Pat McMinn: Geddes Dental Renovations advertisement (1949)

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Pat McMinn: Geddes Dental Renovations advertisement (1949)

It's an odd but understandable thing that advertising jingles can often make as much, if not more, impact on our consciousness than serious music.

The reason is perhaps simple: they are short, catchy and you hear them a lot.

Few if any advertising jingles in New Zealand were heard more than this one by Pat McMinn whose other claim to fame was the song Opo The Crazy Dolphin which was written by jazz pianist Crombie Murdoch in 1956.

But this ad played on radio for as long as I can remember. It was certainly still being played in the Eighties but according to Chris Bourke here, all the pianist Nancie Harrie, male singer Lee Humphries and McMinn got was two guineas apiece (two pounds and two shillings).

The catchy ad lives on -- it nags like a toothache actually -- but Geddes has been long gone.

Last I looked it was a barber shop.

"Need a haircut, need a haircut, woe is me what shall I do . . ." 

For more oddities, one-offs or songs with an interesting backstory check the massive back-catalogue at From the Vaults.

 

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