Advertising
Levi's marketing style has often made use of old recordings of popular music in television commercials, ranging from traditional pop to punk rock. Notable examples include Ben E King ("Stand By Me"), Percy Sledge ("When a Man Loves a Woman"), Eddie Cochran ("C'mon Everybody!"), Marc Bolan ("20th Century Boy"), Screamin' Jay Hawkins ("Heart Attack & Vine"), The Clash ("Should I Stay or Should I Go?"), as well as lesser known material, such as "Falling Elevators" and "The City Sleeps" by MC 900 Ft. Jesus and "Flat Beat" and "Monday Massacre" by Mr. Oizo. In India in August 2007 the “Fit to die for” advertisement campaign ran with Deepika Padukone.
Many of these songs were re-released by their record labels as a tie-in with the ad campaigns, resulting in increased popularity and sales of the recordings and the creation of iconic visual associations with the music, such as the use of a topless male model wearing jeans underwater in the 1986 adverts featuring "Wonderful World" and "Mad about the Boy" and the puppet, Flat Eric, in the ads featuring music by Mr. Oizo.
| Song title | Artist | Original recording | Year of Levi's advert | UK chart | US chart |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| "Wonderful World" | Sam Cooke | 1960 | 1986 | 2 | |
| "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" | Marvin Gaye | 1968 | 1986 | 8 | |
| "Stand by Me" | Ben E. King | 1961 | 1987 | 1 | |
| "When a Man Loves a Woman" | Percy Sledge | 1966 | 1987 | 2 | |
| "C'mon Everybody" | Eddie Cochran | 1958 | 1988 | 14 | |
| "The Joker" | Steve Miller Band | 1973 | 1990 | 1 | |
| "Should I Stay or Should I Go" | The Clash | 1982 | 1991 | 1 | |
| "20th Century Boy" | T. Rex | 1973 | 1991 | 13 | |
| "Mad about the Boy" | Dinah Washington | 1952 | 1992 | ||
| "Inside" | Stiltskin | 1994 | 1994 | 1 | |
| "Turn On, Tune In, Cop Out" | Freak Power | 1993 | 1995 | 3 | |
| "Boombastic" | Shaggy | 1995 | 1995 | 1 | |
| "Spaceman" | Babylon Zoo | 1995 | 1996 | 1 | |
| "Underwater Love" | Smoke City | 1997 | 1997 | 4 | |
| "A Nanny in Manhattan" | Lilys | 1996 | 1998 | 16 | |
| "Whine and Grine" | Prince Buster | 1967 | 1998 | 21 | |
| "Flat Beat" | Mr. Oizo | 1999 | 1999 | 1 | |
| "Background Blues" | Otto Sieben | 1999 | 1999 | ||
| "Before You Leave" | Pepe Deluxé | 2001 | 2001 | 20 | |
| "Crazy Beat" | Blur | 2003 | 2003 | 18 |
Read more about this topic: Levi Strauss & Co.
Famous quotes containing the word advertising:
“Remove advertising, disable a person or firm from preconising [proclaiming] its wares and their merits, and the whole of society and of the economy is transformed. The enemies of advertising are the enemies of freedom.”
—J. Enoch Powell (b. 1912)
“The growing of food and the growing of children are both vital to the family’s survival.... Who would dare make the judgment that holding your youngest baby on your lap is less important than weeding a few more yards in the maize field? Yet this is the judgment our society makes constantly. Production of autos, canned soup, advertising copy is important. Housework—cleaning, feeding, and caring—is unimportant.”
—Debbie Taylor (20th century)
“Now wait a minute. You listen to me. I’m an advertising man, not a red herring. I’ve got a job, a secretary, a mother, two ex- wives, and several bartenders dependent on me. And I don’t intend to disappoint them all by getting myself slightly killed.”
—Ernest Lehman (b.1920)