Propellerheads “Take California”: The First iPod Commercial (2001)
The first iPod commercial
Apple announced the original iPod on 23 October 2001 as a Mac-only player holding 1,000 songs, and it went on sale on 10 November. Its first television commercial, from October 2001, is a live-action spot. A young man in his room grooves to the music collection on his iBook, moves it to the iPod and puts in the earphones. He dances around the room, slides the player into his jacket pocket and dances out of the door. The soundtrack is "Take California" by Propellerheads, and the spot closes on a line about a thousand songs in your pocket.
A format Apple moved away from
Ken Segall, a creative director at Apple's advertising agency, later said that casting a real person was a problem, since Steve Jobs avoided actors because few appealed to everyone. He also found the ad uncomfortable to watch, and online it was nicknamed the "iClod" commercial. From 2003 the silhouette campaign replaced the actor with anonymous dancing figures.
The track
"Take California" was released as a single in 1996 on Wall of Sound and later opened the album Decksandrumsandrockandroll (1998), which reached No. 6 in the UK. Instrumental apart from a repeated sample of a Richard Nixon speech, taken from an interview by Earle Doud and Alen Robin, it was nominated for Best Rock Instrumental Performance at the 1999 Grammy Awards and appeared on the soundtrack of the film Forces of Nature. Propellerheads were Will White and Alex Gifford, a big beat duo formed in Bath in 1995 and also known for "History Repeating" (1997) with Shirley Bassey.
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