newly discovered goldmine. However, the licensing of songs, as a soundtrack, had yet to
move out of the film industry and into the advertising industry in a significant way.
Since the 1980s, and in widespread fashion since the mid-90s, song licensing has
become ubiquitous in all moving-visual media industries. (Entertainment Weekly has a
small feature called “What’s That Song…” that identifies tracks used in ads and TV
shows, and both Advertising Age and Creativity regularly devote space to the trend.) The
now common practice of song licensing for advertisements provides a unique window
into the contentious relationship between popular music and commerce. Perhaps the most
interesting result of the ubiquity of the practice is that what formerly might have
provoked a blanket negative reaction (licensing a song for commercial use, whatever the
nuances, is “selling out”), now draws a range of responses from individuals close to the
practice, including fans, musicians, and music critics.
Volkswagen’s mid-90s spot featuring little-known folkie Nick Drake’s
heartrending “Pink Moon” is often credited with driving the practice to its current state of
omnipresence. In the ad, a group of charmingly disaffected youth drives to a party and
ultimately decides not to go inside, but to return to the road instead. The ad was beautiful,
it matched the poignant sound and spirit of the song, and the company had long been
branded as “hip.” Plus, not only did the ad benefit Volkswagen, it revived the singer’s
dormant catalog: the album Pink Moon was itself re-released with an as-featured-in
sticker on the sleeve. In fact, one of the only possible negative aspects to the VW ad is
that Nick Drake himself, who died of an overdose at age 26 in 1974, was not alive to
grant his permission for the use.
Convention