Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with TV and commercial

Help me identify the Ghirardelli ad music

rdauphin — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 19:42:12 -0800

What is the bit of classical music behind the Ghirardelli Peppermint Bark commercial on TV? I just saw the commercial and heard a snippet of classical music that I've been trying to identify. The ad is specifically for Ghirardelli's Peppermint Bark. Can you name that tune?

What's that song from "The Shack" commercial?

geekchic — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 08:35:54 -0800

Looking for the name of a song in a Radio Shack commercial. It's a newer TV commercial that says "The Shack sells more phones than the population of Scandinavia." The song has lyrics that don't sound like English. I wish I had a link but all of my Googling has failed.

Give a Song a Title

bach — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:02:27 -0800

Mad Men TV Commercial Tune The new TV spot for Mad Men has in the background a great tune that is too short for shazam or any tune-finder to latch onto.

It begins with voiceover, "The critics agree..." and then cuts to text cued to a brass hit (bop, bop, bop, [lower]bop). Repeat, add ooh and ahh lyric.

Can anyone help me with the title and artist. I looked at AdBlather and AdTunes without success.

It's been airing quite a bit on the Food Network lately.

Thanks in advance.

What is that groovy bass line in the Cablevision commercials?

kenliu — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 16:15:46 -0800

What is that groovy bass line on those Cablevision commercials? There are a series of recent Cablevision commercials with a dark haired dude talking in front of a white background - these all end with a really groovy bass line. Is that from a real song, or is it just something they just recorded for the commercial?

Funny Commercial

CollectiveMind — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 07:27:27 -0800

What is the company that makes the commercial where bikers enter a cafe and approach a table with a dad, his wife and daughter. The dad has just finished telling his girl something, to which, she has rolled her eyes. Then the bikers stop at the dad and the wife and daughter looked panicked. But they show the dad respect and he fist punches them back while recognizing and acknowledging them. The wife practically faints but the daughter suddenly has new-found respect for her seemingly geeky dad. And, is that commercial available for viewing online anywhere?

Help me find my TV commercial!

littleredwagon — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 13:55:15 -0800

I appeared in a TV commercial (as a child) in the late 70's. I received some residuals for it showing on TV somewhere, but I never saw it myself. How can I track it down to view it?

90's e-mail commercial?

Venadium — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 16:03:16 -0800

Early-to-Mid 90's commercial: girl in bar slips guy a piece of paper not with her phone number, but with her email address. It might have been a club instead of a bar. I think I remember it being an IBM commercial, but there's a good chance I'm wrong. There might have been some text or voiceover at the end with "The World is Changing", or something similar. Does anyone remember it, or know where I can find it?

General Motors DRL Commercial?

Anonymous — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 20:56:00 -0800

90s GM TV commercial for Daytime Running Lights? I can vividly recall seeing a commercial probably in the late 90s that showed a GM or Chevrolet truck driving around the city with its lights on and bystanders and other drivers would stop and yell out something along the lines of "Hey! Your lights are on!".

I can't seem to find any reference of this and people I have asked don't seem to remember it.

Was this real?

The impossible to find clip??

meta x zen — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 15:10:37 -0800

Impossible to find filter: Need help finding a very funny polaroid camera commercial from approx 1995 There is a Polaroid Camera TV commercial that was used in a fundraising conference recently. It starts off with a voice over of a young kid pleeding for money at Summer camp to "Great uncle Phil & Aunt Susie... etc." You find out that the summer camp is a bunch of clever 11 year olds using a polaroid camera to send pictures out to dozens and dozens of old people who then send them money. The kids are stacking up expensive electronics as a result. There was a line about the kid in the photo needing to look more pitiful.

It was a hysterical clip especially in the context of a fundraising conference. I asked the speaker for a copy and he claimed a 10 year old legal agreement between polaroid and the company prevented him from distributing it. (This is what leads me to believe the clip is from approx. 1995)

I did of course the usual, blow the last two hours of my work day searching google with every possible combination with no success.

Thanks in advance for the help!

Target Ad Music: Rethinking the Dorm Room

sjuhawk31 — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 09:33:41 -0800

More Ad Music Filter: The new Target ads. There's a new Target ad about rethinking the dorm room. It's got a real poppy song playing; the girl's voice is incredibly cute. The only memorable lyric is "Right before my eyes...changing." AdTunes hasn't figured it out yet (I'm not the OP there, for what it's worth.) Can anyone here identify the song?

Sorry for asking two ad music questions relatively close to each other in my own asking history.

Name that tune!

colgate — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 11:56:47 -0800

I really like the music in this XBOX 360 "Summer Blockbusters" commercial. What is it? Also, here is an Article from ADWEEK about the XBOX spot.

Checked AdTunes, but there's just an old thread with no answers.

Where can I find that old anti-Nintendo and Sega commercial series?

thejrae — Fri, 16 Feb 2007 17:58:24 -0800

Does anyone remember those old anti-Nintendo and anti-Sega commercials where they showed the same guy making 3 different responses? Where can I view that commercial, preferably the series? It was a very funny commercial series. I believe it was for PSX (PlayStation 1). They showed the same guy in the same situation reacting 3 different ways. The Nintendo way was lame, the Sega way was a bit spunkier, and the PSX (or whatever system it was for) was the cool way.

For example, I remember one commercial where a cop pulls a guy over and asks "Do you know how fast you were going?"

Nintendo: Sorry officer (or something similarly lame)
Sega: Why don't you tell me? (or something similarly spunky, but still lame)
PSX: No, the needle stops after 150 (or something similarly cool)

I've found websites dedicated to video game commercials and yet still can't find this series. I'm wondering if it wasn't for PSX after all...

Would love to see it and show my boyfriend, because he doesn't remember them. :)

Thanks!

Script format for :30 commercials?

JMB1138 — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 12:41:46 -0800

Script format for :30 commercials?I've been asked by a local company to write scripts based upon concepts I've given them for :30 commercial spots to air on local cable. I know it's not a big deal, but since I'm anal about proper format in general, I was wondering what the proper formatting is for this kind of script. Plus I'm simply curious. I have Final Draft and am comfortable with basic screenplay format, teleplay format for 1 hour dramas, and stage plays. Is there a specific way to write a commercial script or is it irrelevant cause it's so short and anything goes?

Where can I find Noggin commercials set in a workplace?

gnomeloaf — Thu, 20 Apr 2006 08:16:48 -0800

I'm looking for digital versions of a group of commercials for Noggin. The commercials are set in an office, with all adult actors. One example: A manager tells his underling "Bill, I'm afraid we have to let you go...unless (brings out a board with shapes on it) you can tell me which of these shapes is an octagon."

I've tried Googling, YouTube, and Noggin's site with no luck.

TV commercials are too damn loud!

devilshgrin — Wed, 15 Mar 2006 21:50:46 -0800

Is there a way to keep TV commercials from being so much louder then the program that I'm watching? When watching a television program, I often have to fumble around for the remote control during commercial breaks to keep the volume from being too loud. Is there a practical way to 'normalize' the volume?

If it matters, the television is a Panasonic TH42PX25. The service is Comcast Digital Cable. The tuner is a Motorola DCT6412 III.

Here is a link to the TV's user manual in PDF format though I couldn't find anything useful...

Here is a link to the tuner's user manual, (I didn't have any luck)

Thanks for your help.

cool stilts from commercial

TeamBilly — Sat, 11 Feb 2006 13:03:53 -0800

In the beginning of this ad for Zurich Insurance (link is to an MPG video) there is a kid running on these interesting stilts. If it's an effect, it's a really good one, and there are a bunch more people running on them later in the commercial. I was just wondering if anyone knew if they were real and where a person might obtain them. I looked around and only found links to the commercial-type stilts that people use in construction. I'm not even totally sure you would classify these things as stilts, but maybe I'm looking in the wrong place....

Help me find this Pacific war videogame TV commercial

Oneirokritikos — Mon, 23 Jan 2006 09:12:12 -0800

Help me find this Pacific war videogame TV commercial I saw a while ago (mi) I think I saw it in late 2003, but I could be wrong. It's a commercial for a WWII videogame. It starts underwater with soft hawaian music, IIRC, you can see swimmers passing by. Then the camera rises up and breaks the surface, and you realize it's Pearl Harbor, the noise and violence are nightmarish, and the swimmers were actually sailors cast overboard.

I remember being really shaken by this, for various reasons, not important here.

Can anyone remember this commercial and , most importantly, where online could i find it? Not knowing the name of the game advertised, I don't know where to start.

Thank you, AskMeFi hivemind !!

NB: I'm looking for the commercial, not the game.

Where can I find older New Beetle TV commercials?

herrdoktor — Mon, 26 Dec 2005 10:22:02 -0800

Is there a place where I can download/watch Volkswagen New Beetle TV commercials of yore? These would include the commercials featuring music by Hooverphonic, Spiritualized, Nick Drake, The Orb and the like. The official site seems to have pulled them in favor of more recent commercials, and nowhere I've looked seems to have them.

I'd much rather not sign up for AdCritic, and none of the alternative sites suggested here in the past has them. I've tried emailing the operators of both VW.com as well a couple other VW sites, to no avail.

I recently dug up a copy of Spiritualized's "Ladies and Gentlemen..." and got wistful for a stupid girl and her stupid car, and now I want to watch the stupid commercials. Help me get over this mania. I mean c'mon-- emailing freaking VW.com?! I'm stupid.

Citibank Origami Music

daveed66 — Tue, 20 Sep 2005 17:11:09 -0800

Does anyone know who does the music for the Citi Bank commercial with the guy doing the origami in fast forward. Classical sounding piano music.

Big Mac jingle, when did it stop airing?

jammer — Tue, 08 Feb 2005 20:17:43 -0800

I've searched and searched, and can't find an answer to this simple question: What was the last year in which McDonalds used the "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun" jingle in a commercial?

Who made this PBS commercial?

scazza — Mon, 31 Jan 2005 12:16:14 -0800

I love some of the commercials for PBS. There is one playing currently that is constructed around the story of Little Red Riding Hood's wolf. Philip Glass' music from The Hours is throughout, a father is reading the story to his daughter, then gets interrupted by Lara Spencer, Charlie Rose ("In my interview with the wolf, he said he does his own stunts to add more realism to the story"), Jim Lehrer, Bernadette Peters and a couple others who I don't know, who all have comments about the wolf. Is this commercial available online? Does anyone know who made this?