Blue Friday: Whispers and Stories

It's ten years since I first tried, and failed, to write a blog post about this song, but I was reminded of it after reading some of Rol's recent posts featuring Lori McKenna (here and here) - not musically but thematically. Let's wind the clock back to 2012, then, and imagine we're watching ITV. There's a good chance that, at some point in the proceedings, this advert for the VW Polo would come up:

It has a lovely soundtrack, doesn't it? And a heart-tugging refrain, almost guaranteed to get something in the eye of every dad in the northern hemisphere...

...but at the time, there was a little bit of a controversy. It seems that VW had tried, and failed, to license this track for their ad, Take Care by Beach House:

Having failed, VW did whatever any corporate giant would do and went off to commission a creative agency to produce a soundalike, theme-alike track. The creative agency in question was Sniffy Dog and the track they came up with was Whispers and Stories - it's the 90 second track you can hear in the ad at the top of the page. And here's the thing: whilst I like both tracks, it's the Sniffy Dog song that I like best. I know, I know, it is contrived, a deliberate emulation, born of a corporate exercise rather than an emotional and creative spark... but I borderline love it, and not just because it gets something in my eye.

Here's a longer version that I found on YouTube - I don't know if it's a genuine Sniffy Dog longer version, or even if such a version exists, or whether it's just the creation of an enterprising YouTuber who noted a gap in the market for a longer version. Somehow, given the nature of how the Sniffy Dog track came to be, I guess it doesn't really matter. Here you go: prepare for pre-meditated but nonetheless effective bittersweet sadness.