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While Britney Was Killing Her Career, GM Was Turning it On

I almost turned off the 2007 VMAs after I saw Britney pseudo-lip-synching during her gigantic failure of a perform-mess, but I’m glad I kept the award show on long enough to see some commercials from the new GM-Chevy Volt campaign. The funniest part of it was that the day before, E and I were talking about car brands and he couldn’t remember what the Chevy symbol was. I tried to explain the sideways parallelogram and the little slash through it, but he still couldn’t even picture it. I was thinking, “Damn, I kind of feel bad for you as a brand, Chevz. My boyfriend, who actually knows a lot about cars, can’t even picture your brand icon.”

Lo and behold, the next day, I had the pleasure of seeing some new Chevy commercials, which, in my opinion, were delicious. So, after I finished screaming, “There! There! That’s the symbol! I told you it was a parallelogram,” and pointing like a lunatic at the TV screen, I shut up long enough to actually watch this endearing little spot.

I mean, everyone and their grandma is “going green” and I’m getting sick of hearing about how eco-friendly you are, but something about this really just hit me the right way. The absurdity of each spot’s premise (pug licking feet, fairy playing the freaking ocarina of time or something…) cancelled out the seriousness of preaching about going green and saving the environment and all that jazz. And wouldn’t we be more likely to listen to these energy evangelists if it poked fun at itself? Don’t lecture to me about how I suck at turning lights on because I don’t use energy-saving bulbs– show me a dog tongue-bathing someone as an alternative to showering.

Music, Noise, Public Relations |