4.5 million YouTube hits from a funny, get-even song

Sons of Maxwell make it big with fun song on YouTube

Story from Bob Lefsetz – This is one of my favourite stories which keeps getting better with time. Dave Carroll from the Sons of Maxwell, a Halifax NS band nobody knew, had his Taylor Guitar broken by United Airlines.

When we covered in back on July 8th, 2009, only 35.000 people had watched it. Lose your luggage? Sons of Maxwell have the song. I can’t remember who sent me the story, maybe Bob Lefsetz, but we posted it. The video is fun. The story is authentic.

In Halifax that weekend at the Paul McCartney concert, I read in the Halifax Chronicle Herald that United had capitulated and given Dave a $3,000 cheque. Dave donated that to charity. He already got three new guitars from Taylor Guitars for the publicity and their phone was ringing off the wall.

“Dave, when can Sons of Maxwell play in our town?”

United has offered Dave compensation for his guitar and he refused, requesting that United give the money to charity (United is donating $3,000 to the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz). And he is going ahead with the other two songs of his promised United trilogy.

In the end, he is going to come out way ahead. Taylor guitars has offered him some new guitars, other airlines are offering seats, and he and his band now have tremendous publicity. Shotgunconcepts

Good luck to them.

Note they planned this well and excuted with style. The United event occurred in March 2008. The song and video are very professionally done.

If you want to get even this way, it might cost a little for production – or not. Sometimes creativity and a cheap video camera are all you need.

Here is Dave Carroll’s update on their exploits.

Hey Bob:

First of all I have to say I’m a fan of your news letter. Terrific insights as to where the business of music is heading. I recieved email from a couple of friends who heard about my video United Breaks Guitars from YOUR newsletter even after I had released the news to them myself which I find kind of humorous. As of right now the video has been hit more than 4.5 million times in 3 weeks and I’ve experienced the chaos of being thrown into a media frenzy. To those people who suggest the web carries no ability to lift or launch a career, I simply say: WRONG!

United Breaks Guitars is a quirky Country song that was topical, catchy and unlike most of the songs I’ve written but it has drawn hundreds of thousands of people to my site and introduced them to my other music. My cd sales and performance fee have spiked and I’m receiving offers to work around the world. United may have broken my guitar but YouTube broke my career!

Cheers, Dave

(Dave Carroll/Sons Of Maxwell)