For many artists having their music appear on TV shows and movies can provide a big boost interms of getting new fans and awareness. There are so man ways to get into new music nowadays: music streaming platforms, YouTube, as well as musical guest spots on talk shows and variety shows like Jools Holland. For some bands exposure on popular TV shows can do a lot to bolster the bands image. Case and point: Death Cab for Cutie on mid-noughties teen show The OC. Death Cab's music didn't just soundtrack some of the shows more sombre moments, it actually created a way for the band to appear themseleves through the show's fictional venue The Bait Shop. Many American bands appeared in the show through this platform, like The Walkmen, Modest Mouse, and even The Killers at the height of their Hot Fuss fame. Death Cab had a special position as the favourite band of the show's breakout character Seth Cohen.
At the time I thought that when bands I loved appearing in media like this was a good thing, but now I'm not so sure. It's still a garunteed boost for the band in question, and if they appear in the guise of a live performance then the songs can be sampled in a way that promotes them: like Death Cab's performance of Title and Registration, and Sound of Settling. Yet for a fan there's a down side. When a song is used outside of this fake live setting it has to be used carefully. The standard practice of music supervisors is to not only find a song that suites the moment in which it will be place, but to also cut the song down. After all using a full version of a song only really works if you're doing a monatge. The tricky part is to cut down a song in the right way, which in itself is subjective. This is where my attitude to the endevaour has changed as too many times have I heard songs from my favourite bands cannablized for an emotional punch. If it's done wrong then it not only informs your enjoyment, or lack thereof, the song, it can also take you out of the moment it's sound-traking.
Don't get me wrong, sometimes it can work like gangbusters: I've still not seen a TV show, or movie, that has misused Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart, but when it's done wrong it undermines the band, the song, and whoever is using it.
