Plenty of old school rock songs have been played to death by commercials to the point where you forget they were even original artist recordings. This Top 9 List is devoted to the Indie and Alternative Rock songs that have been ruined or marred in one way or another by television advertising.

Click the picture for the commercial Pops in a new window

Number Nine: Punkrocker by the Teddybears by Cadillac

This one ranks not too highly because it didn’t get overplayed quite as much or over such a long period of time as some others on the list. But when this commercial made it to the small screen, the track was just reaching popularity, meaning this spot came out right at that magical sweet spot in the life of a popular music track to taint its listenability.

(Oh there is more…)

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#6: Chrysler / SunCom co-op

I’m not big on top 10 “whatever” lists, and didn’t plan on doing one for the worst commercials of 2006. Until I ran into a few lists that other publications had done. Namely, this list by Slate.com made me cock my head to the side like a confused dog and whimper out a confused grunt. Really Slate, do you really think these are the first ten worst commercials of the year? Or are they just the first ten commercials you found? In fact one of them (the Fudgems one) after viewing I decided must be one of the BEST of 2006. (I did agree with the article on at least one contender.)

(Oh there is more…)

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Sing-a Ding-a Doo!

Just when television watchers couldn’t take the endless “Beep Beep” Ford ad deluge anymore, they decided to relent on their advertising schedule. Unfortunately it seems to have been replaced with another non-stop sing-a-thon, with American Idol winner Taylor Hicks singing about how much he loves Ford. Over and over and over again. In certain market areas, this commercial plays continuously, every commercial break, in every available national and local slot. In a small South Carolina town it has been playing non-stop for eight days on the local Fox affiliate.

It isn’t so much that the song-bite is annoying by itself, but once you hear it, say, twice in one commercial break, one starts to wonder if they died while watching an “Everybody Loves Raymond” rerun and woke up in hell without noticing. If Ford is going to buy so many commercial runs, at least they could break it up a bit with, oh I don’t know, at least a single other goddamn commercial that doesn’t have the same song in it.

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I can’t believe I quit Nine Inch Nails for this

By special request here is an especially annoying commercial for Carolina Ford. There are a few cuts of this spot but they all use the same music track. The track is kind of extremely really somewhat very annoying. This song poisons the minds of our youths and robs us of our precious bodily fluids. Once you listen to it, you can’t unlisten to it.

The song definitely can get stuck in your head, but without identifying the brand in the song I wonder if it serves as good advertising or just a good annoyance. Listen and find out for yourself.

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When I bought this damn talking car, I assumed it would help me solve crime!

This commercial has a Carolina Ford tag on the end, so I don’t know if it is strictly regional, or nationally circulated with different tags put on for different areas. And I don’t give a damn whether or not it is. I have a damn life, ok?

I’ve seen one or two of these spots, and they are all equally obnoxious. The car yammers away at the man because he is leaving it alone somewhere. In another spot the man broke his leg skiing and the car is complaining about how he won’t be able to drive him for a while. In this one the car is just complaining. FUCK YOU CAR, I GOT SHIT TO DO!

The car’s voice is so very annoying, I would like to know what possessed them to make such a wretched choice for the voice. I don’t know if this would be much better with a less annoying voice as the whole idea seems cheap, but it might keep someone from changing the channel or muting the TV. Or shooting the TV with a revolver.

The Dell co-op tag on the end has nothing to do with my condemnation, it just happened to be on the spot. Click the video link below and see how long you can last.

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