Wednesday, November 22, 2006

"I got goose bumps and then punched myself in the face."

No one can say that Mr. Chandler didn't "bring it" in his performance, at times pointing his index finger skyward, hand over heart, and caressing the microphone with both hands. "And we've got Bank One on the run. What's in your wallet? It's not Capital One. It's us...so which card are you?" he sang passionately, wearing a tie and conference name tag. "And we'll make lots of money. Forever I can sing about trusting and teamwork and doing the right thing. We'll live out our core values, while the competition crawls."

A corporate video of the performance was leaked to YouTube and replicated on servers as far as New Zealand. Public response was uncharitable. Many noted that Mr. Chandler, who has had some musical success, could really sing. But more found it hard to watch. "Goodness, that had a car crash quality to it," wrote one viewer. Words like "awkward" and "painful" came to mind. Someone proclaimed they had to watch the video through their fingers and others theorized that this must have been a veiled marketing campaign, if not a joke. "I got goose bumps and then punched myself in the face," one person wrote.

From Jared Sandberg’s CareerJournal article about a corporate video featuring some employees singing about the merger of Bank of America and MBNA.

I made a conscious decision not to post the video. It was too painful.

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