That Pure Moods Commercial From The '90s Is Even Weirder Than You Remember
If the words "Imagine a world where time drifts slowly" mean anything to you, then you were probably alive at some point in the 1990s — and you must have seen the ever-present commercial for Virgin Records' Pure Moods album on cable channels like Comedy Central or Cartoon Network. But looking back on the melange of images — and the album's odd song choices — one can't help but notice how strange the marketing for the album is.
Much of the commercial's imagery comes from the music video for Enigma's "Return to Innocence," which is shot entirely in reverse motion, with a few shots taken from Enya's "Orinoco Flow" and Enigma's "Sadeness (Part 1)" thrown in. But pretty pictures aside, how the track listing is sold raises an eyebrow.
The compilation record is an odd mixture of mainly instrumental tracks, with New Age vocal hits supplied by Enya and Enigma. The compilation cross-licenses a whole lot of TV and movie themes, causing Mike Oldfield's "Tubular Bells, Part 1" — from arguably the best horror movie of all time, "The Exorcist" — to share space with the theme songs for the television-changing "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me" and that of "The X-Files."
The commercial's sales pitch for this mix of odd bedfellows is delightful. "Set adrift with the timeless pleasures of Tubular Bells," its announcer intones. "And take a trip into the unknown with the X-Files theme."
Initially released in the United Kingdom in 1994, it was a big enough hit for the American commercial to brag it's "direct from Europe," and successful enough in the U.S. to spawn a whole cottage industry of albums.
Pure Moods inspired a cottage industry of compilation albums
Even though the notion of chilling out to the theme of "The Exorcist" may sound absurd, "Pure Moods" became such a big hit worldwide, selling over 2 million copies – that's a whole lot of sequel volumes hit the market. There were four more "Pure Moods" compilations released from the late 1990s into the early 2000s, including tracks by artists as varied as Sarah McLachlan and Yanni.
On top of that, Virgin Records created "Celtic Moods," which concentrates on Irish pop, new age, and folk music, "Gregorian Moods," which took advantage of the mid-90s vogue for Gregorian chanting, "Christmas Moods," which gives listeners synth-heavy takes on holiday classics, and the self-explanatory "Instrumental Moods."
Other collections were unique via their eclectic track listings. "Cinema Moods" combined excerpts from movies as wildly varied as "Platoon" — one of the best Vietnam War movies of all time – and "Cinema Paradiso." "Romantic Moods" is comprised entirely of jazz tunes instead of licensed tracks and is meant to set a romantic mood for dates. "Scottish Moods" is the only album in the entire series to be comprised of music from a single artist — The Munroes.
The whole series ended with 2004's "Pure Moods: Celestial Celebration." It took the compilation's history back to basics and combined tracks such as Dido's pop smash "Here With Me" and has songs from series mainstays Massive Attack, Sarah Brightman, and Eva Cassidy. It was the perfect way for the long-running series to go out, and left an impression as strong as the legendary '90s commercial did.