What's That Song in Apple's 'What Is iPad?' Commercial?

'Gold Lion,' by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Ah, the iPad -- the magical tablet that conjures enough recently deemed essential iApparitions to make your head spin faster than this commercial's synth-swooshing and thumping soundtrack. The song starts off as a simple riff and then builds to something familiar, something recent. Something like 'Gold Lion,' the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' first single from 2006's 'Show Your Bones' album. The energy mounts during this art-punk tune as the commercial flaunts screen shot after screen shot, cut to the beat of the song. But something's off.

The difference between the actual track and the version used to charm YYY-heads into Mac fandom is obvious: iPad's 'Gold Lion' is stripped of its vocals. Even sans Karen O's siren-esque caw-caw, the instrumental track builds as the narrator ups the enthusiasm in his serenade on the iPad's advertised niftiness.

iPad users, cropped into anonymity, finger-tap the gadget to bring up apps, one of which just happens to be a movie player. And the movie just happens to be 'Where the Wild Things Are' -- directed by Karen O's ex-beau Spike Jonze and for which she recorded a soundtrack. And, of course, there happens to be an app for that.

'Gold Lion' might have been named after Karen O and Jonze's earlier commercial endeavor's success at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, in which their collaborative Adidas 'Hello Tomorrow' commercial won -- you guessed it -- two Gold Lions. Or not. But if it was, that's one merry triangle of cross-promotion. Though Yeah Yeah Yeahs fans would likely rather see their shiny-clad lead singer belt it out in the official 'Gold Lion' music video, getting the band's fans to tap their fingers to a familiar tune might just be what Apple had in mind.

'Gold Lion' has previously been used in a Yves Saint Laurent's Elle perfume commercial to give low-cut-jacketed supermodel Coco Rocha some rocker girl cred, but the music plug was decidedly less subtle.

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