Monday, October 27, 2008

Where Did All the Jingles Go?

You know what I'm talking about - those commercial jingles that get stuck in your head and are subject to myriads of immature, childhood spoofs.

Like Slinky: What walks down stairs, alone or in pairs, and makes a slinkity sound? A spring, a spring, a marvelous thing! Everyone knows it's Slinky. It's Slinky, it's Slinky, it's fun, it's a wonderful toy. It's Slinky, it's Slinky, it's fun, it's a wonderful toy. It's fun for a girl or a boy.

Remember the Ren and Stimpy's spoof version? Log: What rolls down stairs, alone or in pairs? Runs over your neighbors dog? What fits on your back? Is great for a snack? It's log, log, log! It's lo-og, lo-og, it's big, it's heavy, it's wood. It's lo-og, lo-og, it's better than bad - it's good! Everyone wants a log. Everyone loves a log. Come on and get your log!

Or how about that creepy My Buddy/Kid Sister commercial? Or Skip-It (the best thing of all is there's a counter on this ball!)? J-E-L-L-O anyone? I can see Bill Cosby now...

Or how about those retarded Mentos commercials, where it seemed every problem could be fixed by popping a piece of candy in your mouth? Kicked your soccer ball into the middle of a wedding ceremony? Never fear - Mentos! And it's like everyone in the commercial totally understood why the main character did the brazen/idiotic thing they did when they hold up their huge roll of Mentos that they just happened to have in their pocket. Need to rob a bank? No worries, pop a Mentos and the cops will let you slide as they all nod knowingly at your obvious addiction to breath mints.



Or the possibly crack-addicted people on the Pringles Once you pop, you can't stop! commercials? Or for goodness sake, Meow Mix - meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow....

Doublemint gum got crazy with their commercials by finding the whitest twins possible and having them do the whitest things possible - Double, double your refreshment. Double, double your enjoyment. No single gum double freshens your mouth like Doublemint, Doublemint Gum. No single gum double freshens your mouth, like Double fresh, double good, come on and double it, Doublemint,Doublemint Gum! Is it just me or does it seem like they wrote a normal jingle and then some guy came along and added in a bunch of erroneous doubles into the song?

The best jingle from my childhood was the Oscar Meyer wiener song. And I'm glad to see that they have managed to stick with that one all these years and even ad the bologna song. I can sing both at the drop of a hat.

But seriously, where is the creativity these days? There's not much to remember from today's commercials. Between horrible car ads that feature the owner's slightly less than ugly and obnoxious children (or grandchildren or dog) to those disgusting Axe body spray commercials directed at sex-starved, pimply, high-school boys, there doesn't seem to be anything of marketing value coming over the tubes. (And by the way, Axe smells like ass, just so you know.) Even last year's Super Bowl commercials were less than entertaining, which is a shame considering the amount of money they fork over for the air time.

C'mon people! I want something I can remember! Something I can sing! The only commercial that's been stuck in my head recently is the one for the video game Mercenaries 2. Has anyone else seen this? They took what sounds like should be a rap song, and paid some whitest-of-all-white guys (maybe one of the twins from the DoubleMint commercial!) to basically read it aloud like he would read it to a group of kindergarteners...



I'm not running out to buy the game, because apparently it sucks, but the advertising was effective because the song is stuck in my head. (Although it doesn't help that the cop and his roomie are constantly "singing" it... I say "singing" because they don't know most of the words, and they end up humming most of it.)

Do you guys feel the same way I do? Like companies aren't putting effort into their advertising anymore?

Note to Self: Here you go guys! Sing it right this time! The lyrics:

Oh no you didn't
Sucker tried to play me
But you never paid me, Neva
Oh no you didn't
Payback is a' coming
You will be runnin', foreva
Oh no you didn't
Until I get my vengeance
I will never end this mayhem
Oh no you didn't
I'm a mercenary
You ain't got a prayer, you owe meeeeeee!

12 comments:

Dorkys Ramos said...

I LOVED those jingles, practically lived for them. Every time it was commercial time I wouldn't care because that meant I could sing along to those songs. I loved the doublemint ones, mentos, I even remember log! Loved the Big Red ones too.

It's true/sad. Companies don't care about that stuff anymore. They'll just borrow a song from some indie artist and plug it in.

P.S. my sis and i were talking about our old toys this weekend and I started singing the skip it song...not there was much to it :p

Rachel said...

J E L L O....B O L O G N A
SOOOOO remember those jingles!
Now it's all about Celebs pushing products!

Anonymous said...

Well there IS one notable exception. The original FreeCreditReport.com jingle was cute. ("...Now instead of looking fly and rollin' phat, my legs are sticking to the vinyl and my posse's gettin' laughed at...") although those went rapidly downhill, too. Crying shame.

Anyone remember Florence Henderson's Wessonality? (Hush MJ. I know you're too young.) :0)

merc3069 said...

Noa loves the rappy credit commercial--OH! I cannot think of the name of the company----

Matt said...

Five.

Five Dollar.

Five-Dollar-Footloooooong.

Anonymous social worker said...

yes, the comment above me just posted a jingle I like, the five dollar footlong, catchy,
I agree, now all good about commercials is just the background music.

colbymarshall said...

I did a jingle on my blog today. (or last night, rather) hooray!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I miss jingles too! It seems like these days the companies are paying big bucks for fancy advertising gimmicks but the gimmicks and ads just really suck. They are definitely not getting their money's worth and we're probably paying the price in the long run. So I feel justified in demanding a little entertainment for MY money! ;)

Sornie said...

Music is slowly dying. WHen was the last time you saw a TV show (mainly sitcoms) with a killer themse song? Those went away with the 90s too.

Ed & Jeanne said...

Yeah, I want to see some jingles for all the side effects of the countless pills peddled on TV! Cool...

pure evyl said...

Whenever I am in a bad mood, I sing the Slinky jingle. It is a sure fire cure.

MJ said...

Dorkys - Maybe that's why commercial breaks seem so looong now... the commercials are so bad!

Rachel - So true!

K - You're always so good at dating yourself....

Merc - I love the freecreditreport.com commercials! Some of the best in a long time!

Matt - Yeah, it's catchy, but it kind of has that "dude, you're gettin' a Dell" obnoxious vibe.

Franco - See above :)

CM - I plan to see it as soon as possible!

Teeni - I agree!!

Sornie - So true! I didn't even think about the jingle-less-ness spreading into themesong-less-ness.

VE - It would be something like... heartburn, nausea, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea!... wait, I think that's in use already...

PE - I take a note from the movie Anger Management... I feel pretty, oh so pretty...