Friday, November 08, 2002

NOW I DON'T WANT TO SHOUT, BUT: Second Clash sell-out of the day, as Joe Strummer attempts to justify letting Jaguar use London Calling in an advert:
"Yeah, I agreed to that. We get hundreds of requests for that and turn 'em all down. But I just thought Jaguar…yeah. If you're in a group and you make it together, then everyone deserves something. Especially twenty-odd years after the fact. It just seems churlish for a writer to refuse to have their music used on an advert and so I figured out, only advertise the things you think are cool. That's why we dissed Coors and Miller. We've turned down loads of money. Millions over the years. But sometimes you have to earn a bit, so everybody gets some."
I really don't see the logic here - if the aim is to make as much money as possible, why not let everybody use music? If, on the other hand, Strummer really believes that Jaguar - the car of choice of Annie Walker, John Prescott and provincial mayors?
Strummer's final word is "it's no use being holier than thou" but also manages to opine "I personally would not download or burn a group that has to count every sale",and, when the Londons Burning TV people wanted to use the song as a theme "If you make some spaghetti you don't want it chopped into microsections of what it should be",so clearly he still finds some mileage in being hollier than thou. Really, it's simple: you either let your music be used for ads, or you don't. There's no difference between Jaguar, Budweiser, the International Olympic Committee or Microsoft. We'd have more respect for people who just say "they found out what our price was and offered it" rather than trying to pretend that there's something more noble about a luxury car than there is about a bottle of beer.
Ta to rocktober for the pointer


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