Shiny Toy Guns – Major Tom

I’ve been seeing the Lincoln MKZ ad on television for a few weeks and I’m starting to dig the song. After a quick search, it turns out the song is a cover of Major Tom (coming home) by Shiny Toy Guns:

[Please visit blog post to view streaming video]

Generally, I’d just tweet this but it turns out that Shiny Toy Guns is giving away the song for FREE: TRANSMISSION TO MAJOR TOM. YOURS. FREE. They require you to register, but that seems like a small price to pay for getting the song for free. After registering however, it appears to just redirect you to Lincoln’s website, telling you to look for the download link in the lower right corner.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t find the download link. Looking at the comments back on Shiny Toy Guns’ website, people were saying it was pulled because they were planning for an official release. However on Lincoln’s website, their source still links to the song:

function downloadSong() {
    [...]
    window.open('/extras/asset/majortom.zip', '_blank', 'height=100,width=200,top=200,left=300');
}

If you input javascript:downloadSong() into the location bar or just open this download link, you should be able to download the song. It’s a 10MB file with a 320kbps encoded MP3

Enjoy!

New Microsoft Ads

You’ve probably seen the new ads Microsoft has put out, starting with the ones Jerry Seinfield were in. If you haven’t seen them, you’re not missing out on much, but if you’re curious, you can watch them here: Gates and Seinfeld: The future is delicious.

When it was first announced that Microsoft was having a $300 million ad campaign involving Jerry Seinfield, someone on /. posted this:

Elaine (with Apple-ish grin): I just bought a Macbook
Jerry (non-chalantly sipping his coffee in front of his Dell): So? I’ve got Vista.
Elaine (frowning): But this is a Mac, Jerry.
Jerry: But it’s not Vista.
Elaine: No, it’s not Vista. It’s a Mac.
Jerry: It’s very shiny. What’d that thing cost you?
Elaine (defensive): What does that matter?
Jerry: One thousand?
Elaine: Jerry…
Jerry: Two thousand?
Elaine: Stop…
Jerry: Three th–
Elaine: $2755.
Jerry: Inclu–
Elaine: Including tax.
Jerry: 1250
Elaine: 1250 what?
Jerry: Vista.
Elaine: But it’s not a Mac!
Jerry: It checks email.
Elaine: So does my Mac.
Jerry: Surfs the web.
Elaine: So does my Mac.
Jerry: Makes movies.
Elaine: So does…it does? I thought Windows didn’t make movies.
Jerry (shrugs and sips): Vista.
(Door explodes open!)
Kramer: Jerry! The Dell store down the street is selling computers with Vista for $1500!
Jerry: 1250
Kramer (walking over to Jerry’s laptop): Oooh, is that…
Jerry: Vista.
Kramer: Niiiice.

I actually thought that was quite creative and fit the Seinfield theme well.

When I saw the first commercial (the one with the shoe and churro), everyone down the hall at Microsoft was basically yelling “WTF”. I had to scratch my head and wonder, what the heck was this commercial about. Is it trying to sell shoes? or churros? Personally I wasn’t blinded by Bill Gates wiggling his butt, but I can understand if you were. Everyone at work was just wondering what the heck was this commercial about? We figured if anything, this was suppose to be viral and would get people talking about it. I guess they applying the philosophy that any publicity is good publicity.

Anyway, the 2nd commercial came out and at least this one I found it to be mildly amusing, but still nothing related to Microsoft or Windows. At least it wasn’t as WTF as the first one. All along the marketing team has called this “phase one” and it was meant to be an ice breaker to get people talking about Microsoft.

Then the new I’m a PC ads started showing up and I have to say that it was actually done quite well. I have to admit, I got a similar feeling watching that as when I saw Where the Hell is Matt? (the guy who does a funny dance around the world).

One thing I didn’t quite get was when Deepak Chopra says, “I’m a PC and a human being. Not a human doing, not a human thinking, a human being.” What does that even mean? I guess that’s why he’s the philosopher and I’m not.

Many people are claiming that Microsoft screwed up again and canceled the Jerry Seinfield ads because of the poor reception, but I think New York Times did a good article on it: Echoing the Campaign of a Rival, Microsoft Aims to Redefine ‘I’m a PC’ . If the Seinfield ads were indeed cut short, I personally feel that it was most likely done because it exceeded expectations on getting the number of people talking. As noted earlier, this was always phase 1 (an ice breaker) and if we can reach the target # of audience with 2 commercials, why make 5 (number I just pulled out of my ***)?

While reading Digg, someone pointed me to this comment made on the Penny Arcade forums:

Are you serious? A big part of the ad was a stab at Jobs, his controlling nature within Apple, and his famous “reality distortion field”. The old lady who’d been there for 12 years (the same number of years since Jobs returned to Apple) ran the whole show. She was doing the laundry, she was doing the yard work, she was fixing the car. She kept up the facade of a rather dated looking home full of people who were caught up in appearances (the neighbor’s car) and the pretension of useless things like Greek coins, wine mustard and leather giraffes. When the old lady croaks, the place will fall apart. They had shitty pong to play (Macs suck at gaming) while Bill Gates had the most incredible game ever for the kid.

The first ad was a rip on the Apple Store – the fact you buy your computers from a place in the mall and they don’t even fit you properly. Regular people pointlessly idolize them (the family staring through the window) and you don’t get much for your money “Why pay more?”

Keep in mind the entire purpose of these ads is that they’re a direct response to Apple’s “Mac vs. PC” campaign, it’s hardly a stretch to point out the statements being made about Apple vs. MSFT in them.

I never thought about them that way, but it’s an interesting way to look at the Seinfield ads.

Moccona Quest (Cinderella Ad)

So Tera showed me this ad: Moccona coffee: Quest Cendrillon Cinderella. I don’t usually blog about advertisements (well, unless they’re on my site), but this ad was just too good that I wanted to share. The music was just so amazing and I spent hours trying to find it but only to hit a dead end. The story the commercial tells is also really sweet. If you don’t want the commercial to be ruined, skip to the next paragraph. Or else read on and be spoiled! [Begin Spoilers] It’s similar to the Cinderella glass slipper story, where this guy goes around town with a glass cap trying to find the coffee jar which the cap fits in. One by one, he rejects woman after woman, but ultimately finding the one and only girl. I guess one can only imagine how awesome the party must’ve been if someone dropped their coffee cap. ;p [End Spoilers]

There’s actually a longer version (80 seconds vs 60 seconds) on their homepage: Moccona Coffee – Never settle for less than special. At first I didn’t notice any differences, but as I watched them side by side, I realize that it showed more of the women’s responses.

While searching for the music, I found this page: Moccona Coffee in Quest for Romance

The Quest was developed at M&C Saatchi, Sydney, by creative director Ben Welsh, art director Michael Jones, copywriter Lizzie O’Hara-Boyce, agency producer Rod James.

Filming was shot on location in Montevideo, Uruguay, by Noah Marshall via The Sweet Shop, with director of photography Ian McCarroll, and producer Tony Whyman.

Post production was done at Digipost and Fin Design in New Zealand.

Moccona is a brand of coffee produced by the Dutch corporation Douwe Egberts and popular in Australia and New Zealand. The coffee is regarded as one of the superior brands in the market. In my household Moccona jars are kept to store nuts and confectionery. The lid does look as though as it could have been formed by the sea.

Inside the comment area, M&C Saatchi posted:

Thanks for the comments guys. The music was created for us by composer Elliott Wheeler through Nylon Studios in Sydney. We’re soon going to post an mp4 on the moccona.com.au website that you’ll be able to download. For a ltd time there’s also a longer (80sec) version up there.

In the posted YouTube video, Mocconateam posted:

Thanks for all the positive feedback – we’re glad you like the work.
The commercial was filmed in Montevideo, by a director called Noah Marshal from The Sweetshop (Aukland). We cast all the actors locally except for the hero and the blonde woman who came from Argentina. The music was by a composer called Elliott Wheeler who we commissioned specially for the job through Nylon Studios here in Sydney, Australia.

Since the music was “specially commissioned” for this advertisement, that means it’s no where to be found besides ripping it from the ad. I also wasn’t able to find the .mp4 file that they mention would be posted on their homepage.

Update: Thanks to Chriszam for letting me know that Moccona has released the mp3 for the track on their homepage. The mp3 is zipped up into a 1.2MB file: Download

Enjoy!

Update #2: blufindr pointed out the cute girl in the ad is Caitlin Stasey (an Australian actress that played Rachel Kinski in Neighbours).

Caitlin Stasey Cute Girl from Moccona Quest Ad (Cinderella)

I will admit they do look very similar and Moccona is an Australian coffee, though I still have my doubts. I did a search on Caitlin Stasey and Maccona and found nothing that linked them together. Also, the director noted: We cast all the actors locally except for the hero and the blonde woman who came from Argentina. The heroine isn’t blonde, so I would’ve assumed she was cast locally, meaning she would’ve been from Montevideo (largest city, the capital and chief port of Uruguay). Caitlin Stasey on the other hand was born in Melbourne, Australia.

Update #3: Thanks to marcus6 for identifying the mystery girl as Uruguayan actress Ana Lia Badani:

Ana Lia Badani

You can see more pictures of her on her official site.

Update #4: Looks like the removed the mp3 from their servers. Here’s a mirror: 01-Moccona-Quest.mp3. Enjoy!

Project Wonderful

You may have noticed that I have rearranged my ads once again. I test drove Project Wonderful on HD-Trailers.net and had great results so far. I’m pleased with the system and just how simple it works. At first I wasn’t clear on what “bids” actually meant, but apparently bids are the amount they’re willing to pay for the entire day of showing their ad. So if someone bids $0.24 and the ad is displayed on your site for an hour, you’ll get $0.01 minus the commission. Once you hit $10, you can withdraw to your PayPal account, or you can immediately use the funds to place ads on other sites.

The selection of sites they have is still pretty limited and I don’t want to bother going over the things I went over already on HD-Trailers.net: Project Wonderful.

AdBrite’s system just didn’t work that well as I was just getting random ads. Text Link Ads was pretty awesome while it lasted, but they have a black box approval process which I don’t quite understand and for some reason HD-Trailers.net still hasn’t been approved yet. And when people stopped purchasing ads on my site, I had an empty area for months, at which point I decided to return to AdBrite since they added a new text-only ad feature.

The Gallery has also been updated to use Project Wonderful.

Message From Your Heart – Heart Beats

So I was checking out this year’s Superbowl ads and saw this one: Kina Grannis – Doritos – Commercials. You might know Kina Grannis as the Digg Girl after she made this song/music video: Gotta Digg. Anyway, she won the Doritos contest by having the most votes online so she got a full minute ad during the Superbowl, advertising her new song Message From Your Heart, which is apparently now available on iTunes.

kina grannis - message from your heart Anyway, I was browsing through Digg earlier today and came upon this site that linked to the full version of her song (and maybe her entry to the Doritos contest): Doritos: Crash the Super Bowl Contest – Song: Message From Your Heart – Artist: Kina Grannis. Anyway, I found her method of making the beating heart sounds by tapping twice quickly continuously on the guitar was ingenious! I have no idea why they removed it from the Superbowl commercial, but I especially liked that part of the song. Having her say bum, bum, bum, bum, bum… as the heart beat sounds isn’t bad, but I’d prefer the tapping on the guitar.

Tap-Tap, Tap-Tap, Tap-Tap, Tap (repeat)

Just awesome!

UPDATE:
Speaking of which, you can check out the 2 new HD Movie Trailers that were advertised during the Superbowl: