Commercial makers are grabbing songs faster than ever before. Can’t quite remember the title of that oldie? Want to know who does that new techno funk dance groove track? Scott G is rather fond of some Web sites that help you out and let you help as well.

Commercial soundtracks are becoming a music preview service for consumers. The Verizon phone spots helpfully name the groups, but most often, commercials use the tunes without identifying the title or musical artist.

If you can’t quite remember the name of the Black Sabbath song in the Nissan truck commercial (“Iron Man”) or who is doing the cover version of Plastic Bertram’s “Ca Plane Pour Moi” in the Giant Pepsi Ball spot (Presidents of the United States of America), then you’ll have to start searching online.

Fortunately, help is on the way. There are sites dedicated to presenting this data.

That’s it, really. That’s my whole column this week.

Oh, except for the links:

http://Songtitle.info
They offer links to the songs on Amazon or MySpace and welcome updates, input and suggestions.

http://www.whatsthatcalled.com
Nice search function, although most recent posts are in the forum section rather than the main body of the site.

http://adtunes.com
Forum seems especially up-to-date. For example, they show that the Heineken replacement for the Pussycat Dolls’ “Don’t Cha” is “Beautiful” by Snoop Dogg featuring Pharrell.

As with a lot of lists and topic-specific forums, you can wind up spending a lot more time performing “research” than is good for your economic health.

[tags]songs in spots, ad music, wikis, consumer engagement[/tags]