Ultimately, today we are bringing together the most striking and popular commercials that have ever been seen on television screens for Techno Airlines readers.
Among alternative musics, techno music was hot for a time, and was mainly, though not exclusively, employed mainly in automobile and in other kinds of commercials. Examining the use of its music at the peak of its trendiness- the late 1990s and early 2000s- gives evidence of how music frequently associated with the underground was finding its way to television commercials. One advertising creative staffer who had used techno in advertisements said proudly in 2002, “The music you hear in automobile commercials is better than most of the music you can hear on the radio.” Techno musics of various kinds became so ubiquitous as the sound of the underground in automobile commercials that in the fall of 2002, an annual gathering of companies with licensable properties and firms looking for a deal, had to move to a bigger venue; the organizer said that all the record labels asked how many car companies were coming.
VOLKSWAGEN | Turbonium
“We want to create an image where people will remember us for our music. When you go after the youth market, they’re very in-tune with music. They love what we do with it. It’s our way to carve a niche.”
says Liz Vanzura, director of marketing at Volkswagen of America.
By all accounts, it was Volkswage that set the trend of using new and interesting music in television advertisements. For years, Volkswagen had been experiencing lagging sales in North America and wanted to attempt a comeback. They hired Arnold Worldwide, who borught sales back and recaptured the image of a new-born brand. His strategy tented to be younger than its competitors, thus let them to earn more money and bring customers.
MITSUBISHI | Eclipse
It was around Arnold Worldwide‘s strategy that successfully achieved notice for campaining advertisements with techno music in automobile commercials, hence again it is seen this time by another car company, Mitsubishi. The creator and the director of the advertisement marks that out he specifically chose that song rather than bringing up an emotion or a pop-cultured track. Eric Hirshberg clearifies by his own words:
“We had this very simple idea: Let’s make the Mitsubishi owners into a cool club. If they were all singing a Britney Spears song, the specialness of driving a Mitsubishi would have gone away.”
NISSAN | Maxima
Another related Nissan commercial features mechanical grinds created by a musician named Rob D, which is perfectly synchronized to on-screen robots building a Maxima.
“The role of music in car commercials is one of the last tools in the marketer’s arsenal. It can get under people’s radar. People have grown up on commercials — they’ve seen everything. But the one thing that is disarming, the place where you can connect, is the music. That’s why it’s been playing such a prominent role,”
explains the director of Nissan’s ads firm.
LEVI’S | Drugstore
And techno’s prominence had been growing in advertising. Up coming to the second millenium, a song by the Norwegian band Biosphere was used in a Levi’s ad. This different style of used pieces and advertisements attracted the attention of the audience and further increased the popularity of Levi’s.
PIRELLI | P6000
In January, Pirelli tires used a Chemical Brothers tune to accompany the adventures of a woman as she dashed through ice plains, across lakes and over lava pits.
In a nutshell, why use this music? Ad firms are looking for tunes that fit the mood of a commercial, says Vanzura. If you’re making a gentle commercial, you’ll go for gentle music. But if you’re doing a commercial that evokes a “technical” emotion, an electronic, high-paced feeling, you go techno, she says.
