Ain`t singing` for Pepsi
Ain`t singing` for Coke
I don't sing for nobody
Makes me look like a joke

- Neil Young

When I was growing up, Cadillacs were driven by boring, middle aged men and all the hip kids listened to Led Zeppelin.

30 years later, I am a middle aged man who drives a Cadillac and Led Zeppelin does commercials claiming that Cadillacs are hip and cool.

Some executives at General Motors decided the song, "Been a long time since I rock and rolled," would cause people to mistake Cadillacs for hot cars like Jaguars and Porsches.

The surviving members of Led Zeppelin (the drummer drank himself to death in 1980) sold out. They are no longer hip. They are corporate shills.

There was a time when rock stars did not do commercials for car companies or any big companies. Rock music stood for taking a stand against authority and commercialism.

Robert Plant and Jimmy Page defaced their music for a quick buck. I can't imagine that they needed the money, even though they used to spend a lot on drugs and parties. Their only excuse for taking General Motors' money was out and out greed.

Many commercials use songs from the 1970's as background music but I suspect the commercials writers are too young to know the history of the songs.

A stock brokerage company revived the Blondie song "Call Me" after its first life as the theme song to the movie "American Gigolo." John Kerry's campaign for President recently started a campaign rally with the song "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" by the Canadian group, Bachman Turner Overdrive.

I can't see how a song about a male prostitute gives people a good feeling about investing their money and you would think that Kerry would have found a song by an American band.

Advertising has changed dramatically as we get more and more products and places to advertise them. Not long ago the only drugs that advertised on television were aspirin and cold remedies.

Now drugs to cure ailments like herpes and erectile dysfunction get tons of commercial time.

Like snake oil salesmen, companies are overselling the wonders of the drugs they offer.

When Viagra was first marketed, the company ran respectable ads with Senator Bob Dole sitting in front of an American flag, discussing how the medicine helped him after his prostate cancer.

As the profits and competition increased, so did the sensationalism of the ads. Suddenly the Viagra ads featured another guy named Bob. Gone was the old, un-sexy Bob Dole for a young, hip Bob with no last name. The new Bob is a confident, good looking guy and he is so hopped up on Viagra that his wife can't wait to rip her clothes off.

According to the ad, all you have to do is take Viagra and every aspect of your life will be better.

I'm amazed that Viagra does not use Bob Dole in another ad, saying that he would have been President if Viagra had been invented earlier. It was obvious that Dole's opponent, Bill Clinton, did not need the stuff and Dole could have used all those magical powers that Viagra is supposed to give you.

Now that more drug companies are competing with Viagra, the ads are getting racier and racier. Some competitors' commercials look like they are for porn movies instead of medicine.

Viagra has an ad with a bunch of men jumping up and down to the tune, "We are the Champions," sung by the late Freddie Mercury of Queen. Freddie was a flamboyant man with a wild sex life who died of AIDS. Freddie was a far cry from Senator Bob Dole or even the Bob with no last name.

At least Mercury did not sell out. His estate and band members did.

Since Led Zeppelin already sold out to General Motors, working for Viagra would be its next logical step. They could call Viagra their "Stairway to Heaven" and discuss how Viagra interacts with all the drugs they took back in the 1970's. They can say that Viagra makes them feel like they are back in the sex crazed days of their youth.

Instead of being boring middle aged guys who drive Cadillacs.

Don McNay is President of McNay Settlement Group and wants to put a Deadhead sticker on his Cadillac. You can email him at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it '; document.write( '' ); document.write( addy_text52288 ); document.write( '<\/a>' ); //-->\n This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or read other things he has written at www.donmcnay.com