Re:The Musical Diversity of Pop Songs
by dragonwriter on Monday June 04, 2018 @12:35PM
(#17229566)
> I should add - do you remember Justin Timbrlake song 'Lovin' it'?
No, and having researched it just now, from it's chart performance, I doubt all that many people outside of Belgium did even within a few months of its release, except for the part actually used in McDonalds commercials.
> A huge star, worked with a mega fast-food brand so that the song / brand tag line would be literally the same thing.
The song was written as a jingle, based on a pre-existing advertising campaign in Germany, before Timberlake became involved; AFAICT, his involvement was a straight take money to do cross-promotion deal.
I don't disagree with what you're saying, but I never got the impression that "I'm loving it" was anything less than a clear McDonalds/Timberlake tie-in. Was this really not obvious to parts of the world?
And how McDonald's brand tag line for that time was 'lovin it'?
That was coordinated.
A huge star, worked with a mega fast-food brand so that the song / brand tag line would be literally the same thing. That was a brilliant but kind of shady move by both parties, but it shows the 'absolute corporatrization' of the music industry. Literally the music is there to push fast food. That goes way beyond using a hit song to sell cars - it's literally the creation of pop-stardom in alignment with marketing objectives of a major brand.
The fact that can happen right in front of us, while so many people are apparently unaware - or don't care - is pretty funny and sad.
Again one could take the 'it's still art' line ... sure, a kind of 'art of sneaky marketing' maybe, but it's more than fair to say that this will significantly compromise creative aspects of the music.
Big labels are the same as Big Hollywood and Big Corps - they are in the business of entertainment in a way.
And it's not to say that McD's is entirely crap, nor does it mean that Timberlake is not talented, it's just that it's corporatized. Timberlake came up inside Disney, a professional by his mid-teens. Not so much the path of the artiste ...