Sir John Hegarty is alleged to have stated, in the heyday of the Levi’s commercials, that the “music is 50% of my commercials”. A few years later, when BRANDsense and Millward Brown asked consumers what ratios they attributed to vision and sound in their advertising and marketing, they responded with a loud 58:41 (with the […]
Last Friday, I went to see Beyoncé and Jay-Z’s On The Run II Tour at the Olympic Park. Being a die-hard fan, it was my 7th time seeing Beyoncé and 4th time seeing Jay-Z, I thought I was prepared as can be.
Fast forward to 2 minutes before the opening song, and I was sprinting through […]
Ask any Music Supervisor and they will tell you that most tracks are chosen on gut instinct by the creative teams, late in the creative process. Ask the Creative Director for some direction and the response is, “Keep the suggestions coming – I’ll know it when I hear it.”
Millward Brown is one of the most respected consumer […]
PLEASE! No more ‘Uplifting’ and ‘Anthemic’
As Music Supervisors, we understand that writing music briefs is inherently difficult. A music brief demands that creatives find words to describe their own personal and emotional responses to music. It needs to provide exact instruction to a third party to find music for a target audience that is different […]
How much should you pay for using music in a commercial?
Around 70% of TV commercials use music in one form or another. That is a lot of music. And a lot of money being paid by brands and their agencies to the music industry.
Procurement departments ask us three questions:
Can you explain to me why […]
1) Is it available?
2) Has it been used before?
3) How much?
They seem such obvious questions – rookie stuff really. But, all too often in the rush and panic of getting ideas on the table, comes that horrible moment in the editing suite, when someone asks ‘did anyone get clearance on these tracks?
It usually comes after […]
As Music Supervisors, we are already seeing the licensing of music move from traditional TV commercials to online content. Brands are expected to double their investment in digital video by 2020 to around $17 billion in the US alone. Yet Google has already admitted that 65% of people watching online ads hit the ‘skip ad’ […]
Using Music To Tell A Better Story
We all love a good story, one with a hero/heroine that we love and plot that we remember. TV Advertising has the ambition to create a 30 second story, where we understand and retain the key message and the name of the protagonist – the brand.
In a recent report […]
Is the purpose of a commercial to sell product or win an award?
When Creative Directors at ad agencies set their hearts on a particular music copyright, it is very hard to shift them from an idea. Tell them no and they insist that the producer keeps going back until they hear YES.
As a Music Supervisor […]
‘Soundalike’ and ‘Musicologist’. Two words that, as a Music Supervisor, generally fill me with dread. This is especially disconcerting on a Monday morning, when everyone from an advertising agency has been busy in the recording studio over the weekend. And when these two words are used in the same sentence, my heart drops.
‘Soundalike’ and ‘Musicologist’ […]
