UPDATE (11/20/15): Apple's Jimmy Iovine issued an apology following his statements he made yesterday on CBS This Morning. "We created Apple Music to make finding the right music easier for everyone — men and women, young and old. Our new ad focuses on women, which is why I answered the way I did, but of course the same applies equally for men. I could have chosen my words better, and I apologize." Host Gayle King insists that his comments were taken out of context. You can decide for yourself by watching the full interview.
This morning, Jimmy Iovine appeared on CBS This Morning alongside Mary J. Blige to speak on Apple Music's new ad campaign. Blige, Kerry Washington, and Taraji P. Henson star in a brand new Apple Music ad that CBS premiered. It's the second ad featuring the pop culture powerhouses, the first of which premiered during the Emmys.
Iovine, who currently heads up Apple Music, was asked by host Gayle King, “What was your thinking behind the story? What were you trying to tell?" Here's what Iovine said:
“Streaming is a technology…. What this is, is a music streaming service. What it does is sort of gives you 30 million songs, and it serves them up to you and makes it easy to find music. So I always knew that women find it very difficult at times—some women—to find music. And this helps makes it easier with playlists, but curated by real people. They’re not made by algorithms alone—they’re made by algorithms but with a human touch."
Blige went on to explain her real life friendships with Henson and Washington before Iovine elaborated on his creative concept behind the ad. "Girls are sitting around, you know, talking about boys. Or complaining about boys when they're heartbroken or whatever. They need music for that, right? So it’s hard to find the right music. Not everyone has the right list or...knows a DJ."
The ad spots themselves feature the three women dancing around to curated playlists and joking about how the service is comparable to an old boyfriend making them mixtapes. Yet something tells us that these powerful women in the entertainment industry require neither a man nor an algorithm to help them find new music.
