Optigan “Swing It” disc in car TV ad
Posted by peahix on January 30th, 2010
So, there’s this new car commercial going around…
…and for some reason it seems folks are fairly interested in the music. It’s been pointed out that it comes from an Optigan (possibly from my sample set), but apparently some folks don’t believe it (?) I’m not sure why this has become some contentious issue, but I spent a couple minutes re-creating the ad music (sans the heavy reverb & slight time compression in the ad version- theirs is lower in pitch, but faster in tempo, mine is at the original unaltered pitch/tempo):
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
…and here’s the same thing reconstructed using loops from the original Optigan studio master tapes (and thus much higher fidelity):
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After originally posting all of this, some folks inexplicably remained unconvinced or confused, so I made one final attempt to explain the whole thing with this video:
The working title for “Swing It” was “Tommy Dorsey.” It was arranged & conducted by Art DePew, and played by members of the Lawrence Welk Orchestra. Here’s a demo they made of the arrangement during the recording session, strictly for in-house demo purposes to show how the chords should work together musically:
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Note that in this demo, many of the chords are an alternate arrangement than the one that ended up on the final disc. Often they would record variations like this and choose the ones that worked best at a later time. Oh, and for those of you unfamiliar with the Optigan, the reason why this demo sounds so clear and the ad music sounds so lo-fi is simply due to the nature of transferring the studio quality music onto the optical discs and playing them back on a cheap piece of equipment. Optigan discs are inherently lo-fi, muddy and scratchy sounding. There’s no extra effects needed to make them sound that way.
Well anyway, hope that clears things up a little!
UPDATE:
This commercial is also discussed on this episode of the Sonic Talk podcast, including a clip from my video. Listen in around the 30 minute mark.
Robert spotted this Woolite commercial that uses a time-stretched riff from the Optigan “Big Band Beat” disc at the beginning.
January 30th, 2010 at 12:29 pm
Thanks a bunch!
January 30th, 2010 at 1:41 pm
WTF? The first song doesn’t play and I don’t know what the hell you’re telling me. What is the name of that song? Stop trying to confuse people. We just want a simple answer as to what the name of that song is played in the Chrysler Town And Country Commercial.
January 30th, 2010 at 2:28 pm
hi, all audio in this post plays fine here. as to your other question, nobody is trying to confuse anything- you’ll need to read up on what an optigan is in order to understand that this is not a “song” per se. it’s a series of optigan loops strung together to make a “song,” but other than that, it has no title unless the person who put it together decided to give it a title. the optigan doesn’t play songs on its own- you press chord buttons and make your own chord progressions (or use samples of optigan loops assembled on a computer). this ad music is just one of an infinite number of “songs” you could play using optigan’s “swing it” disc. “walk & chew gum,” a song by my band optiganally yours, is another of the infinite number of “songs” that is possible to play using this disc. again, if you have any further questions about it, please browse the site and learn about what an optigan does. are you familiar with apple’s garage band software? the optigan was essentially the 1972 equivilent.
January 30th, 2010 at 6:57 pm
where can i buy optigan music
January 30th, 2010 at 8:09 pm
Wow, Thanks Peahix for that explanation, I know further understand what I’m dealing with here. I’m very interested in using loops and creating full length songs. I’ve used Acid Pro and Mixcraft software in the past to assemble loops to create my own electronica/dance songs. I also enjoy the old swing style of music. I must know more about this. I use Windows Vista and I want to know more to get started. What should I do?
January 30th, 2010 at 8:32 pm
I’m watching your YouTube video you specially made for me right now. I’ll let you know once I’m done with it. Thanks.
January 30th, 2010 at 11:44 pm
Peahix–you’ve got me completely hooked. I went Googling the music from the Chrysler Town & Country commercial and found my way to Youtube, then to optigan.com. I read every last detail of the story of the endless search for optigans (so, what commercial do you suppose just came on the tube????). Absolutely fascinating. I Googled “Optiganally Yours” and found a handful of great tunes from Exclusively Talentmaker! But–the first post was correct. I can play your 2nd and 3rd audio clips, but not the 1st.
Thanks for the great tunes. Keep it up!
JZ
January 31st, 2010 at 3:10 am
you can create optigan tracks in Acid Pro with the original loops pea is offering in the shoptigan section
http://www.optigan.com/shoptigan/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=6&products_id=23
February 1st, 2010 at 6:06 am
[...] Pea Hix demonstrates how the memorable music from this recent Chrysler Town & Country, above, was created using [...]
February 3rd, 2010 at 7:41 pm
You should get paid for that commercial Pea, if it wasnt for your site no one would know what it is and the guy using it wouldnt have gotten it off some Torrent for free nor would I have been able to actually buy and pay for the samples if it wasnt for you Pea.
Thanks for introducing us all to the optigan and keeping us connected.
I dont think you get enough thanks and credit honestly.
Hopefully your band can play on Jimmy Kimmel Live one day.
February 3rd, 2010 at 7:51 pm
Thanks for the props, Tony, but all I can really say is- give credit where credit is due, and that rightfully belongs to the original creators of the Optigan and the folks who arranged/recorded the music (in this case, Art DePew). All I do here is try to preserve that legacy and make the material available for folks to use. I still don’t know who did the music for that commercial, so for all I know he bought my sample set, or has his own Optigan.
Nevertheless, I appreciate your comments, so thanks again!
February 4th, 2010 at 3:53 pm
[...] zostało, zgodnie z tym co sam twierdzi, użyte bez jego zgody w reklamie Chryslera, na co Pea ma dowody. Wyśledził też, że jego brzmiena reklamują Woolite. Ach, ci [...]
February 6th, 2010 at 11:51 pm
Do you know if Dave Grohl used an optigan or your sample set for the song “Interlude With Ludes” on the Them Crooked Vultures album? It’s Latin Fever played backwards.
F.Y.I - Them Crooked Vultures is Dave Grohl of Nirvana/Foo Fighter’s new band with Led Zeppelin’s bass player John Paul Jones and the Lead Singer from Queens of the Stone Age.
February 10th, 2010 at 9:06 pm
Being an audio geek I immediately knew that was an Optigan and it was the “Swing It” disc because of that riff that immediately got stuck in my head. I had the Optiganally Yours contribution to the Powerpuff Girls movie soundtrack with their song Walk and Chew Gum (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pc-jxjgF0ko) going in my head.
Seriously, I was all OMG WTF OPTIGAN!
Second time today. I heard an Esquivel song in a Tide commercial.
OMG WTF ESQUIVEL!
February 13th, 2010 at 1:24 pm
Thank you. My mother has been asking me to find out the name of the song in that commercial. This explanation was not only thorough, but pretty fascinating. I can’t wait to show this to her.
THANKS AGAIN!!
February 14th, 2010 at 7:10 pm
Let us get down to brass tacks with no hems and haws and give a direct answer to a direct question. When can I buy the CD on which this happily infectious music is recorded? Whenever I listen to it my heart, soul, and intellect become extremely happy. And I cannot explain the reason. What is most unusual is that I listen only to classical music!
February 14th, 2010 at 11:34 pm
Hi, if you buy my Optigan sample CD, you can use the “Swing It!” loops to generate an infinite amount of this music for yourself.
February 16th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
The Apples in Stereo used this very thing on “Walk and Chew Gum” (Optiganally Yours). That title never made sense until now, also when I heard the music I thought they had ripped Apples who in turn I thought ripped off Tommy Dorsey.
February 16th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
hi, “walk and chew gum” is by my band, optiganally yours. apples in stereo appeared on the same album, but had nothing to do with our song.
February 18th, 2010 at 9:17 pm
Cool video, thanks for the explanation.
February 21st, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Thanks so much for posting all this Pea! I have been looking around for months, trying to find out the name and band for that delightful Chrysler commercial song. Like others, I was sure it was a 20s or 30s jazz piece, and am so surprised to find out about this “optigan.” Never heard of it! Can’t wait to share this with others.
Keep up the good work!!
February 21st, 2010 at 9:54 pm
Lawrence Welk would love this! Chrysler(Dodge)was a long time sponsor of his show & LW drove a Dodge till he died! Wonder if the ad agency had known this?!
February 21st, 2010 at 10:09 pm
actually, lawrence welk had nothing to do with this music, and was likely completely unaware of it. it was just members of his band that played on this session (which they likely did for all sorts of sessions outside the lawrence welk show).
February 21st, 2010 at 10:15 pm
incidentally, if you check out my most recent blog post, you’ll find some demo recordings done during these sessions, including a demo for the optigan “champagne music” disc, which was intended to sound like lawrence welk (again, using his own band members). in the demo, you can hear art depew lampooning/imitating welk.
February 23rd, 2010 at 6:56 pm
If you’re using the Firefox browser and have the Adblock plug-in, disable it on this page to play the three Flash audio samples above. Otherwise, they’ll say “Buffering” forever and never play.
HTH,
Ian
February 23rd, 2010 at 10:26 pm
I first heard this when the Olympics were on NBC. It absolutely stopped me in my tracks. I thought I was hearing music from the 1930’s Little Rascals!!!! What a neat ditty!!