2006.10.19 - The Ball State Daily News - Slash Commercial Creates New Level Of Selling Out

Slash commercial creates new level of selling out

By Paul Metz
Ball State U.

(U-WIRE) MUNCIE, Ind. -- I don't know if you've seen it or not, but Volkswagen has launched a new commercial ad campaign. The new "V-dubs rock" campaign has started, and the company's flagship commercial is airing constantly. The thirty-second or so commercial features former Guns N' Roses guitarist Slash playing a customized VW guitar, using six black Volkswagens as amplifiers. It may very well be the most ridiculously arbitrary and inane commercial that has ever ran on television.

It really makes no sense when you think about it. Why Volkswagen? Why Slash?

It is clearly an attempt by the Volkswagen advertising team to hip-ify their image. They want to appeal to a younger, cooler audience. If that's the case, though, why would VW choose an endorser who hit his peak of popularity fifteen years ago?

Looking back, I've never seen Slash playing a guitar and thought, "I need to buy a tiny car." Inversely, I've never seen a Jetta driving down the street and thought that now would be an appropriate time for "Sweet Child O' Mine." The connection between Slash and Volkswagen seems totally phony and arbitrary. These two entities share no common link, and putting them together for the sake of marketing is stupid and contrived.

If a company really wants to use Slash as a promotional tool, it should do so in a way that makes sense. And it's not that hard. He's a natural for Gibson guitars. Slash would make a great Marlboro Man. He'd be the perfect spokesman for Jack Daniel's; he's living proof that the stuff works. I think Slash would be great in a commercial for a shampoo/conditioner, as his hair has way more volume than any of those hair models. And any company that makes and sells giant novelty top hats would be idiotic not to use Slash as a spokesperson, although I'm not exactly sure demographically to whom giant novelty top hats are marketed.

And I'm not calling Slash a sellout. It's way beyond that. Michael Jordan sold out when he did Gatorade and Nike commercials; these were products that he was already using, so he struck a deal that put money in his pockets just for using the products that, to him, were already a mainstay. Jordan, during the peak of his popularity, was endorsing products that he could very easily be associated with. He didn't use the products any more often; he just smiled for the cameras when he did. That's selling out.

Slash's Volkswagen commercial completely supersedes the notion of selling out. It goes above and beyond. This commercial takes selling out to a whole new level. In essence, Slash is saying, "I'm old and washed up and rather than doing something productive by using my natural talents and abilities and working on something artistically worthwhile, I'll just make a quick buck by hawking German-made cars that have absolutely no relevance to my body of work because I'm lazy."

That's not simply selling out; that's a whole new exciting level of being a corporate whore.

I'd like to think, however, that Slash is belittling himself in this way because he already views himself as trivialized by society. Recently, I was watching college football and was fairly astounded when the marching band marched in formation to the strains of "Paradise City" at halftime. That has to be a downer. I think had Slash known that when writing the guitar line for the Guns N' Roses opus one day some dork would be playing his riffs on a trombone at a Wisconsin Badgers football game, he would have just said "forget the whole thing" and finished off another bottle of Jack Daniel's.