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Superscreen: The Best Radio Commercial Ever

by Russ Litten
10 September 2013 15 Comments

When the gaffer of Superscreen was unhappy with a radio jingle script, he wrote it himself and locked the staff in the office until midnight...

In the late 90’s, I worked as a copywriter at a radio station. The idea, back then, was to try and write stuff that was moving away from the accepted idea of a local radio ad – to avoid the clichés and cheesy crassness that (we were told) lost the station thousands of listeners. Instead, we were to make ads that were a bit less annoying and, hopefully, more bearable, if not likeable. That was the somewhat optimistic notion of the day. Of course, the repetitive nature of radio ad campaigns often kills that hope stone dead after about three days. No matter how well its written performed or produced, it’s ultimately going to get on people’s tits. It was my happy task to compose the jaunty jingles that, under the guise of informative entertainment, plagued the homes and workplaces of Humberside and beyond.

There were moments of grim hilarity to be had in the job, not least when the clients insisted on writing and making their own little personalized monsters of the airwaves. These advertisers all held certain beliefs in common: that an audience of potential consumers could best be wooed by 1) shouting at them and 2) pretending to be mentally ill. Hence, Mad Mike’s Tiles N’ Floors, Big John’s Big Car Superstore, Krazy Kolin’s Kastle Of Kunting Karpets, etc etc. Stick a microphone in front of the manager of a shoe shop in Grimsby and you got thirty terrifyingly frantic seconds of public self-delusion. And then they’d ring you up on the phone and complain their ad wasn’t loud enough.

The gaffer wrote the script, allocated the voice-overs, and directed them to within an inch of their lives. Legend has it that he did not let any of them go home until they had performed their parts to his satisfaction

Sometimes, though, you were gifted pure aural gold. Radio commercials you would want to play again and again and again. The best of this glorious bunch was undoubtedly SuperScreen, a large retail outlet in the Teesside area that sold TV’s and Videos.

The story goes that the gaffer of SuperScreen was not happy with the efforts of the local stations Creative Team. Their ads were not good enough. They had missed the brief. They didn’t make the right sort of impact. SuperScreen was not like any other TV and Video retail outlet, he reasoned. SuperScreen was massive! SuperScreen was the best! He wanted his ad to explode from the regions speakers and stick like glue on the minds and lips of his captive audience.

To demonstrate his point, he locked his entire staff into the office one Saturday night and made them all record a radio advert into a cassette recorder. The gaffer wrote the script, allocated the voice-overs, and directed them to within an inch of their lives. Legend has it that he did not let any of them go home until they had performed their parts to his satisfaction. I think they were there until midnight, on this industrial estate in Middlesbrough. Listening back now, fifteen years or so later, you can still hear the terror in their voices. No more words – listen to the greatest radio commercial in the world – SuperScreen!

“SUPERSCREEN!!” Worlds worst radio commercial? by samcoley

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image descriptionCOMMENTS

James Brown 9:37 am, 17-Jun-2011

"If... it's a.. TV.. that you want..." pure Mark E Smith

biff bifferson 10:23 am, 17-Jun-2011

belting stuff. commercial radio ads can be horribly effective though. from 30 years ago, off the top of my head (radio city) 7080080 when you need a cab just let us know call davy liver cabs its the boss here from great western carpets deacon goldrein green the solicitors who are close enough to help get down to goodison (efc ad) the widnes market, the widnes market,the widnes market has more to offer you

Johnny Daukes 10:29 am, 17-Jun-2011

Majestic, reminds me of Frank Sidebottom doing 'Shake 'n Vac'.

Dave Lee 10:58 am, 17-Jun-2011

Surely the inspiration for Vic and Bob's Geordie Jeans.

robin lee 12:38 pm, 17-Jun-2011

bizarre. why that music? Russ, seem to remember you telling me about an ad you heard where someone had over done it with sound affects. i got up this morning (yawn) got in my car (door slam) (engine stating) etc etc. still got it?

H. Flowers 4:39 pm, 17-Jun-2011

FREE PARKING.

Russ 6:07 pm, 17-Jun-2011

Why that music? Probably because it was a piece of cheap library music that everyone knows. They usually asked for "Simply The Best". Can't recall the ad you mean Bob. Could be one of 1,000's. Does it say "Open 7 days a week, including Sunday"?

David L 6:30 pm, 17-Jun-2011

Nice ad, almost gratuitously British, and like James said, it's got The Fall's influence all over it. But I'm afraid it's going to have to take second place to an ad I heard on my local station last week, with the breezy slogan "Gloucester Road Gearboxes: we don't just do gearboxes, and we're not on the Gloucester Road". Perfection.

robin lee 1:27 am, 18-Jun-2011

I've got an idea for an ad....'Carpets! Carpets! Carpets! Carpets! Don't bring a Van! Bring a Truck! Carcroft Brigg Thorparch and Hull!' Starksey and Hutch theme in the background. The punters will be on that like beans are on toast!

robin lee 1:30 am, 18-Jun-2011

hold on is that free parking, or free Parkin.... the cake?

Scotty 9:44 am, 18-Jun-2011

Agree with Bif - they can be earily effective. Spent a lot of last year in an office singing WE BUY ANY CAR. WE BUY ANY CAR. With the secretary looking up and saying DOT COM.

Simon Green 10:46 pm, 18-Jun-2011

There will only ever be one Big John from Karelia Cars. You knew it was the weekend when you heard that twat because he'd only pay for 3 days of advertising!

Mark Magrs 8:44 pm, 22-Jun-2011

Ha ha! I haven't heard this since 1998! I was in the studio when this was recorded (at Century Radio in Gateshead). My sound engineer and I had to bury our faces in the mixing desk as the superscreen staff (and various members of their family) went through take after take after take. Sadly, the management of Century Radio refused to let the ad go to air as originally recorded and it was re-voiced by professionals (including, if memory serves, Peter Dickson and Tony Aitken) who didn't try to sing the lyrics unfortunately. They still shouted 'free parking' at the end 'though!

ustuntman 4:46 am, 30-Jun-2011

Well it took me 1m09s to crack one off to that. The free parking pay-off was a nice surprise.

Mark Barber 11:31 am, 18-Jul-2011

This is one of the most played ads from the Radio Advertising Bureau archive. Sheer audio genius!

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