Monday, February 27, 2006

Now Here's a "Just Say No" Campaign I Can Get Behind

Apparently, the poor folks at Hummer are having a helluva time trying to market their product to the hipsters. Aside from being fiercely expensive and grievously environmentally unfriendly, they can't even find anyone to sell them a jingle.


Uh oh. Posted by Picasa

Courtesy of Steve Gilliard's NewsBlog:
The Thermals, a rambunctious rock band from Portland, Ore., were en route between gigs last year when they got a phone call from their label, Sub Pop. Hummer wanted to pay them $50,000 for the right to use their song "It's Trivia" in a commercial.

Portland, Ore., trio The Thermals turned down a $50,000 licensing deal from Hummer.

Trans Am, an electronic rock band from Washington, spurned $180,000 in ad money from Hummer.

"We thought about it for about 15 seconds, maybe," lead singer Hutch Harris said.

They said no.
....................

The post-punk band LiLiPUT, who broke up more than 20 years ago, could have pocketed $50,000 for "Heidi's Head" after making close to nothing during their five-year existence. But they, too, said no.

"At least I can sleep without nightmares," Marlene Marder reasoned.

........................
Lyle Hysen runs Bank Robber Music, a licensing group that pitches songs to film, television and advertisement companies. He's gotten his clients featured in shows like "Six Feet Under" and "The L Word" and in car ads by Volkswagen and Jaguar.

Hummer, however, has been a nonstarter.

"My standard line is you guys will play a hundred million gigs before you see this amount of money," Hysen said. "Usually they come back with, 'We'll do anything BUT Hummer.'"
.........................

"It's not about the money," Manley said. "It's the principle."


Maybe Hummer can get those nice Prussian Blue girls to slap something together. I'm sure they're not too concerned with the environment.

3 comments:

ntodd said...

I'd sell them a jingle if they'd offer me a hummer. The other kind.

emerson said...

Lilliput are great. Why Hummer thought "Heidi's Head" would sell cars is another question.

Anonymous said...

In my town, there's a doctor who drives a hummer and he campaigns against cycling, saying it's dangerous. Yeh! Cause of thickheads like him and their urban assault vehicles!

Wouldn't sell Hummer a tune of mine if they held a gun to my head.