Always on the lookout for the next best thing (yet somehow never making a profit) I've come up with yet another stellar marketing idea: Grocery Store Rock Anthems.
During my years of food shopping experience, I've noticed that there are certain grocery store music staples that never go away. These songs are mellow, non-threatening and presumably help the shopper feel calm yet just a tad... jazzy as they select pork chops and laundry detergent. I'm not sure what types of tests were conducted, but it is astonishing how the same songs are routinely played over and over. These staples include such hits as "Sweet Love" by Anita Baker, "Get Out Of My Dreams" (Get into my Car) by Billy Ocean and anything by Phil Collins.
Admittedly, these songs are also inevitably played at generic midtown diners and low-rent department stores.
Now, while I genuinely dislike the bulk of these songs, there are a few exceptions that I can tolerate. Some I even get excited about. I will be in mid-squeeze of a cantaloupe, mid-inspection of a rump roast and start to grin when I hear them.
Unafraid of the chiding that could ensue, here's a sampling of the songs that get my toes tapping on the grocery store linoleum:
1. "Maggie May" by Rod Stewart
2. "Tempted" by Squeeze
3. "Brass In Pocket" by the Pretenders
4. "Vision of Love" by Mariah Carey
5. Almost anything by Hall and Oates
Grocery Store Rock Anthems of the future:
Anything by Keane, who really are the heir apparent to Christopher Cross.
If you feel like helping me compile the Greatest Hits of Grocery Store Rock, why, feel free. With any luck, this could turn into a Late Night Infomercial!
7 comments:
I like a little Juice Newton myself.
Trish, stop your gyrating to Juice Newton in Aisle 4 and get your fat ass back to work.
I have actually found myself singing along to Fleetwood Mac at the grocery store.
I used to work in a pharmacy and they would rock Al Stewart songs on the in-house system. Who can forget classics like "Time Passages," and "The Year of the Cat?"
And, let's not forget Procol Harum's "Whiter Shade of Pale."
I cannot believe that no one has, until now, mentioned that all-time AM classic by none other than Rupert Holmes... The Pina Colada Song.
Elvira, by the Oak Ridge Boys:
Giddy-Up, A-Oomp-Bop, A-Oomp-Bop, A-Mau-Mau...
My heart is on fire for Grocery Store Rock.
PERRI PELTZ IS THE DEVIL. What an unpleasant, ungrateful woman. Glad that I don't have to see her smug, elf-eared mug on WNBC anymore.
p.s. Audio-Spud, I heart the Pina Colada song. Good call.
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