Celine/Elvis: RIVETING...will radio notice?
I THINK I can figure out how they did it, and they did it VERY convincingly.
I got chills.
The King lives.
They convinced me that He, and Celine, were standing side-by-side.
What a moment.
As consultants insist on saying, "Two points:"
1. Too bad DJ-dummy Ryan Seacrest felt the need to burst-the-bubble, when, groping to seem warm-and-fuzzy with the young girl in the audience afterward, he alluded to the-moment-being-a-special-effect.
2. OLDIES LIVE! The circa-1968 Elvis clip sure seemed to resonate, despite the way radio is abandoning music so dear to fifty-somethings.
I know WHY this is happening, but I think it's a mistake. At an Oldies FM I consult, we just did an auditorium music test; and what-the-sample-is-telling-us is more "I Guess That's Why They Call It The Blues" by Elton John and less Motown. Meanwhile, the Mt. Everest on the USA's demographic graph -- 50-somethings like yours truly -- are deemed out-of-the-demographic...while we 50+ fossils spend more money, at-a-more-dizzying-velocity, then we've ever spent in our lives.
Example-of-such-spending: Recently, I was among cheering fans at a sold-out Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons concert at fabulous, fabulous Mohegan Sun Casino in Connecticut. 7000+ plus packed the arena, a steep ticket prices, and there wasn't an oxygen tank in sight. When Frankie asked, state-by-state, for "Where are you from?" applause, he got a big hand when he asked for "New York?" and "New Jersey?" Yep, people drove RIGHT THROUGH radio's #1 market, where no station plays his music on the radio, to see Frankie Valli. Who, not-so-incidentally, had a recurring role on cable's big money-maker, "The Sopranos." Yet he's abandoned by radio.
It seems like every-third-commercial on TV has an oldie playing in the background. When I landed at the airport Sunday, "My Girl" by The Temptations was playing on the airport Muzak. Just TRY to find it on radio.
Admittedly, Madison Avenue is the-long-pole-in-the-tent. As long as Sally Timebuyer -- an entry-level ad agency twenty-something, who spends her day squinting-at-dots-and-spots on a computer screen -- is tasked 25-54, moments like last night's RIVETING Celine/Elvis virtual duet will seem exceptional.
But soon, and suddenly, advertisers will wake-up and realize that, every day in the USA, ten thousand people turn 50. Hopefully, music radio won't have shunned them irretrievably.
HC
www.HollandCooke.com
PS: Per USA Today last week: Highest-priced ticket in Vegas? AN OLDIE, Barry Manilow's "Music and Passion" show at The Las Vegas Hilton.
