Yahoo Autos GMC Steps Up Its Game in New "Anthem" Commercial
Sometimes a commercial doesn't have to be super clever to be incredibly effective.
Have you seen the new GMC spot? It was all over the NFL Wild Card Weekend games. It's the one where people are marching through the countryside carrying pickup-truck tailgates, which the camera makes sure we understand are from every major competitive brand, toward an unseen destination.
It will not go down in history as an Apple "1984"–level adrenaline shot of creativity. In the ad world, it's kind of a by-the-numbers idea. Zero in on the thing you want people to concentrate on, then do a dramatic reveal that shows how your product is better.
But Super Bowls and NBA Finals are often won by familiar plays called at exactly the right time and executed exactly the right way. This is in that ballpark. (For another take on a tailgate theme, check out our report on the new Chevy Silverado spot that debuted during the College Football Playoff National Championship game.)
When the GMC spot opens, you go, okay, I get it, this has something to do with pickup trucks (what says pickup truck more than tailgates?) and probably about tailgates themselves. And there's clearly going to be a punch line at the expense of the other major truck brands. But what? You have to keep watching.
Soon, we see a square-jawed GMC Sierra owner on a hillside lit by God rays do something we've never seen before: turn his tailgate into a staircase. Stepside? No, dammit. Steptail. He climbs up into the bed-Gosh, Mindy, look how much easier that is than what we have now!-and stares contentedly at the other pickup drivers arriving on foot, carrying their tailgates (with which they're going to do what, exactly?) and wearing oddly gleeful looks about how obsolete their trucks suddenly are.
There are no words. Just the gathering throng singing a cappella and en masse the #1 1969 hit "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye" by the then as yet unformed band Steam.
Then an equally smart super at the end: The tailgate to end all tailgates.
Exclamation point. End of report.
Credit the creative team for calling the right play at the right time and executing it to near perfection. Credit the agency's music director for marrying the perfect song to the idea (and securing the rights to it). The spot's official name? Anthem.
Credit, too, the GMC designers who've innovated what looks like a pretty remarkable advance in tailgate design. Make no mistake: without the innovation, there's no spot. But the advertising team is smart enough not to let the creative get in the way of the innovation.
For the moment, this might be the pickup-truck commercial to end all pickup-truck commercials.
But the real Super Bowl is just weeks away, and we know the other guys are drawing up potential game-winning plays of their own.
Between a stint as editor of AutoWeek in the 1980s and his latest gig writing award-winning motorsports books, George Levy spent more years than he can actually remember as a creative director and marketing strategist at major advertising agencies and as a consultant to clients. His column provides an insider's view of some of today's most interesting commercials.
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