Music and Diet Coke

Marketers are smart people, and know when they hear a song that will work in a television commercial.

There are a few types ways to go, it seems. Using well known songs by popular artists is one approach. A second and related approach seems to be using a melody that is sort of close to one that is deeply ingrained in our minds. They’ve been studies, I’m sure…

The third source of music for television commercials is the use of new or unknown songs with strong pop hooks. One of the great clips I’ve watched over the past few years is Mohammad Rafi’s “Jaan Pehchan” from the Bollywood movie “Gumnaam.” (All of those spellings may be wrong.) The song and accompanying marathon dance routine are a couple of levels beyond great. The road I took to that video went through a Heineken commercial.

That brings us to today’s post, and Diet Coke. The song above is “Suit” by “Boom! Bap! Pow!,” a few seconds of which is used in the current commercial for the drink. It’s a very catchy. It’s sort of a naughty GP-rated song that fits right in with our current weird 50 shades of gray culture. It’s appropriate that the band ended up on television, since it seems to have been named with a nod to “Batman.” Below is “No Pleasin’,” which also displays what could be called the band’s pop chops.

There is nothing at all wrong with using music in this way, in my opinion. We are a capitalist society, and using songs to promote products is a legitimate avenue for artists to prosper on their work and for the companies to push their products. It also is fine and refreshing, of course, for folks such as Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen to just say no.

Here is Boom! Bap! Pow!’s Facebook page. It’s interesting that there is a shout out to The Divinyls in one of the photos at the page. If you’ve never heard of the Divinyls, well, I can’t really explain it.