I never thought I’d see the day a song by the “mostly fictional” band Spinal Tap (Gimme Some Money, their first single from “1965″) is used in a commercial for a completely non-fictional product. That day was today. I haven’t found a video online yet of this American Express commercial, but look out for this one on television. It’s a funny song, and a completely random sighting.
Spinal Tap seems to have gone commercial lately, with the guitarist “Nigel Tufnel” appearing in a Volkswagen ad: “This amplifier has airbags!”
Update: Thanks to a commenter, now you can see the commercial online, courtesy of YouTube.
Updated February 6, 2012 and originally published December 11, 2006. If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to the RSS feed or receive daily emails. Follow @flexo on Twitter and visit our Facebook page for more updates.
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Luke Landes founded Consumerism Commentary in 2003 and has been building online communities since 1990. Luke, also known as Flexo, has contributed to PC World Magazine, US News, Forbes, and other publications. 
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Man, I remember actually going to see Spinal Tap live in concert, it was a blast!
Yeah, they have gone commercial with the Amex and VW ads but don’t you think that anything that results in revenue is commercial.
“This is Spinal Tap”, while an underground cult movie, it is still commercial.
I just find the ad campaigns to be interesting and a bit refreshing. I guess American Express and VW know their target market and many (myself included) are who they are targeting and it keeps my attention.
Hmmm, now where is my Spinal Tap CD. I haven’t listened to them in years!
There are 2 VW ads out there with rockin’ guitarists, Slash from Guns N’ Roses and Nigel from Spinal Tap.
They’re both part of a promotion between VW’s Jetta and First Act guitars. The offer: buy a car and get a free guitar that plugs into the dashboard ;-)
Here’s one of the online ads to give you a flavor of this very cool promo:
[link to static web ad block (you have to be kidding me) removed]
Enjoy!
If that had been a link to the commercial, I’d be happy… but it’s a link to a flash ad… which when clicked on goes nowhere…? Sorry, link removed.
Courtesy of YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLYk0CgxQbM
I was thinking about how weird it was that American Express was using the song too….
Thanks, Lin. I added the video to the post above.
I’m not so sure that I’m comfortable with it. I’m definitely not eligible for an American Express card (I’ve got way more fundamental economic problems in my life), and I suppose every time I see one of their ads AmEx has wasted another couple of dollars.
I am a huge Tap fan, and I suppose it was a nice moment when I heard Gimme Some Money coming outta my TV… but then again Tap was a symbol for crass monetary desires in the world of rock’n'roll, right? They were lost when they had no fame or money, and things only made sense in their world when they were big sellers. So I guess it’s appropriate that I felt like a sucker for listening to the AmEx ad… if Tap were a real band they’d be way into this kind of promotion.
sigh…
Just saw this tonight, amazed, and google’d it to see if there was any buzz about it. So it’s been on for over a month?
I wouldn’t say I like this or am unhappy about it. Bemused is the right word: the joke is on AMEX, right? It’s like they thumbed through some disembodied catalog somewhere and found a song about money and decided it would be dandy for their new commercial.
I suspect that’s thereason general public want to read blog….Internet visitors generally create blogs to declare themselves or their secret views. Blog grant them same matter on the monitor screen what they specifically needed,so as the above stuffs declared it.