Led Zep-Sellouts (1 Viewer)

[Jack Fanning]

Sigh....read today where Cadillac will unveil it's new ad campaign for their new line of CTS' on Super Bowl Sunday using Led Zep's "Rock & Roll" song...the article stated that this is the first time a LZ song has been used in an advertisement.

I'm glad my favorite and most admired artist-Bruce Springsteen-has resisted any temptation to sell out that way.

Jack

 

[Jagan Seshadri]

No bother, as that song was filler anyway.

-JNS

 

[Ryan Spaight]

I'm sort of curious exactly when in music history it became bad to "sell out."

I mean, back in the early-to-mid sixties it was completely normal for pop groups to not only sell their songs for ads, but to perform entirely new ad jingles, or adaptations of existing songs, for them. The Beatles, the Who, Hendrix, everyone did it.

Heck, check out "The Who Sell Out" -- they explicitly advertised for real companies all over that album as part of the album's concept. They've admitted that they did it in part in hopes of getting free gear to replace the stuff they smashed up on stage. Until "Tommy," they were always on the edge on bankruptcy from equipment replacement costs.

I guess it was during the screw-the-Man late sixties/early seventies that this became a bad thing. Or maybe it was punk in the mid-to-late Seventies that really did it in. (Though I've heard plenty of punk songs in commercials.)

Ryan

 

[Mike Broadman]

I've often noticed that bands and their fans use the claim that they didn't "sell-out" as an excuse to play poorly.

A rock 'n' roll song isn't a delicate piece of art that should only be heard in a certain context. It's just a song. Big deal.

 

[Jack Fanning]

I happen to think it is a bad thing....it cheapens the song and the integrity of the artist to use the songs to sell Dr. Pepper (ugh....Garth Brooks) or vehicles or whatever.

IMO, of course.

 

[Mike Broadman]

Why?

 

[MikeAW]

If there is anything positive about this, is that it introduces a new generation of listeners to their catalog...and they can use all the help they can.

 

[Jack Fanning]

Why? Simple.

At the risk of being melodramatic here....a good song, to me, is one that paints a picture, tells a story or relates something to me. If that song that touched or moved me in some way is then used to sell consumer goods...it cheapens it in my opinion.

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

Considering the song was written and recorded a couple of decades ago and was not affected by the desire to place it in a commercial, they could use it to sell Viagra for all I care and it would not diminish my opinion of it one iota.

Regards,

 

[Ralph Summa]

Who cares?

My wife and I picked our wedding song from a Jaguar commercial. Etta James "At Last". What an incredibly beautiful song. I never heard of her or the song before that commercial and it opened us up to a whole different genre of music for me: Lena Horne, Billie Holliday to name a couple.

What about American Airlines using Gershwin? Someone's getting paid, but is that considered a sellout?

I am a huge Zep fan and I don't think any less of them for allowing Cadillac use their song. Anyway, Plant and Page are doing OK, but John Paul Jones has to need the money!

Just my .02...

 

[Mike Broadman]

but John Paul Jones has to need the money!

Then buy his solo album, Zooma. Excellent instrumental album. And he's releasing another one in February. He just came off of a tour opening for King Crimson.

I'm sure he's doing just fine.

This whole "cheapens the song" thing is a bunch of nonsensical rhetoric that sprung up from hippies and punks. It doesn't matter. Music is music, not politics.

 

[Brian Perry]

Are we sure Zeppelin still had the rights anyway? I thought there was a 25 year time limit.

 

[Ryan Spaight]

Yep, they still hold the rights.
They kept a tight rein on the songs for many, many years, but apparently the experience of licensing a few songs for Almost Famous convinced them that "exploiting the catalog" was a Good Thing.
Late last year, their management sent out a multidisc compilation of their work to ad agencies and other folks involved in licensing out songs. It now goes for big bucks on Ebay.
Looks like Cadillac was one of the first fish caught with that lure.
Ryan

 

[Dan B]

I agree with those of you who think this is tired rhetoric. Led Zep created what they created...a commercial featuring their music doesn't change anything.

Jack, I understand your deep connection with Led Zep's "art", but I don't think that commercial usage should have any effect at all on your relationship with the music.

-Dan B.

 

[Greg_Y]

I thought that Iggy Pop said it best that he didn't care what his songs are used to sell, they were written by him, performed by him to convey certain emotions, and they'll always have a meaning for him and his audience.

Of course, I thought that until they started using Lust for Life in every friggin commercial on TV.

 

[Ryan Spaight]

Of course, I thought that until they started using Lust for Life in every friggin commercial on TV.

I hear you. I don't know what's worse, using "Lust for Life" to promote a cruise ship (what, do they serve smack on board?) or using CCR's "Fortunate Son" as a post-9/11 patriotic anthem to sell blue jeans. (They took one line -- "Some folks are born made to wave the flag / The red white and blue" -- and left out the next one -- "But when the band plays Hail to the Chief / They point the cannon at you." Wonder why they did that?)

Still, in my mind companies that make stupid music choices just make themselves look bad. For every one of those, there's a classic pairing of music and visuals like the Nissan ad with Barbie, Ken, GI Joe and Van Halen. One of the all-time best ads ever.

Ryan

 

[KrisM]

I would rather have bands that I admire not use their songs in commercials, but that is just me. It is Led Zeppelin's song, they can do as they please. It is not as if they are the kings of integrity anyway.

KrisM

 

[Jeremy Illingworth]

I wouldn't call them sellouts. I reserve that for Britanny Spears and Metallica. Britanny Spears sings the Pepsi theme on tv so I would call that selling out. Especially since nobody could possibly like Pepsi. And Metallica, going from hard metal with only a single video in five albums and snubbing the musical 'establishment' (awards and whatnot) to being a four single and videos per album and attending the Grammys. That may have changed since I quit listening to them for being sellouts.

But Zeppelin took a twenty five plus year old song and rented it to Cadillac. I think its selling when it affects the content, which this certainly does not.

jeremy

 

[Lee Scoggins]

If you think Led Zep's a sellout, how about Martin Luther King's family holding an auction on everything.
How's that for a controversial posting!
Lee

 

[MikeH1]

As much as many of us dislike it, releasing songs to the advertisers just won't end. Its too bad it happens with timeless classics. I remember my first experience with a song that brought me great memories and was in a commercial some time later. Sure, Boston's More than a Feeling had been released for many years already but when I heard it being played on that Boston Pizza commercial in the early 90s my heart sank.

But I knew real quick I had better get used to some of my favorites being violated for it isn't just going to end.

Just a matter of time until Stairway to Heaven is used for a Microsoft ad.