When car adverts and rap music collide, terrible things happen. Here are the five worst examples of the last few years.
There’s nothing cheesier than a bad rap, yet car manufacturers continue to use hip-hop music in their adverts in the hope that some of the ‘gangster’ swagger rubs off. These attempts at viral marketing will make you want to pull your ears off and eat them just be sure you will have to endure the misery again.
Here, presented for the purposes of mockery, are the worst we’ve ever seen. Listen at your peril.
Toyota Sienna – Swagger Wagon
Can a family car ever be considered to have ‘swagger’? Yes, in the same way you can call Boris Jonhson ‘hip’. Face it; your gangster days went when you got married. In a church in Surrey. Let the reality sink in and then let’s tie some heavy rocks to this advert and let it sink to the YouTube ocean depths where it belongs. Shame on you, Busta Rhymes.
Snoop Dogg – GoCompare
Snoop Zilla? DJ Snoopadelic? Snoop Lion? Nobody but Snoop knows his current name. But we are all tragically aware the Dogg Father was in a series of GoCompare adverts. It’s lucky he is one of the few people that can pull off such a commercial sellout stunt and still get away with some dignity intact. Or maybe we were just fed up of that fat opera singer from Wales. Anything but epic, this one.
Fiat 500 – The Fatherhood/Motherhood
Such was Fiat’s quest to inflict maximum pain on consumers, it released not one but two rapping adverts for the Fiat 500L MPV. One was from a man’s perspective (The Fatherhood), the other from a woman’s (The Motherhood). If somebody had a Desert Eagle against our head and forced us to choose between the two we would pull the trigger ourselves. What do you mean the lyrics are catchy?
Kia Sportage – Grandmaster Melle
Kia wheeled out not one but two Furious Five rappers (of Grandmaster Flash fame) for its Sportage advert. Grandmaster Melle Mel and Scorpio can be seen accompanying a man who looks way too pleased with his SUV purchase. So pleased, in fact, he joins in on the The Message rap song, ruining a true rap classic.
Kia – Rapping hamsters
It’s difficult to dislike hamsters, them being furry, cute and all. But since the Cuban Brothers released the Hamster Dance our relationship has been under strain. Then Kia decided show a bunch of them covering Black Sheep’s brilliant The Choice is Yours.
Pontiac – “Two miles an hour” ft Ludacris
Chris Bridges, aka Ludacris, who has starred in all the Fast & Furious movies to date, hooked up with Puma and Pontiac a few years back. The fruit of this relationship (besides lining Luda’s pockets) was some trainers and an advert for the Pontiac Solstice, a nippy little two-seater roadster. Suffice to say, the car was less cringeworthy than the rap ad.
Chrysler – Eminem Super Bowl Commercial
Detroit was once considered by some to be the centre of the automotive universe. But the place also known as Motor Town (hence Motown music) lost its automotive muscle and has valiantly fought to recover ever since. While we wish it the best chance of a recovery, the Chrysler Eminem Super Bowl Commercial ‘Imported From Detroit’ deserves a different fate. Also is it just us or does Eminem look really scary in this?
Toyota – Gadget Master
Anyone who played a game called Jet Set Radio will be familiar with the term cel-shading. Basically you draw a black line around a 3D object so it looks 2D. That’s what Toyota did for its Gadget Master advert, which sees a Beastie Boy wannabe who looks like a comic book character rapping about gadgets or something. We were too busy tying a noose to the ceiling to catch it all.
Swagger Wagon – Toyota
The car crash Busta Rhymes advert atrocity was, in fact, a sequel. Yes, Swagger Wagon is the joke that keeps on giving. And by joke we mean mental torture. It features two parents rapping about minivans and family life – all the stuff parents would rather forget. “Where my mother-fathers at?” Drinking bleach, if they have half a brain.
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