Sound + Vision

1. This Diet Coke commercial that played a lot during the Olympics is one of my favorites. It's pretty much a perfect expression of an ideal summer day.


The song is "Starry Eyed Surprise" by Paul Oakenfold. The singer, surprisingly enough, is Seth Binzer from Crazy Town, whom you may have recognized from Celebrity Rehab.

Another nice thing about that commercial, like a lot of Coca-Cola commercials, is that the underlying concept is "associate your product with something good" rather than "flatter your customer's sense of being too cool for commercials," which has unfortunately gained prominence in the last decade or so.

2. A lot of music videos are good because they have a clever idea, or mind-boggling special effects, or pretty ladies, cool dancing, colorful sets, etc. Other videos are just cool because the visuals match the mood of the music so well. This one for The Prodigy's "Poison" is one of those:


I'm sure the budget for that was pretty low, but it works. The song has a great beat and sounds menacing, and the video fits that simply and perfectly.