Where There's Life, There's Beer - and Music

These days, the big beer brands sell mainly via ads that punctuate the televised exploits of professional athletes. But sixty years ago, easy listening music was part of the marketing mix, as this 1960 LP demonstrates.

It represents a promotional tie-in between Anheuser-Busch, brewers of Budweiser beer, and RCA Victor, purveyors of vinyl records. The LP is titled Where There's Life..., which happened to be the first part of Budweiser's tag line, "Where There's Life, There's Bud." And the awkwardly posed model seems to be eagerly anticipating the frothy Budweiser being offered. Either that or the off-camera male has no pants on. It's hard to tell, no pun intended.

Magazine ad

Other than the label on the bottle, there is no other mention of Budweiser or Anheuser-Busch on the album. Even so, the brewery went all out in support of the LP. Billboard reported that it pushed out 40,000 display cards, 12,000 streamers and 4,000 coasters, plus it sprung for a big ad buy in the major magazines of the time, with all items featuring the album art. There even was a promotional single.

But what of the music, you may ask, this being a music blog and all. There is a melodic tie-in as well - the first song is "Where There's Life," which turns out to be (no surprise here) a glamorized version of the then-current Bud jingle. All the other tunes have "life" in the title as well.

The proceedings were under the direction of Russ David, who it turns out, wrote the Bud jingle back in 1956 with arranger-conductor George Cates, Lawrence Welk's music director and a mainstay of the Coral catalog. Cates recorded "Where There's Life" first, on a 1957 Coral single that went nowhere, probably because it didn't benefit from 40,000 display cards, etc. George is nowhere in evidence on the LP, and his name is spelled "Catz" on the songwriter credits. I've included Cates' single in the download.

Russ David as radio personality

David did not have a national presence - this is his only LP, as far as I can tell - but he was well known in St. Louis, the home of Anheuser-Busch, where he had radio and television shows and where he led a band. I get the sense that he also did other work for A-B through the years.

The record is a credible affair, with David doing a Gordon Jenkins-style single-note solo over the opening of "Where There's Life," accompanied by accordion, followed by clarinet, tenor sax and trombone. It's all very pleasant, even if several years out of style in 1960.

On other songs, David brings in a vocal group and a terrific female soloist, who remains unnamed. I wish I knew who it is - I first thought it might be Jamie Silvia of the J's with Jamie, but comparisons suggest that it is not her. The vocalist is particularly good in her "Give Me the Simple Life" solo spot, but then I am partial to that Rube Bloom-Harry Ruby composition. Less effective is the male vocal chorus on "There's a Lull in My Life," which has a peculiar robotic quality.

Cover of 1957 promo

As I mentioned, the Budweiser jingle dated back to 1956. I've included a Bud promotional record from 1957, with seven ads in different musical styles. The first one, to my ears, features the same female vocalist as on the Russ David record. Also included are a waltz, a Dixieland arrangement, a Glenn Miller-style rendition, and a lounge version a la Jackie Gleason's records with Bobby Hackett on solo trumpet. (The latter arrangement is  reminiscent of Gordon Jenkins' style. David was apparently a fan - I am assuming David did these charts.) No rock 'n' roll on the LP or the promo record, though. Bud was not aiming to be up-to-date or hip at the time.

The LP is my transfer; the other items are courtesy of the web although remastered by me. RCA's sound is very good, although lushly reverberant in the style of the times.

This post is a result of a discussion that I had with my pal Ernie not long ago, where we differed on which RCA record had a beer on the cover. I opted for this one, although I said it was by Larry David, while acknowledging that couldn't be right. Ernie claimed it was a Boston Pops record. It turns out we were both right - there is a two-LP Pops set, "Everything But the Beer," that has two Anheuser-Busch beer steins on the cover. I have that album as well.

To go back to the Where There's Life cover, it is an example of the "Droste effect," that is, a picture within a picture of itself. It's not perfectly executed, though.

If you want more beer music - and who doesn't - a decade ago I uploaded a Schlitz promotional record with Nelson Riddle at the helm and featuring Jamie Silvia on vocals. Riddle turned the Schlitz jingle "The Real Joy of Good Living" into "The Joy of Living," the title tune of a 1959 LP. So the Milwaukee brewer or its ad agency had the idea first. The Riddle record is still available if you haven't had enough brew for the evening.