10 great moments when 'Mad Men' got its '60s pop on
With the penultimate episode of AMC's "Mad Men" airing tonight, you are going to see a lot of lists about the best Mad Men moments, of which there are many musical ones. Throughout its seven seasons, the series has shown more imagination in its use of licensed music than any other show in recent memory, with "Mad Men" creator Matthew Weiner framing the action like director Martin Scorsese does in his best work.
But since the show is holding a mirror to '60s pop culture, we thought there should be a list of the times where pop stars and hit songs of the day somehow figured into the actual plot line. And lo and behold, there were 10 of them!
1. Season 1, Episode 8
"The Hobo Code"
In this memorable episode, the office of Sterling Cooper goes out, gets drunk and does "The Twist." As Chubby Checker himself might say – "EEEE-YAAA!" Pete Campbell is the only one not falling under the spell of this aphrodisiac dance craze, telling his former secret office shag Peggy Olsen, "I don't like seeing you like this!" In another part of the world, Pete Campbell might have also insisted she also wear a burka.
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2. Season 1, Episode 8
"The Hobo Code"
That same episode, Don Draper goes to the Greenwich Village apartment of his bohemian mistress Midge but doesn't expect to find a beatnik blowout already underway. He wanted to surprise her with plane tickets to Paris. She has an alternate flight pattern. "We're gonna get high and listen to Miles!," she coos. They put on "Sketches of Spain" (released July, 1960) and forget all about Paris. Then Don and some dude in a fez get into an argument about toothpaste. Hey, just like married couples! Try "toothpaste doesn't solve anything" on your spouse.
3. Season 2, episode 11
"The Jet Set"
Closing out Season 1 with Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" was a harbinger of things to come when we leap to 1962. Apparently Albert Grossman's hype machine is in full gear since even twistin' Peggy Olsen, a gal who lives in her work cubicle like some sheltered veal, has heard of Dylan. Maybe she heard "Pretty Peggy-O" on his debut and took it personally. When her European co-worker Kurt says he saw Dylan at Carnegie Hall, she asks him if Dylan sounds like the records, as if they might've used some primitive form of Auto-Tune that could make him sound like Bobby Vinton. We learn a lot more about Kurt later on when he comes out of the closet to his male co-workers with all the afterthought of a guy sharpening a pencil. Although we hear no Dylan song in this episode, in the background there's a news report about the riots in Oxford Town that will be the subject of a Dylan song in 1963. All we learn about Dylan from Kurt is that the spokesman for a generation is always late for his shows. That gives Kurt some extra time to not put any moves on Peggy. Here's what Dylan would've sounded like if they saw him at the Gaslight in 1962.
4. Season 4, Episode 10
"Hands and Knees"
Don scores tickets to the Beatles' Shea Stadium show for Sally's birthday, as delivered to him by his then-secretary Megan. Yet when he stares at her through the open door in his office, it is a muzak version of "Do You Want to Know a Secret" that he hears. With Hawaiian guitars! This inability to process Beatles music will presumably continue when he attends the concert and cannot hear a single note they are playing.
5. Season 5, Episode 3
"Tea Leaves"
Don and Media Department head Harry Crane go to Forest Hills Tennis Stadiums Music Festival on July 2, 1966 to try to get the Rolling Stones to sing a jingle, like they did for this U.K. Rice Krispies commercial in 1964. It's hard to imagine the Stones at the height of "Paint It Black" doing something so innocuous as singing "Heinz, Heinz, Heinz is on my side." Oh, if they'd only asked the Who to sell out for baked beans! While the generation gap between Don and the teenage girls is understandable, the fact that the younger Harry Crane can't tell the difference between the British pop phenomenon and the American one-hit wonders he winds up signing to The Trade Winds ("New York's a Lonely Town") is inexcusable. Here are the snap, cracklin', poppin' Stones and the snowbound Trade Winds for comparison's sake.
6. Season 5, Episode 6
"Far Away Places"
At a party thrown by Jane's psychoanalyst, Roger and Jane drop acid to the strains of "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times" from "Pet Sounds" – on reel-to-reel, no less! With all this added clarity, Roger has a revelation and winds up getting an immediate divorce from Jane, although he's more "Wouldn't It Be Nice" than "Caroline No" about the uncoupling than she is. Word of warning: When dropping acid, try not to see a picture of Ted Knight with two-tone hair.
7. Season 5, Episode 6
"Far Away Places"
Megan: "I thought you hated that song?"
Don: "It's stuck in my head."
In a flashback to happier times with Megan, Don recalls driving back from Disneyland with the kids in the back seat, whom he lulls to sleep. How? By whistling the song he allegedly hates, "I Want to Hold Your Hand" so it winds up sounding like an Old Spice commercial. What else could you expect from an ad man?
8. Season 5, Episode 7
"At the Codfish Ball"
Creepy neighborhood kid Glenn Bishop is on the phone from boarding school, asking Sally "Did you go get the Spoonful album?" With Glen, everything is down to appearances, like pretending he has a girlfriend when he's on the phone with Sally, whom he views as a kid sister, and being too cool to call them the Lovin' Spoonful. "Summer in the City" is No. 1 in August of 1966 (Sally says, "It's on the radio all the time.").
"Hums of the Lovin' Spoonful," their best long player, is released that month. At the end of the episode, Glen asks Sally how the city was, and she tells him "dirty." But not gritty. Like the back of John Sebastian's neck.
9. Season 5, Episode 8
"Lady Lazarus"
Much of the episode is about the difficulty of licensing the Beatles' music for commercials, even as far back as 1966. The Chevalier Blanc commercial in question is going with an out-of-date "Hard Day's Night" concept which is light years behind the Beatles music Megan recommends Don listen to. Midway through, he lifts the needle off "Tomorrow Never Knows," which was licensed by the show at a cost of $250,000. Maintaining the firm's belief that there are hundreds of bands that sound like the Beatles, they substitute the Fab Four with the Wedgewoods who sing "September in the Rain," one of 15 songs the Beatles performed at their failed 1962 audition for Decca Records. If they had waited two months, they could have had the Monkees.
10. Season 7, Episode 1
"The Strategy"
At an intensive all-night session at the agency brainstorming for Burger Chef, Peggy breaks down that her life is one big nothing, as she does whenever the talk turns to family and children. When Don gives her a pep talk that she hasn't wasted her life pursuing a career, Frank Sinatra's rendition of "My Way" comes on the radio. "You think that's a coincidence?" Don asks her as they slow-dance in the office. Thank goodness it was 1969 and another Paul Anka-penned song was four years from being written. Because hearing "You're Having My Baby" would've killed her.