Apple’s ad firm, Chiat\Day, does its job admirably well: the featured song in the above ad, by Swedish popstress Miss Li, is firmly stuck in my brain, as are the color-coordinated dancers and their camera-equipped iPods. Mission accomplished. If I were in the market for an MP3 player, I don’t doubt my final decision would have been influenced by this spot.

The ad gets even better when you go listen to the original song:

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It’s a fairly standard take on alienation from suburban materialism, an irresistible sugary blast of angst and frustration with our consumerist lives.

Talking shit about the neighbor wife
But when she comes, you put on a big smile
I’d like to throw up in her Gucci bag
She’s coming here to brag
…
A house, and a boat, and a gray shiny car
Things just to prove you’ve gone far
Soda streamer, watching tv, cute little dog
Perfect in your shallow bourgeois
Shangri-La

Chiat\Day’s edits to the song deftly avoid any of these inconvenient sentiments, making it sound like the soundtrack for an ad for a travel agency (“I gotta get away”) for disaffected hipsters (“I’ve got a feeling that I don’t belong”). Mention of “bourgeois Shangri-La” does make it in towards the end of the edit, but by that point it sounds like a great place to be, maybe even the place these colorful hipsters are trying to get away to. Apple’s iPod nano, which should by all measures be the emblem of the senseless consumerism Miss Li is singing about, is presented by the ad as the very passport to some sort of glorious paradise where we’re free to be ourselves.

Brilliant.

I went on a whim, and I was very impressed. My friends have been clamoring about the Clean for years, but I never investigated. Turns out they’re the first band to come out on the seminal New Zealand Flying Nun record label, and their 70s-80s psychedelic punk stands the test of time well. Cursory internet survey mentions the Velvet Underground as an easy comparison, and I can hear it, but it’s hardly an encompassing touchstone. Well worth the listen.

As for Kilgour’s solo stuff, I’ve just downloaded A Feather In The Engine and am quite enjoying it. If he’s playing anywhere near you, go spend the $10 and see the show. You won’t be disappointed.

Here’s a taste:

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Photo by the_photographer used under the Creative Commons license.