Funk & Soul Coke commercials
LokoOne
1,823 Posts
So I picked up this weird looking 45 yesterday, from a University Library collection. Looks like BP (the oil company) put it together has there logo on it...Its got snippets of old radio commercials, detective shows and disc jockey intors...all faded in and out of each other...kinda like a mini sfx record.But the last track called Coke Commercials is a blend of 4-5 funk/soul songs advertsiing Coke. One of them rips of 'Baby Love' and even sounds like Diana Ross singing.... I will post up audio tomorrow for those interested...but does anyone know more on this? it seems like these commercials where done obviously for the black radio stations...but who was involved? Who played on them? Did the labels partner up with Coke? Any raer Coke commercial heat?
Comments
on youtube:
Marvin Gaye (nice one!)
Marvin & Tammi
probably that is what you meant
it was just unexpected to buy a 45 for the sfx/spoken word samples and then hear some funked up coke commercials.... only thing that sucks is they are faded into each other on this 45 and not full versions.
What was fans reactions b.i.t.d? Did they see it as a sellout or a power move?
Ill up the 45 sounds 2moro, theres also a few excerpts of some black radio djs talking about the latest otis redding song etc... very cool...
Back in those days, pop music fans didn't question these things. Not like today.
It probably was.
In the sixties and seventies, both the pop and soul stations had Coke jingles sung by the artists of the day. As far as who played on them...generally it was the same musicians that played on the regular hits. I have a Little Milton that sounds like the Chess Records house band in Chicago, a Lee Dorsey that has his usual New Orleans crew, a Joe Tex that has the same downhome Nashville cats from his usual records, an Otis Redding that obviously has the Stax-Volt band in Memphis blasting away.
They bought more Coke...
the Real Thing or the drink?
related note to the original post: Johnny 'Movements' Harris did a nice promo 45 of the early 70s Esso ad music. Sells for half-decent wedge these days. Tiger In Your Tank -related.
I have a comp around here somewhere of psych band commercials. It's a great listen.
Does it have the Troggs for Miller Beer? Granted, their ad was rather late for garage-rock (1971, which is like looking for a hard funk track from 1989), but I've still been wondering about it.
On a similar note...around 1990, Miller Lite had a cool series of radio ads where different bands in different styles would play a song that incorporated the phrase "Miller Lite, it's here and that's that." Some real good songs in that series, but one of the better ones was a HARDCORE PUNK ad that sounded suspiciously like Bad Brains!!! Still trying to figure out who did that one, as the spots were unidentified. (I somehow doubt that Bad Brains would be doing radio commercials.)
I just went looking for the the tracklist and....found a page that has download links for Psychedelic Promos & Radio Spots Vol. 1-8. I had no idea there were 8 volumes.
Anyway, melt your face here.
Those are great. A few of them were from CD box sets, but the rest are from old cassettes, radio station reels, etc, and for the most part the quality isn't bad at all. The Iron Butterfly one where they promote deodorant, now that's funny.
http://hamburgcitysoul.com/upload/gloriagaynorgeneralelectric_1.mp3
http://hamburgcitysoul.com/upload/ultrasheen_1.mp3
http://hamburgcitysoul.com/upload/dark_lovelyshampoo_1.mp3