Mandolins In Commercials

[Jim MacDaniel]

Saw this one last night...



And if movie trailers count, here is the trailer for one off my favorite flicks from 1999, Pane e Tulipani (Bread and Tulips): charming, funny, great setting/location, and with a fair amount of mandolin in the ST...

[journeybear]

Man! Really makes me want to have a bowl of cereal!

Remembered this one. There are just a few strums in the second refrain ...

[russrench]

The GCO Carpet Boys, or whatever they called themselves:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2l_xTnO1EP8

Similar adds ran for a few years in St. Louis, until the business closed. One of the bluegrass DJs at the local public radio station interviewed the mandolin player who was also the owner of the business. He really can play. I don't know about the rest of the band.

Russ

[Ed Goist]

I SO want to jam with the freecreditreport.com guys! BTW, I find it interesting that they are an unabashed 'Fender' band...I wonder how much Fender paid for that privilege!

[Jim MacDaniel]

Here are a couple new ones to look out for that aren't yet on youtube...
- Chrysler Town and Country: "60 day pledge"
- Samsung 3D TV: "Tonight"

Those two came on while I was watching TV with the wife, a four year old, and a noisy dog the other night, so I can't be sure whether either featured mandolin or some other short scale plucked instrument such as ukulele, cavaquinho, etc. -- but I did manage to disqualify another that caught my ear as it featured violin pizzicato.

BTW, you gotta love those FreeCreditReport.com guys!

[journeybear]

I haven't seen the Samsung one yet, but I think I've seen the Chrysler ad. Pretty sure it's mandolin.

Those GCO guys are a hoot! They have a ton of spots - here are a few:

[journeybear]

Tropical mandolin, chocolate, coconut, almonds - how can you go wrong? One of my favorites!

[journeybear]

Here's that Chrysler Town & Country commercial - may be different from the one Jim mentioned:

[journeybear]

- Samsung 3D TV: "Tonight"

Those two came on while I was watching TV with the wife, a four year old, and a noisy dog the other night, so I can't be sure whether either featured mandolin or some other short scale plucked instrument such as ukulele, cavaquinho, etc. ...

Hey - finally figured out which one you meant here. That's Train with "Hey, Soul Sister," pretty ubiquitous these days. Without being able to inspect the liner notes, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that's a ukulele, possibly doubled, if for no other reason than the several times I've seen them perform this on talk shows, a ukulele was being played. But the visuals are so cool, and I'm just a bit unsure about my ears' reliability, that I'll put it up here, hoping someone who knows for sure can enlighten us.

[journeybear]

Terrible video quality, and the music's not so great either, but ... I guess if you want to promote your new Italian lasagna flavor, go with "O Sole Mio" and mandolin ... from 1986 ...

[Jim MacDaniel]

Hey - finally figured out which one you meant here. That's Train with "Hey, Soul Sister," pretty ubiquitous these days. Without being able to inspect the liner notes, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that's a ukulele, possibly doubled, if for no other reason than the several times I've seen them perform this on talk shows, a ukulele was being played. But the visuals are so cool, and I'm just a bit unsure about my ears' reliability, that I'll put it up here, hoping someone who knows for sure can enlighten us.

That's the song, and while the review at Barnes and Noble references a mandolin, the Details & Credits tab lists a uke only in the credits.

[journeybear]

Dang! Now you made me go and look it up ... And I'll tell you, I am not qualified to tell the difference between the two from listening or watching on TV. I'm willing to assume that it's a ukulele, just because I imagine they're more common. Don't forget - what we hear in the audio track for a commercial is not only the recorded version, which has been tweaked enough, but may have been tweaked further by the ad agency to satisfy the client (advertiser). It's not uncommon for instruments (and voices) to get doubled (or more) during mixing to make them sound fuller. So if a ukulele ends up sounding like a mandolin as a result, it wouldn't be too surprising.

[journeybear]

BTW, you gotta love those FreeCreditReport.com guys!

I SO want to jam with the freecreditreport.com guys!

You may be in luck, or even better. Looks like the band has been fired and they are looking for a new band. I'm not sure what the deal is, but whatever happens it'll be better than the stupid furry numbers series they're running now. Now if only I could find a website that has all the info about this search ...

[Bslot0622]

[QUOTE=journeybear;801154]Well, I'll be ... Shoulda thought of this sooner. Browsing by artist popped out the following:

Don't know who's singing, but the mandolin is credited to David Grisman:

Yeah I remember seeing this a while back and yelling to my dead head mother about hearing Dawg and Garcia play this on Not For Kids Only

[journeybear]

Remember these? I did - I just couldn't remember what they were selling! And as if it weren't rare enough that "Garfunkel" is playing a mandolin onscreen (left-handed, too), isn't "Simon" playing a charango? Now that's rare!

[Don Julin]

http://www.maxoderm.com/2009/playbg.html

Does anyone remember those annoying lo-budget male enhancement ads that were running about every 15 minutes on cable channels a few years ago? I remember the first time I heard my song "Mr. Natural" on that commercial. It reminded me of that saying " Be careful what you wish for...." The reality is: When you license your music to a publisher, you authorize them to try to make money with your song. Oh well! It is another TV commercial with mandolin music.

[journeybear]

Hope you were adequately compensated. Not the kind of thing you can proudly tell your folks about!

Many a time rubes have made rude comments concerning me playing "that little guitar," impugning my manliness or whatnot, and if pressed I respond with "It takes a big man to play a small instrument," which usually shuts them up. If not, I go on to describe Bill Monroe's size and stature and his meaty hands and the great music he produced with them. If they're genuinely curious, I explain that it doesn't matter how big your hands or fingers are, as long as they don't go over the fret you're using. Nice to see when that light bulb goes on in someone's head.

[journeybear]

... Now if only I could find a website that has all the info about this search ...

BTW, I was being facetious about this, but there really is no info at the website about the band contest. Over here you can see the commercials, with lyrics too, but for the band contest, all I know is they've been advertising that they're supposed to show the finalists in the new band contest during the all-star game and we get to vote. I don't see how they could top this one, whether or not they're real. They are characters.

This is the one that comes closest to MC - about :22, a measure after the line "since we first put out pirate hats on," there's a chord strummed that has always sounded mandolinesque to these tired ears (onscreen there's some kind of lyre shown).

[Paul Statman]

Remember these? I did - I just couldn't remember what they were selling! And as if it weren't rare enough that "Garfunkel" is playing a mandolin onscreen (left-handed, too), isn't "Simon" playing a charango? Now that's rare!

I dragged my guitarist along to audition for that Mushroom 'n' Swiss ad. Of course we were loads better than the ersatz players they picked for this gig..

[Mandoviol]

Oh - Now I get it!

Here's another one that uses the Eddie Vedder song:

Was that Harry Belafonte at the end there?

[journeybear]

I dragged my guitarist along to audition for that Mushroom 'n' Swiss ad. Of course we were loads better than the ersatz players they picked for this gig..

Take the high road - consider yourself lucky. I think they were looking for just the right kind of bad for these spots.

Mandoviol - I think that's Sidney Poitier.

[wamjr52]

Maybe ten to fifteen years ago there was a commercial with a women playing an autoharp and her husband playing a F5. Anyone remember or known anything about this one??

[Mandoviol]

Not so much a commecial but a TV theme: Syfy's Warehouse 13 features a mando in its opening theme (go to 5:04 for the theme). I had to link the whole episode because Youtube doesn't have the theme alone, but hey, if you didn't get to see last week's episode, now you can.

[journeybear]

Maybe ten to fifteen years ago there was a commercial with a women playing an autoharp and her husband playing a F5. Anyone remember or known anything about this one??

Yes, and they were wonderful. There were two of them, for Citibank, apparently directed by Errol Morris, and not available on youtube. Here are the links. If anyone can figure out how to embed them here that would be great. Our collection will be incomplete without them.

http://www.errolmorris.com/commercia...mandolin2.html

http://www.errolmorris.com/commercia..._mandolin.html

[journeybear]

All right, no one has mentioned the freecreditreport.com band contest finalists aired during the All-Star game ... maybe it's because they all [fill in negative past-tense verb here] and were forgettable - the kiss of death for a jingle. In fact, I forgot all about this until a spot just flitted across my screen. I don't know if this was the winning band, or if they're going to run all of them, because their website is unnavigable where this is concerned. However, some of the entrants (not finalists) in this vid clip used mandolin ...