Forget MTV - Apple iPod Ads Make The Next Great Music Stars
New York, NY (November 28, 2007) – There are a number of stories credited to random happenstance that often lead to the breaking of a new artist. One such story belongs to CSS, a Brazilian electro-funk-indie-rock outfit that has more or less risen from beyond obscurity to seeing their hit single “Music Is My Hot, Hot Sex” make waves on the Billboard 100.
Nick Haley, a college student from the University of Leeds in England, paired the song with a video about the features of the iPod Touch and posted it to YouTube in September. To sum up quickly, the Advertising Department at Apple was so impressed with the 30-second clip, they flew Haley to their headquarters to help produce the first commercial for the yet-to-be-released product. An excerpt from the article by San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer Chris Cadelago:
…“Since 2001, small, independent bands appearing in iPod commercials have sold thousands of records, been placed on numerous Billboard charts, and drawn the respect and admiration of music fans around the world. Apple’s promotional influence has grown so great that music industry insiders now compare it with Oprah Winfrey’s ability to create best-sellers through her book club.
CSS (Cansei de Ser Sexy, a Portuguese translation of "tired of being sexy," taken from a Beyoncé Knowles quote) released its debut album in July 2006. American fans and critics touted the group for its high-energy act and playful innocence. But CSS soon learned that buzz, rave reviews and a small indie following do not necessarily translate into lofty record sales. The album sold just 340 copies per week through October, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
Then the iPod Touch commercial premiered on Oct. 28. In the next two weeks, CSS sold 2,000 records and climbed to No. 15 in song downloads and No. 5 in ring tone sales at Apple’s iTunes Store.”
Chalk it up to fluke luck, but you can’t underestimate the power of social video and the people watching it. The right video is like pop culture magic. If there’s a formula, no one seems to have found it, other than the end result being a quality product (regardless of whether it’s lo-fi or hi-fi). Think about the videos you watch on-line vs. the ones you actually share with other people after watching it. More than likely, it has a combination of the following: some artistic quirkiness (kind of a go-for-it-or-go-home attitude), maybe a small heh/chuckle-factor, probably an ‘oh shit, that’s fresh’ five times in a row thing, and, yes, the perfect soundtrack. Music is a huge influencer on the emotional and rational parts of us; it makes people feel more than words can alone, and it opens the mind’s senses to let a little bit more of the art into what otherwise is a skeptical, analytical ‘NO, NO, NO’ factory.
My own personal rule of thumb for songs – if you can listen to it on repeat for at least 2 hours and not find anything wrong with it, and when you put it on again in a month, you are actually blown away that you even wrote/recorded it… it’s a hit. I have nothing for you when it comes to video, though, only that I’ll watch it if it’s really fucking cool. Chances are, I won’t share a video and you’d have to bet on someone else to do that. But then again, I might. Only if it’s really fucking cool, though.