtuna said:
I do notice there are not very many current/recent songs used for commercials. There has got to be a reason they use the Oldies.
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K.T. Tunstall's "Suddenly I See" (2006 or thereabouts) is already being used on its second commercial campaign, this time for Rooms to Go. It was previously used in a Goody's/T.J.Maxx or similar store campaign.
 
There's a Swiffer commercial where a guy is stuck in the cracks, gets picked up by a duster, & next you hear What About Love by Heart. That completely annoys me hearing that song in that commercial.
 
I haven't heard this one used in a commercial lately, but for a while there, it seemed like almost every other ad on TV was using "It's Your Thing" by the Isley Bros. It was okay for a while there, but time to give it a rest now!

And I'm surprised that no one has mentioned it yet, the overuse of Christmas songs (usually with new lyrics) in a commercial. Charter communications has been using "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" in a football promotion (sung really lousy by a bunch of football fans) since August! :mad:
 
visaman said:
I'm shocked no one has mentioned "Revolution" for NIKE.
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That one especially rankled people because it came right after Michael Jackson bought the rights to most of the Beatles' songs. It must have backfired on Nike because they didn't use it for very long. It didn't do Michael any favors, either! ::)
 
firepoint525 said:
visaman said:
I'm shocked no one has mentioned "Revolution" for NIKE.
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That one especially rankled people because it came right after Michael Jackson bought the rights to most of the Beatles' songs. It must have backfired on Nike because they didn't use it for very long. It didn't do Michael any favors, either! ::)
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Didn't Jacko care about the Chinese children in Nike's factories?
 
Tim from Springfield said:
My latest contribution to the Worst TV Commericals thread involving Stimulator's lousy rendition of Olivia Newton-John's "Magic" that used in the recent Macy's ad campaign (both radio and TV) has just prompted this spin-off thread. The Stimulator cover of Magic is on YouTube:
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Which is interesting, considering that no one plays ONJ's version of it anymore. Of course, Xanadu (the movie it was from) was a dud, so that may have something to do with it. I don't even hear "Physical" anymore, but I'm still tired of it from when it was a hit, so no loss there.
I also nominate the 2008 "Saved By Zero" Toyota ads (after the 1983 Fixx follow-up to "One Thing Leads to Another") and how it was overplayed (per Wikipedia--yes, I know :) ) 40,000 times by October 26, 2008 as another poor use of a classic hit in commercials. Time magazine had an article that fall about the Saved By Zero campaign and how "it wouldn't stop."
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"Saved By Zero" was actually the predecessor (not the followup) to "One Thing Leads to Another."
 
I heard a contender for this prize last night: a new commercial for Anthem Blue Cross, trying to get people to switch their health insurance.

The music - Steppenwolf's Born to Be Wild. WTF? If the song had a point, they didn't make it clear from the copy the voice-over guy was reading, or the footage they were showing.

If you live a "wild" life, make sure you have the best health coverage??? I did not get it.
 
volunteers of america by jefferson airplane used for a investment broker company in around 2000 or so is a bad case that comes to mind.
 
Was any theme song more nauseating than The Golden Girls, "THANK YOU FOR BEING A FRIEND" ?? I'm guessing that this song garners more recognition from Golden Girls viewers than from it's run on the radio more than 30-years ago.
 
flashback said:
volunteers of america by jefferson airplane used for a investment broker company in around 2000 or so is a bad case that comes to mind.
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That's hilarious considering the original theme of the song. Later on, Starship's "We Built This City" was used ins an ITT commercial ("We built this busines on serving yooooou...) which also was pretty amusing considering the Airplane/Starship's "counterculture" image. That's all it was too. An image. Read an interview with Grace Slick one time and they really came off like capitalist money-grubbers. They should have called one of their albums "We're Only In It for the Money," a la Frank Zappa.
 
firepoint525 said:
And I'm surprised that no one has mentioned it yet, the overuse of Christmas songs (usually with new lyrics) in a commercial. Charter communications has been using "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" in a football promotion (sung really lousy by a bunch of football fans) since August! :mad:
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Maybe, but Staples gets points for using it for their back-to-school commercial. Priceless!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPIIMbG9R4w
 
dhett said:
firepoint525 said:
And I'm surprised that no one has mentioned it yet, the overuse of Christmas songs (usually with new lyrics) in a commercial. Charter communications has been using "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" in a football promotion (sung really lousy by a bunch of football fans) since August! :mad:
Click to expand...

Maybe, but Staples gets points for using it for their back-to-school commercial. Priceless!
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Also, the Staples ad used the original Andy Williams version of the song, instead of trying to rewrite the thing.
 
A different twist...

A combo worker @ a small town radio station I worked at in New Mexico once pulled off using Buddy Holly's "Oh Boy" as a commerical music bed. The client was an independent grocer, advertising the grand opening of his new store: Poor Boy's. The compression of AM radio caused the backup refrain of "Oh Boy" to sound like "POOR Boy...", beneath the the copy. This would not have worked on FM.
 
Years ago...(maybe the 90's) a gas/convenience store retailer in the Southwest called Diamond Shamrock used Creedence Clearwater Revival's Down On The Corner in their radio ads.

"Down on the Corner Diamond Shamrock's all you need."

To this day I hate hearing that song.
 
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