I want to rock and roll all night, and I don't have time to brew coffee.
December 22, 2014 9:20 AM   Subscribe

In 2000, Kiss frontman Paul Stanley (sans makeup) filmed a commercial for Folger's Instant Coffee. It never aired. Now you know why. [SLYT]
posted by Room 641-A (104 comments total) 20 users marked this as a favorite
 
Is it the lyrics? I can't really tell what he's singing but it looks like an ok commercial to me.
posted by I-baLL at 9:23 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Yeah, why? What's wrong with it?
posted by ethnomethodologist at 9:25 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


Now you know why.

Is it because the "ultra conservative parent company, Proctor and Gamble shelved out of concern regarding being associated with KISS."?

Because I never would have associated that commercial with KISS.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 9:25 AM on December 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


According to the Youtube video description, it was because "ultra conservative" Proctor and Gamble didn't want to be associated with KISS.

This sort of does remind me of Homer Simpson's "Mr Plow" commercial where Lisa asks him "Was that your commercial, Dad?" and Homer replies, "I don't know!"
posted by surazal at 9:26 AM on December 22, 2014 [11 favorites]


If you don't already know who Paul Stanley is (and also probably if you do), his presence in this commercial is just strange and off-putting. There's no reason in the commercial for this strange, dramatic man to being singing about/too those trapeze artists. It's kind of sad because you realize how little of a persona Paul has outside the Kiss brand - if he's not wearing the makeup, there's just no reason for him to be there.
posted by anazgnos at 9:27 AM on December 22, 2014 [12 favorites]


Folgers has always struck me as having the most depressing-if-true advertising slogan.
posted by Flashman at 9:28 AM on December 22, 2014 [44 favorites]


He should have gone with the make-up. It would have been less pretentious.
posted by Repack Rider at 9:28 AM on December 22, 2014 [8 favorites]


That's worth a deuce.
posted by davebush at 9:28 AM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


There's no reason in the commercial for this strange, dramatic man to being singing about/too those trapeze artists.

Well, yeah, but the trapeze artists have even less reason to be there. At least Paul's drinking the coffee!
posted by Sys Rq at 9:29 AM on December 22, 2014 [18 favorites]


Moments later, the trapeze failed, instantly crushing Mr. Stanley beneath two hundred pounds of combined acrobat. The P&G company replaced Mr. Stanley with a ghola from the axolotl tanks, the commercial spot was quietly buried and the story remained a carefully guarded secret... until now.

Merry Christmas.
posted by phooky at 9:30 AM on December 22, 2014 [28 favorites]


Also I think he was very busy writing The Room right about then.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 9:31 AM on December 22, 2014 [16 favorites]


Maybe it was because people would mistakenly think, based on his appearance and the quality of his singing, that it was David Copperfield?
posted by Flashman at 9:32 AM on December 22, 2014 [9 favorites]


So. What was that flamenco/Las-Vegas-magician-ta-da move at the end? I admit I was never much of a Kiss fan. Was that something he did on stage?
posted by a lungful of dragon at 9:32 AM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


That was simultaneously more weird and less weird than I was expecting, not quite sure how.
posted by poffin boffin at 9:32 AM on December 22, 2014 [22 favorites]


Well, if we're going to have a thread about unused Folgers commercials... Tolerate Mornings

I'm sorry
I'm not really sorry

posted by hippybear at 9:32 AM on December 22, 2014 [34 favorites]


> That has always struck me as the most depressing if true advertising slogans.

"You Gotta Eat!" made it sound like Checkers had a gun to the head of one of your loved ones.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:34 AM on December 22, 2014 [7 favorites]


It kind of sounds like he's saying, "limit, is the sky / hey world, watch me die"
posted by stinkfoot at 9:35 AM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


Was that something he did on stage?

Well, how do YOU mysteriously vanish from circus tents? You can't just stand there, you know.
posted by JoeZydeco at 9:36 AM on December 22, 2014 [12 favorites]


> So. What was that flamenco/Las-Vegas-magician-ta-da move at the end? I admit I was never much of a Kiss fan. Was that something he did on stage?

Kiss's music has always given me the impression that whoever writes their songs wishes, deep down, that they were writing Broadway musicals.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:36 AM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


There should have been four separate commercials released the same day, one for each member of the band.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:38 AM on December 22, 2014 [20 favorites]


For true classic Folger's excellence he should have had an awkwardly romantic conversation with his sister.
posted by poffin boffin at 9:40 AM on December 22, 2014 [18 favorites]


According to the Youtube video description, it was because "ultra conservative" Proctor and Gamble didn't want to be associated with KISS.

Riiiiight. I'll just bet that the advertising firm just went out and hired Paul Stanley on their own without P&G ever knowing and had nothing to do with the focus group spitting up their complementary coffee.
posted by dances with hamsters at 9:42 AM on December 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


That Checkers ad and slogan, despite its cheery appearance, is probably aimed at chronic drug addicts.
posted by Flashman at 9:42 AM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


I'm pretty sure KISS is best understood as the unlikely slamming together of An Irredeemable Dirtbag, David Copperfield, A Guy Who Had Nothing Better to Do, and a Guitarist.
posted by Navelgazer at 9:43 AM on December 22, 2014 [22 favorites]


This is your wake-up call,
time to reach, go for it all
Folgers stirs inside of me,
and I know what I can be.

Limit is the sky,
Hey world, watch me fly!

The best part of waking up,
is Folgers in your cup!


I'm guessing they cut it for some of the awkward meter and the confusion between first and second-person perspective. There is certainly nothing here that isn't 100 times better than fucking Rockapella.
posted by Think_Long at 9:43 AM on December 22, 2014




Do it, Rockapella!
posted by I-baLL at 9:45 AM on December 22, 2014


Kiss's music has always given me the impression that whoever writes their songs wishes, deep down, that they were writing Broadway musicals.

Peter Criss = Cowardly Lion
Ace Frehley = Tin Woodsman
Gene Simmons = Scarecrow
Paul Stanley = Dorothy
posted by Sys Rq at 9:47 AM on December 22, 2014 [18 favorites]


The only thing worse than Folger's in your cup is what those two girls got in theirs.
posted by jenkinsEar at 9:47 AM on December 22, 2014 [16 favorites]


If I saw that ad, I would have rushed out to buy some Folgers. Not.
posted by 724A at 9:50 AM on December 22, 2014


AWW RITE

HOWL YAW FEELIN TONITE

EVVY BODY FEELIN GUUUUUUUUUUUUD

ANYBODY HERE TONITE WHO LIKES TO GET HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

He's really only an appropriate spokesperson if you're selling ham-flavored coffee. Or cheese-flavored coffee.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 9:52 AM on December 22, 2014 [9 favorites]


DO YOU FOLKS LIKE COFFEE?

REAL COFFEE FROM THE HILLS OF COLOMBIA???
posted by edheil at 9:52 AM on December 22, 2014 [23 favorites]


OK, it's maudlin, ham-handed, and not representative of a coffee and chicory blend. But I can't see the supposedly obvious reason it didn't air. We see worse on air every day. And Mr. Stanley can sing MOR better than I would have given him credit previously.
posted by 3.2.3 at 9:56 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


Darn. I was really hoping the reason it never aired is because of what happens to trapeze artists if they haven't had their morning cup of joe.
posted by surplus at 9:57 AM on December 22, 2014


For some reason the commercial reminds me of this and this.
posted by duffell at 9:58 AM on December 22, 2014


He's really only an appropriate spokesperson if you're selling ham-flavored coffee.

Aren't many if not all of the members of Kiss actually Jewish?
posted by hippybear at 9:59 AM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


Hard (I guess) to verify but Tom Scharpling (previously) took credit for this on twtter. Seems plausible.
posted by creade at 10:01 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Here's the Kiss coffee commercial that I'd have liked to see:

FADE IN

EXT. SUBURBAN MANSION, DRIVEWAY -- DAWN

BMW 7-Series parked next to running motorcycle. A swarthy, tattooed bike gang member sat atop the bike. A visibly angry WIFE sends enraged shouts and hand gestures in PAUL STANLEY's direction. She jumps on the back of the bike and the pair ride off in a cloud of chopper sounds. A disheveled STANLEY walks back in the house.

INT. KITCHEN

STANLEY spoons out ground coffee into the machine. He runs water into a coffee pot and slides it home with a satisfying thunk. He sits down at the kitchen table, shaken and haggard, but patient.

Teenage DAUGHTER suddenly storms into the kitchen with visible track marks, shouts at DAD that she's off to start her porn career. SON trundles in stinking of beer, vomiting in the kitchen sink before leaving for the school bus waiting outside.

A dejected STANLEY looks into the camera, a lonely voice in an empty kitchen.

STANLEY

"I rocked and rolled all night long last night to support this family. This is no party."

STANLEY lifts mug to lips and sips. A pause. A vision of bliss comes across his visage. He jumps up with sudden energy and does a flamenco move.

STANLEY

"Ta-da!"

posted by a lungful of dragon at 10:01 AM on December 22, 2014 [16 favorites]


He's really only an appropriate spokesperson if you're selling ham-flavored coffee.

Aren't many if not all of the members of Kiss actually Jewish?


I'm assuming the Kiss-sponsored, ham-flavored coffee would be kosher.

I'm pretty sure that's the only time anybody has ever typed those words in that order. I'm pretty happy about it.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 10:04 AM on December 22, 2014 [17 favorites]


hippybear: "Aren't many if not all of the members of Kiss actually Jewish?"

Simmons and Stanley are Jewish; I don't believe Frehley or Criss are.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:10 AM on December 22, 2014


They aren't. I was just reading Stanley's autobiography. Poor guy has only one ear. He was teased in school about it, but it gave him an excuse to grow his hair long before everyone else.

/KISS fan
posted by jonmc at 10:12 AM on December 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


Conflict of interest, everyone knows that KISS stands for Knights in the Service of Sanka.
posted by 445supermag at 10:18 AM on December 22, 2014 [65 favorites]


Shouldn't that be Knights in Sanka's Service? Either way, I can't favourite that enough.
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:35 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


This is the greatest musical crossover since Dee Dee Ramone's Funky Man.
posted by Flunkie at 10:38 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


Fl-fl-fl-fl-fl-fl-fl-fl-FLUNKIE!
posted by Navelgazer at 10:41 AM on December 22, 2014


The original had Stanley drape a silk scarf over his face as he posed dramatically in a fan's breeze.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 10:47 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


I like rlap, and hlip hlop
posted by Flunkie at 10:47 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


If nothing else, it's easily the least noxious thing ever done by a member of Kiss.

Ever.
posted by rock swoon has no past at 10:49 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


They should have just had him extol the virtues of Folger's while lying in bed.
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:49 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


I wish mid -70s Judas Priest did a Folgers commercial in the style of Dreamer Deceiver.
posted by I-baLL at 10:52 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]




It references the youtube video description as the source.
posted by I-baLL at 10:55 AM on December 22, 2014


Well, it's still the funniest explanation. Can't that be enough?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:57 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


According to the Youtube video description, it was because "ultra conservative" Proctor and Gamble didn't want to be associated with KISS.

So Starchild is off limits, but unintentionally smoldering sexual tension between brother and sister is totally OK?
posted by zombieflanders at 10:57 AM on December 22, 2014 [12 favorites]


Came for the Folgercest mention, left satisfied.
posted by kmz at 10:58 AM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


the man of twists and turns: " Now you know why.

Is it because the "ultra conservative parent company, Proctor and Gamble shelved out of concern regarding being associated with KISS."?

Because I never would have associated that commercial with KISS.
"

Hhaaha... Growing up as a fundie xian, I remember the good times of being fed the Urban Legend, about P&G being run by Satanists...

Clearly Knights In Satan's Service was all part of the great indoctrination. Somebody must have done some real hardcore prayin' to get this satanic plot destroyed.
posted by symbioid at 10:59 AM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


I am no expert, but I'm pretty sure you shouldn't be able to feel coffee stirring inside you.
posted by running order squabble fest at 11:00 AM on December 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


He really should have done this in his classic stage banter style.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 11:02 AM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


I am no expert, but I'm pretty sure you shouldn't be able to feel coffee stirring inside you.

That's how you know it's time to poop.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:06 AM on December 22, 2014 [18 favorites]


There should have been four separate commercials released the same day, one for each member of the band.

And they should have mixed some actual BLOOD in with the Folgers.
posted by dirtdirt at 11:12 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


The only thing worse than Folger's in your cup is what those two girls got in theirs.

Chocolate pudding?
posted by slogger at 11:12 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Decaf. They had decaf in theirs.

(shudder)
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:13 AM on December 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


Oh fudge
posted by I-baLL at 11:19 AM on December 22, 2014


Someone with more discretionary time (in service of the greater good) needs to go through this and fill it with Folgers references.

For real - what's up with the mustard?
posted by dirtdirt at 11:20 AM on December 22, 2014


There should have been four separate commercials released the same day, one for each member of the band.

Ace Frehly' s commercial would be the only good one, then.
posted by KingEdRa at 11:26 AM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


I'm assuming the Kiss-sponsored, ham-flavored coffee would be kosher.

Metafilter, don't ever change.
posted by chavenet at 11:33 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Folger's should have followed the tried and true approach of getting a British person to pitch your instant coffee.
posted by Cash4Lead at 11:37 AM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Join The Coffee Achievers
posted by charlie don't surf at 11:38 AM on December 22, 2014


> He's really only an appropriate spokesperson if you're selling ham-flavored coffee.
> Simmons and Stanley are Jewish; I don't believe Frehley or Criss are.

If they're Mormon, we have a winning campaign on our hands.
posted by ardgedee at 11:39 AM on December 22, 2014


Yeah, why? What's wrong with it?

Could it have anything to do with the way we hear "Folgers in your cup" just as we see the explicit shot of the trapezist's perfect, clenched, naked-looking butt?

No, I guess not; they all have stuff like that -- but I liked the way they managed to make the reference to coffee's laxative properties simultaneously erotic.

And it hadn't occurred to me before to make the now in retrospect almost obvious connection between the white porcelain cup full of Folgers and another white, cup-shaped porcelain object full of another rich brown material, but I seem to have been way behind Folgers' advertising team -- the "best part of waking up" indeed!
posted by jamjam at 11:54 AM on December 22, 2014 [2 favorites]


The only thing worse than Folger's in your cup is what those two girls got in theirs.

Twice as much Folgers?
posted by a lungful of dragon at 12:00 PM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


Kiss's music has always given me the impression that whoever writes their songs wishes, deep down, that they were writing Broadway musicals.
Well, Paul did star in a production of The Phantom of the Opera in Toronto in 1999.
posted by Oriole Adams at 12:31 PM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


So Starchild is off limits, but unintentionally smoldering sexual tension between brother and sister is totally OK?

Not having seen that commercial, I was like "No way!"

Then I was like, "...Oh...way."
posted by Gelatin at 12:31 PM on December 22, 2014 [4 favorites]


The best part of that commercial was Paul Stanley's syllable-stressing choices. "The best...part...of WAKE-ing up..."

[magic gesture, VANISH]
posted by ignignokt at 12:40 PM on December 22, 2014


They should have just had him extol the virtues of Folger's while lying in bed.

Or hell, why not just get Lemmy: "When I'm out of bennies, there's nothing I like better than fresh Folger's crystals, crushed and snorted up my nose."
posted by ennui.bz at 12:41 PM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


Isn't he famous for his cringey/awkward stage banter? Show me some of that.
posted by sourwookie at 1:14 PM on December 22, 2014


If by "cringey/awkward" you mean awesome, then yeah.
posted by spilon at 1:16 PM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


So Starchild is off limits, but unintentionally smoldering sexual tension between brother and sister is totally OK?

HOLY SHIT!
posted by Navelgazer at 1:31 PM on December 22, 2014


Without the makeup he's generic hair metal guy, upstaged by clenching buttocks. Which is so Duran Duran.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 1:48 PM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


"Isn't he famous for his cringey/awkward stage banter? Show me some of that."

That was the subject of a recent FPP:

https://www.metafilter.com/145425/PEOPLE-LEMME-HEAR-YUH-LETS-SEE-SOME-HANDS-LETS-MAKE-SOME-NOISE

posted by I-baLL at 2:14 PM on December 22, 2014


That was a pretty good use of Paul Stanley.
posted by mazola at 2:37 PM on December 22, 2014


In case any of you are wondering about the creepy, incestuous Folgers commercial that others are referencing but didn't want to google "Folgers incest commercial", here, I jumped on that grenade for you.
posted by NoraReed at 2:38 PM on December 22, 2014 [5 favorites]


So *that's* how it is in their family.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 2:57 PM on December 22, 2014 [6 favorites]


The message is: "Parents, the smell of coffee gets you downstairs in the nick of time to keep your children from bare-backin' it on the kitchen island."
posted by Navelgazer at 2:59 PM on December 22, 2014 [16 favorites]


(As Don Draper would put it.)
posted by Navelgazer at 3:00 PM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


The worst part of waking up, however, is getting mauled by a Bengal tiger on center stage.
posted by Chitownfats at 3:07 PM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Navelgazer: "The message is: "Parents, the smell of coffee gets you downstairs in the nick of time to keep your children from bare-backin' it on the kitchen island.""

This is the third time in a week reading Metafilter that I've burst out laughing, quickly stifling my giggles when my 12 year old asks me what's so funny.
posted by double block and bleed at 3:54 PM on December 22, 2014 [3 favorites]


I came into this thread expecting a confusing and misguided commercial only to find it secretly replaced with folger's incest fanfic

What the hell people
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:37 PM on December 22, 2014 [12 favorites]


Ray Walston, Luck Dragon: "I came into this thread expecting a confusing and misguided commercial only to find it secretly replaced with folger's incest fanfic

What the hell people
"

My wife and I carpool. Once in a while, we'll get breakfast at the McDonald's drive-thru. At that particular McDonald's, there's no telling if we'll get everything we ordered, extra things that we didn't order or someone else's order entirely. My wife calls it "Breakfast Roulette".

Sometimes the same thing happens here to post subjects.
posted by double block and bleed at 4:47 PM on December 22, 2014


Well, if we're going to have a thread about unused Folgers commercials... Tolerate Mornings

I'm sorry
I'm not really sorry


I genuinely love that commercial had had the audio as my alarm for about a year.

posted by [insert clever name here] at 5:35 PM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


So. What was that flamenco/Las-Vegas-magician-ta-da move at the end? I admit I was never much of a Kiss fan. Was that something he did on stage?

Yeah, well, Paul's always been a bit...flamboyant. That move was actually pretty low key for him.
posted by MikeMc at 5:44 PM on December 22, 2014


Holy crap, this the first time I've seen that "Tolerate Morning" commercial. Are we sure that the creative team for those Folgers commercials aren't behind the current Adult Swim Infomercials? It would explain SO much.
posted by KingEdRa at 6:03 PM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Now if anyone can find the 'We've just replaced their usual coffee with sand and ground-up clamshells. Let's see if they notice.' ad, my day will be complete.
posted by bq at 7:03 PM on December 22, 2014


My favorite Paul Stanley moment is when he takes on a guy with a laser pointer.
posted by lester at 8:23 PM on December 22, 2014 [1 favorite]


Holy crap, thank you for making my day. I actually worked art department on that commercial (the hay bale Paul Stanley is standing next to in the last shot is mine). That was also one of the last commercials I worked on before I left production. I hadnt realised it never aired (a lot of the spots we worked on in Vancouver were for the U.S. market) but makes sense because whenever people ask me if I'd ever worked with anyone famous this was one of the few examples I would give. And invariably no one had ever seen the spot and the few times i searched for it on YouTube I couldn't find it. Guess I didn't try hard enough. I remember Paul Stanley being rather unfriendly. I also remember our VTR guy was a longtime KISS fan and was super excited. He had a KISS waste paper basket from when he was just a teenager. He cleaned it up and brought it to set one day for an autograph. I think he got the autograph.
posted by dismitree at 9:43 PM on December 22, 2014 [21 favorites]


" the few times i searched for it on YouTube I couldn't find it. Guess I didn't try hard enough."

Probably because the video was uploaded on the 21st of December.
posted by I-baLL at 9:48 PM on December 22, 2014


@i-baLL - yup saw that after I posted my comment. When I viewed video I saw the 100k+ views so assumed it had been up for some time.
posted by dismitree at 9:52 PM on December 22, 2014


Holy crap, this the first time I've seen that "Tolerate Morning" commercial.

I am so sorry.
(I'm not really sorry.)
posted by hippybear at 12:31 AM on December 23, 2014 [1 favorite]


Great googly moogly, I missed seeing in that Buzzfeed link that there's erotic fan fiction about that commercial. Because of course there is.

(I'd disagree, though, that the presence of erotic fan fiction is necessarily evidence of any subtext, because Rule 34.)
posted by Gelatin at 4:05 AM on December 23, 2014


That commercial, as poffin boffin notes, indeed is strange and not-so-strange at the same time. Even weirder to me is finding out that 50 years ago the Rolling Stones did a commercial for Rice Krispies.
posted by LeLiLo at 4:26 AM on December 23, 2014 [1 favorite]


I kept expecting him to take a sip of the coffee and then a pyro would go off, and he'd appear in his make up all "YEEEOW! That's good coffee!!" or somesuch, but it went full on white people to the very end. It's weird how something as relatively 'recent' as 2000 can feel like another world entirely, like, a brief snapshot at what "celebrity doing a commercial" looked like before internet culture 'happened'.
posted by Uther Bentrazor at 5:40 AM on December 23, 2014 [2 favorites]


That spot where Heart shills for the coffee industry (you know, around the time the US started to become crazy for coffee) was totally legit.
posted by clvrmnky at 5:42 AM on December 23, 2014


They also shelved the Peter Criss Folgers ad:

"...Beth, what can I brew? Beth, what can I brew?"
posted by Renoroc at 5:38 PM on December 23, 2014 [5 favorites]


Man, I remember some of the Folgers commercials getting remixed or mashed up in an *amazing* way, but I can't find them now.

It's not the "tolerate mornings" thing, though I do love its chorus: "You can sleep when you're dead."
posted by Pronoiac at 10:36 PM on January 3, 2015


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