Great songs from old TV commercials

Yesterday the devil dropped a quarter into the Jukebox Inside My Head and a random song started playing.

Sometimes my jukebox plays classic rock. Other times it plays theme songs from 40-year-old TV shows. This time it played a song from one of my favorite musical genres – jingles from old TV commercials. Specifically:

            Never borrow money needlessly,

            Just when you must.

            Then borrow from the oldest company,

            From folks you trust.

Do you know the next line?

If you aren’t old enough to remember where you were on November 22, 1963, you don’t. But if you do recall where you were, and if you also watched The Honeymooners, which was sponsored by this company, it probably rolled right off your tongue:

Borrow con-fid-ent-ly

From H.F.C.

Up until the late ‘80s or early ‘90s, commercials were often comprised almost entirely of music – songs with catchy lyrics advertisers spent massive amounts of money to have written, orchestrated and performed.

I can’t think of a single all-musical commercial that's running these days -- yet one more example of the ways we are evolving into a completely visually-oriented society. People watch TV, they don’t listen to it. Listening to the lyrics of a commercial requires connecting the dots – something that’s hard to do while watching TV, texting, cruising the Internet and playing video games simultaneously.

Here are five of what I consider the best classic commercials that feature songs readers “of a certain age” are likely to remember. You may not remember your children’s middle names or the maiden name of your first wife but you’ll remember these. 

United Airlines

This commercial, from the mid 1970s, features my favorite iteration of the song used in United’s long-running “friendly skies” campaign. The lyrics are great. And the upbeat, carefully orchestrated music, which starts off simply and becomes more complex as the commercial unfolds, is extraordinary. This is American – I mean, United -- advertising at its best.

Chevrolet

This song helped make Chevy America’s #1 car brand during the fifties and sixties. Though dozens of versions were produced, the most famous rendition was the one Dinah Shore always sang at the end of her show. A pop quiz question before you watch the commercial: What did Ms. Shore do when she finished the song?

(a) Swung an imaginary golf club
(b) Tugged at her earlobe
(c) Threw a kiss
(d) Bit the head off a bat

Burger King

This jingle, from the mid '70s, gave Burger King what we ad people call a “USP” – Unique Selling Proposition. The USP, in this case, is that Burger King, unlike that other rigid fast food chain, will happily make your burger to order. If you’ve already started humming “Have it Your Way,” you’re wrong. This spot features an even catchier song you probably haven’t thought about for years. But once you hear it again you will be singing it over and over until your head explodes. Brilliant. But not brilliant enough to make Burger King's made-to-order flame-broiled Whopper taste better than an assembly-line made Big Mac. 

Country Cornflakes 

Introduced in the early sixties, Country Cornflakes had a catchy song but failed to catch on with the public and disappeared from shelves. Perhaps it's because they were made with rice. Fifty years later the song hasn’t disappeared – at least from the Jukebox Inside My Head. 

Movie concession stand 

OK, this song wasn’t written for a TV commercial. It was for a trailer that ran before the feature presentation at thousands of movie theaters across the country, including the Liberty Theater in Mexico, Mo. (RIP). I still half expect to hear it every time the lights go down at my local theater.

What commercial songs are playing on the Jukebox Inside Your Head?

Let me know. It’ll be payback for these five songs I’ve implanted in your brain that you won’t be able to stop singing for days to come.