Chuck Klosterman, acclaimed Spin magazine critic and author of such bestsellers as “Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs: A Low-Culture Manifesto,” has written an elegant defense of the use of rock songs in advertising. “If I can’t avoid occasionally being told to buy shoes,” he says, “I would much rather have the commercial involve rock music.”
He makes an excellent point. Before you rush to call your favorite band a sellout for showing up in that Nike commercial, remember that it could be a lot worse. They could have used polka music in that ad instead. Or, you know, something far more sinister, like that one Ween song that is undoubtedly responsible for nearly all of the domestic violence, terminal illness, and bad hair days that plague our great nation.
