Not Ad-dicted

I've been watching too much television lately and, for some ungodly reason, paying attention to advertising. Time for some props and some venting about...

• The song "Lady": Did you know this is an actual song from Lenny Kravitz's album, Baptism? When I first heard it on that insipid Sarah Jessica Parker Gap commercial, I thought they just came up with thirty-seconds of guitar riff and nonsense to sell jeans. But then I heard it again in a Target commercial. I can't believe anybody went into a studio to record that dreck.
• On a related note, why have car commercials suddenly begun using decent music? Somewhere deep in the bowels of these ad agencies, there's one guy with a sweater and Rivers Cuomo glasses programming Modest Mouse, Richard Buckner and Nick Drake for minivan and SUV spots. This is a welcome respite from that Alan Jackson song about Ford trucks. I also appreciate TCM's use of Wilco and the Postal Service turning up in the in trailers for Garden State, among others
• I just don't get the Old Navy ad campaign. How does irritation equal purchasing fleeces? This self-consciously dorky series of commercials has been going on since the mid-90's, outliving Magic the Dog and the old woman. Please, somebody, stop them before they kill again (although perhaps not before Morgan Fairchild's demise).
• I can't say I'm displeased by the emergence of the two most Monty Python influenced ads in history: the free associative surrealism of the Emerald Nuts ads and the swarming crowds talking in unison from Sony's recent HDTV spots. These ideas may come from the rotund individual in the Black Adder t-shirt who is cube-mates with the indie rock fan mentioned above.
• Erectile dysfunction commercials should have quit when they were ahead: with the Levitra ad where they guy can't throw the football through the tire swing. Visual metaphors just don't get more perfect than that. Now it's just getting creepy.
• Just one more thing: why is ad quality inversely correlated with the benevolence of the product? Netflix, Eggland's Best and the DNC just can't seem to get it together.