And by commercial music, I don't necessarily mean the stuff played on the radio, (although I can't speak so highly of that either.) I mean music on commercials. How many more times do I have to listen to "na na na"s in a pentatonic scale, or those stupid clapping hooks, and I swear if I hear one more uber-sentimental reversed echo piano ballad for a soap ad, I'm gonna flip. Commercials, and television in general has become too saturated with bullshit hipster poetry being sung on top of over-compressed guitar chords. Not to mention theres the chick that does these awful covers of classic Beatles songs that make it onto Target commercials. I swear, I'm never shopping and Target again because of that. And then there's dubstep. God, the dubstep. Has anyone else heard that irritating dubstep song that made it onto the Internet Explorer commercial? Are they that desperate for a userbase now? At least every time a dubstep track gets used as the background for a movie trailer, I can accurately predict whether it will suck or not. So has my metalhead desire of complex and different music made me unaccustomed to simple commercial friendly tunes, or are they really just getting that bad?

What about that infamous Discovery Channel commercial with Suffocation?

Was it ever good?

Um, I'm not old enough to remember a day when it might have been. But at least half a decade ago it was easy to ignore. Now I think about it nearly every day.

I'm pretty sure commercial music is made to be catchy, not good. Doesn't matter how annoying and terrible it sounds as long as it makes you remember their product.

It's nothing new. There has been awful, cliche commercial music for a long time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdQY7BusJNU

When "standards" were played by live bands and recorded music wasn't something that could be sold, sheet music of songs was marketed as much as it could be marketed - publishers pushed new music this way. When recorded music became an accessible and marketable product, the music business that we know formed around it. More marketable, poppy versions of styles were something that could appeal to more people and were therefore easier to sell. One of my least favorite groups of all time was a pop-folk band that were extremely popular in the 1960s, but were forgotten because their music was boring and forgettable. I have an irrational hatred for The Kingston Trio
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VMSGrY-IlU


When did the "AM Radio" style song become popular? Very similar song strutures, very limited length. The Beatles broke this trend in 1968 by being an incredibly popular band and not cutting a radio edit of a longer song (Hey Jude). We still see the "single format" songs today on nearly every album, mostly broken from by extreme bands who have a niche fanbase, don't get radio play, and are famous for doing things differently. The Beach Boys first ten records came out in a span of three years and one month (Oct '62 - Nov '65). Their most acclaimed album, "Pet Sounds", was when they broke from their famous formula of putting a dozen variations of "Surfin' USA" on a record.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2sfev-gu3I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbRKfieMsdQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FS7SUFz36lg



It's been going on for at least 50 years. Instead of clapping along, I shake my fist at The Kingston Trio.



That's better than awful bands trying to write songs like the Beatles, right? There certainly was a saturation of those back when the Beatles were big, and for a while afterwards.

Bingo.

And that should explain why it's "gotten" so bad... ad execs realize that if they can bore an obonxious jingle into your mind, you will never forget the product associated with it. You are therefore more likely to subconsciously remember the product.

So ad execs are doing their best to come up with the most irritating jingles ever to brainwash you!

The only solution is to just stop watching TV/listening to the radio, honestly.

Now, I like my cartoons... And my trashy half-hour crime docs, too... and even syndicated shows like Matlock and Golden Girls... So I see enough annoying commercials. But I literally have no reason to turn on the radio. It has literally nothing to offer. I am amazed that anyone ever turns one on these days. I really don't know why radio is SO watered down, or why (compared to cable TV) it has to be so "safe" and highly regulated, but I can't stand listening to it and thus never, ever do because everything on it is terrible, aside from maybe the (very rare) interesting tid-bit on the otherwise lame/annoying NPR.

Cyndi Lauper <3

Hit the nail on the head.

I will never forget that freecreditreport website because of that annoying singing guy with the guitar in all of the commercials.

I usually just change the channel when ads come on so I don't suffer through them much and I don't watch much tv to begin with.

I have a long history of downloading music because I heard it in a commercial. I'm so caught by it that I actually forget the product/service they were trying to sell. I actually like the music used in commercials except the latest dubstep in IE9 of course. Just because its a mixture of two awful entities in one. I'm a person who likes to discover new catchy songs. Adds are giving me that opportunity.

My all time favorite - I know for sure many of you would disagree.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WS_alU8X2Q

Other songs I like from commercials:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LcKbD8F0Sqk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NfomRCalU5A

My favorite Ipod commercials:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftTaWwtbvgM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKxGfLo7Cqo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkLF8rEFDps

There were a few more but I cant remember now - but i'm quite happy the songs I discovered thanks to commercials - they are surely indie pop which CF_Mono called hipster crap. I know its not the best music out there but I prefer it over any Black Eyes Peas song being used in a commercial.

Pretty much never, no.

If I watch TV, I mute the commercials. Everybody wins.

Don't bash the pentatonic scale or I'll bash you.

This is one of the things I would do for the most obnoxious ones (the aforementioned FreeCreditReport.com ads, I'm looking at you), but otherwise I would zone out completely during commercials or make fun of them with my friends/captives.

I say "would" because I never watch television anymore. I only have cable because it makes Internet access cheaper by a few bucks, and the last time I turned on the television for something other than video games or a movie was back in January, so my place would seem normal when the pizza delivery guy showed up.

lolwhatisitwithpeopletalkingabouthowtheydon'twatchtvasifitshouldmakethemfeelgoodaboutthemselvesorsomething.

I usually fast forward though commercials at home, at this hotel I have no option... and I'm stil not bothered by the jingles or music... it's usually the horrid acting or how everyone in the commercials at like fiending crackheads for some certain thing that's more bothersome than the background bullshit.

and commercials back in the day were ass as well. same problems as above.

That was the history channel, methinks.

Yeah, it was the History Channel.

always been shit, just more noticeable since music as a whole has been circling the drain for a good 30 years but uh i came here to reply cause i've been meaning to ask if anyone else has noticed an increase in, specifically, pseudo-metal riffs being used in commercials? ionno, picked up on it since metalcore was the 'thing'.....always good for a chuckle

But that's the thing. Isn't Catchy music what makes it good? I wouldn't call commercial music (like the ones Yahko was generous enough to post) good or catchy. I can repeat lines and riffs from Dead Congregation and Nader Sadek in my head because it's catchy. The only band I'd be proud to say I discovered through a commercial is Justice, because they avhe unique and catchy music.

/undercoverhipster

Bebop, Ambient, Impressionism, Noise, and No Wave would all like to have a word with you.

I dunno. Music that resonates with me still has to resonate and be memorable. Sunn O))) and Bohren und der Club of Gore might not have like a hook or anything, but they're still catchy because I can remember them.

I run into a lot of people that are not even really music fans. Not just this band or that band, but at all. To them, music is just a background thing that makes noise vaguely pleasant.

I do not understand these people. But it does go a long way towards explaining why commercial pap is what it is.

A lot of times, music used in commercials is meant to evoke an emotion, or a state of mind. They know it's background, but they use it to support what they are trying to say.

Nowhere is this more obvious than in political commercials.

That Internet Explorer commercial made me laugh my ass off. Like the commercial for "The Watch" it was totally geared towards middle schoolers with the dubstep they played. That's what will turn people's heads. They hear some loud noise on the television and want to know what's causing it. Nonetheless, I would have to agree that commercial tunes are getting pretty bad. The worst is that new Levi's commercial with that hipster-ass poem and music that went with it. They're fucking jeans...

Commercial music deteriorated because no one actually watches commercials anymore. That being said, there is no reason to flesh out a million dollars on a soundtrack for a 30 second advert every screaming American is going to throw their remote at for interrupting a football game.

This is in stark opposition to classic commercial jingles? I don't get it. Products being geared towards a specific demographic usually have retarded "current" music attached to them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bun8tA_ksZw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCwn1NTK-50

Or how about shit that got play during daytime TV when networks try to sell soap to women?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ZoERwnXOoU

The good old days, folks. The use of "actual" music for commercials rather than having it produced by the advertising house blew through the roof in the 90s when Moby licensed his shit to anyone who asked and promptly wound up discovering a commercial audience and selling a bajillion copies of Play. Then management began to suggest it to anyone with intentions to sell discs who wasn't going to get enough of a label push to buy airtime.

I just searched that on youtube and found a history channel commercial. That really kicks ass. I guess that's from when history channel used to be good. When the hell did history channel get so fucking crappy? It's like, they made one show, ice road truckers. Then they get successful off that cheap garbage, then they revamp their entire schedule with only reality TV shows about working class people with unspectacular jobs, like "swamp men" "axe men" "moonshine men" "deadliest catch" "american pickers" "pawn stars." It should be called "the redneck channel" for now now. Ironically, none of the shows have anything to do with history. Is it a result of the economy? It's a real bummer that it sucks so bad now.

It's just as bad as MTV! And apparently MTV became crap before I could even remember. It was crap when I was in middle school, that's all I know. I remember when I was young I would watch the history channel for it's documentaries!

Then in an attempt to justify all their reality shows they changed their slogan to "History made every day".

The history channel's descent into the crapper is probably another thread, but yeah. It makes me sad. They offloaded all the educational stuff (which I love) to H2. Now the main channel is a steady diet of reality shows.

But they get better ratings with the axe men, alaskan truckers, and pawn shop dealers, so there you go.

Every channel is the history channel in that case.

I forgot there was a history channel 2. I remember hearing about that but I never found it.

Oh man, don't get me started. The Science Channel did the same damn thing too, years ago. I used to love watching episodes of Extreme Engineering when I was a kid. Then I had it, after seeing the seventh re-run of some How It's Made episode. All across the board, History, Science, Discovery channels etc... educational television is taking a back seat while reality shows handle the wheel. Now let's be honest, some of the shows like Deadliest Catch and Pawn Stars and whatever they're showing on a regular basis now, have some interesting insight and fun content, but that kind of stuff is it's own "genre" of television and shouldn't take the place of programs where I can sit down and just learn something new for an hour. Now there's nowhere else to get that kind of information on TV. Especially with the internet around these days. Not only does it offer a better source of information, but it's a better source of entertainment too. That's why these channels have no choice but to show the most mind rotting shit they can come up with.

You make an excellent point. However, how it's made isn't terrible television filler. Whatever though. The problem is that pawn stars and deadliest catch aren't worth watching to me. If you justify those kind of reality shows, doesn't that only serve as a means to an end? Meaning, the reason there is such an absolute slew of shitty reality shows is because shows like deadliest catch opened up the floodgates. I find any show that isn't at least compelling enough to give me arbitrary justification beyond having something to stare at while I eat food in front of the TV, than it really shouldn't even be on television in the first place.

Perhaps i'm a television idealist. Educational television unequivocally kicks ass.

Man, I miss when History Channel would air shit like The Naked Archaeologist, Cities of the Underworld, Engineering an Empire, and Decoding the Past ALL DAY LONG.

Or the "I Had To Have It Channel". Seems like whenever you watch these crap shows, they always stress about how they had to have something. Reminds me of the old Looney Tunes cartoon...I wanna Easter Egg! I wanna Easter Egg!

So this guy comes in with a filled condom he just used last night. It looked like the Trojan Magnum Fire & Ice, but I wasn't sure. I had to call in an expert from the drug store to verify the authenticity of the used condom. And when he said it was real, I had to have it!

That's when it started to go downhill in my opinion, before they got even worse. It was better when it used to show documentaries all the time. That was a bygone era.

Mainstream music may as well be defined as music for people who don't actually like or appreciate music.

Oops, got the meaning of this thread wrong...

I can't really comment on the music in adverts because I never watch them.

Commercial music is genius, really. One of the few forms of music with a real practical function beyond simply to be enjoyed or "appreciated", aside from maybe tribal ritual dances and church music. The amount of thought and effort going into a single commercial is probably ten times more than your average modern rock album.

I guess Demolition Man was right about one thing in the theoretical future.