Musings on the Most Ridiculous Band I Can't Stop Listening To

Sponsorship Has Its Privileges

bobby old happy beard
TELEPHONE NOISE.

TELEPHONE NOISE.

“Weir here.”

“Hey, Bobby. It’s Thaddeus Americanexpress. How are you?”

“Well, you know: fine. Okay. Um. Who is this?”

“Thaddeus Americanexpress. I own the credit card company.”

“Ah. I didn’t know it was a family corporation.”

“It isn’t: just a coincidence.”

“How’d you get this number? I’ve got, like, nine or ten people you have to talk to before I get involved.”

“Bobby, you’ve been a Cardmember® since 1971. We have all of your phone numbers. I see you’ve recently upgraded to from Black to Uncolored.”

“Yeah, about that: there’s a small problem with the card.”

“Every time you look at it, you get violently ill?

“That’s it, yeah.”

“That’s because the card isn’t uncolored in the sense that you can;t tell what color it is, it’s actually has no color. The object does not exist in the spectrum, but you can feel it in your hand and your brain refuses to process this and then you projectile vomit. The human psyche has a fine-tuned radar for things that shouldn’t exist; this card should not.”

“So why did you send it to me?”

“To demonstrate how Valued a Customer you are.”

“Did you just capitalize those words with your voice?”

“Business school trick.”

“Sure.”

“So, anyhoo, Bobbarino: while I got ya, I wanted to run some ideas by you for the free show.”

“Yeah, y’know I think it’s great that we’re gonna be tasteful and low-key about the sponsorship thing.”

“Right, me too. But what if we weren’t? Like, at all? Wouldn’t that be fun and rock ‘n’ roll, too?”

“Um.”

“All I’m saying is: let’s explore the possibility of slathering every surface with our logo and doing a commercial or two from the stage and…how long does it take you to write a song?”

“About a decade.”

“Okay, so maybe we can’t have a new song, but how about a little lyrical rewrite of one of the old ones? About how great American Express is, or how shitty Visa is. Either one is fine.”

“I would be uncomfortable with that.”

“Okay, okay. You artist types! Let’s talk about the banner. I had a great idea: let’s tie-dye it! Won’t that add value for your customers!”

“Deadheads. They’re not customers.”

“Right, right. ‘Deadheads.’ I love that: that’s branding and I fucking love it. Really coalescing a vibrant and engaged client-base. Such great messaging.”

“When you say ‘banner,’ what are you talking about? How big?”

“American flag outside a car dealership.”

“Absolutely not.”

“We’re going to tie-dye it!”

“No.”

“Fine.”

“Nothing onstage.”

“All right, all right. How many times do you want to talk about American Express?”

“What?”

“Well, we’re footing the bill, so we figured it would only be polite for you to thank us. And we’d like you to do it from the stage. And we’d like to write the thank you’s. And we would like to to thank us in between every song.”

“I’d like to do the opposite of that.”

“Counter-offer: you sing our praises between every song in the first set, then in the second set just once, but you tell a long story about how Amex funds orphanages.”

“Do you fund orphanages?”

“Fuck, no. No money in orphans these days.”

“This is the part of the movie where the hero realizes what kind of people he’s gone into business with, right?”

“Pretty much, Bob.”

“Ah.”

21 Comments

  1. tor_haxson

    Is there any card a man would rather use.
    When you charge some liquor sent up to your room.
    Running out of cash, keep a close tab on your bills.
    Cause Amex gold is all you need today yay..

    • Mike & Gloria Gonna Be My Name

      Ha! Amexicali Blues

    • SpamJam

      10/10, would read in Bob’s voice again

  2. Boogaloo

    Its almost time for a Sellin’ Out to Da Man sandwich punch card to keep track of all this bumblefuckery.
    After 10 punches, you’d get your choice of either some reversible Stealie knee-pads or a set of Wake of the Flood Mudflaps.

  3. tor_haxson

    She comes from a town where they call her the woodcutter’s daughter
    And she’d go the bank to get cash but she’d rather not bother
    So she carries a card that’s respected and honored all over
    Use the card, Use the card, all the time..

    • Mike & Gloria Gonna Be My Name

      Credit Grow!

  4. Bonnie Lass of Fenario

    She’s got everything financial
    She can help me pay for weed
    A platinum card in the summer night moonlight
    Useful in the sunlight yes indeed

    Sometimes when the bank is crying
    When the balance is halfway down
    Sometimes when the cash is dying
    I take it out and I flash it round
    I flash it round

    (inspired by TOR!!!)

  5. maggiemay

    I want this post on my tombstone if I die

    • Bonnie Lass of Fenario

      DON’T DIE

      • maggiemay

        IDK I MIGHT BUT PROBZ NOT

  6. Bonnie Lass of Fenario

    We just wrote half of Weird Al’s next album.

    • Mike & Gloria Gonna Be My Name

      Weir’d Al!

  7. tor_haxson

    Gone are the days when you’d take cash to town.
    Open your wallet and lay those bills down.
    Gone are the days when you had privacy
    Every single purchase now is made ‘lectronically.

    Amex Gold and Identity Thieves
    Takin our lives leaving nothing thats green.
    Shout all you want but they’re to big to fail,
    And it looks like the bankers got us now.

    1920’s well they owned us then,
    After the Crash then they did it again.
    2008 took us all back around.
    Stepped on our heads drove them into the ground.

    Amex Gold and Identity Thieves
    Takin our lives leaving nothing thats green.
    Shout all you want but they’re to big to fail,
    And it looks like the bankers got us now.

    Daddy made whiskey and he made it well
    Didn’t take paypal, or bitcoin from hell
    Once a youngster tried to pay with a card
    I held him down while we feather’d and tarr’d

    Amex Gold and Identity Thieves
    Takin our lives leaving nothing thats green.
    Shout all you want but they’re to big to fail,
    And it looks like the bankers got us now.

    • spencer

      Awesome!!

  8. Chadb

    …I took that gold, and I left his dead ass there by the side of the road.

  9. ste4ve

    “Good communication has just a little to do with eloquence. It’s character that makes it more successful. Harsh words nicely articulated are sharp enough to kill your brand!” ― Israelmore Ayivor

    (I dunno, I beg to differ. Eloquence, like neatness, might not count, but it helps. Sometimes a lot. In fact, sometimes I’ll take eloquence and fuck the communication. Which is to say: the eloquent entry/comments above is now posted to my illustrious FB page, so the world can see it and exactly five of my “friends” can “get it.” I don’t really know the other 368 “friends,” anyway. And the point of this is killing the brand. Whose brand is getting killed: the Dead’s or Amex’s? And does anyone in this whole hot mess have any character?

    p.s. Quote above filched from the “Great Hand Book of Quotes.” Is it research, or just stealing, to use a “Hand Book of Quotes”?

    p.s.s. Is “Israelmore Ayivor” a great name, or what?)

    p.s.s.s. Better name: “The Great Hand (Job) Book of Quotes.”

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