Pilot was one of those pop rock bands from the 1970s that people remember for a few hit tracks, and one of them became a soft rock staple that got an interesting resurgence decades later.
The band released “Magic” in 1974, and it was considered their breakthrough on the charts after having initially formed a few years earlier. Released on their debut album, From the Album of the Same Name, the song was penned by 24-year-old David Paton and 21-year-old Billy Lyall.
“Magic” did the job of putting Pilot on the map for a while, as it landed at No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 11 in the UK. It had greater success in Canada, where it topped the charts, while making some waves in Europe. In an interview with HotDiscTV, Paton even admits they didn’t do any promotion in the U.S. due to poor management.
Grunge even ranks it in its Top 5 list of the best soft rock one-hit wonders. “Magic” is a feel-good song about waking up to sunrise, with Paton having revealed that the inspiration partially came from his wife.
“She just happened to say, ‘I’ve never been awake to see the daybreak,’ and it stuck with me,” he said. “I knew it was going to work with a little chorus that I had on my tape. I picked up my guitar and wrote the verse using her words.”
The track didn’t make Pilot millions or famous, but it did gain traction decades later, in the early 2000s. “Magic” was reimagined by singer Selena Gomez at the height of her fame with Disney Channel.
She converted the song into a pop-rock track that was used as a promotional single for the Disney Channel series, Wizards of Waverly Place. It landed on the Billboard Hot 100 chart at No. 61 and entered the charts in the UK and Canada. Her cover of the song was later used for the TV film, Wizards of Waverly Place: The Movie.
A decade later, “Magic” went through another resurgence, but for a drastically different reason. The pharmaceutical brand, Nova, began using the song for their Ozempic commercials. It’s an injectable drug used to treat Type 1 diabetes but gained popularity for its weight-loss effects. The song suddenly brought in royalties for Paton.
“I knew that Ozempic were using ‘Magic’ because the publishing was coming in, and my earnings were suddenly going up,” he said, according to Guitar Player. “Friends were phoning me and saying, ‘David, do you know your song’s being played every 20 minutes here in the states on TV?’”
Paton was asked to return to Abbey Road Studios to re-record the song with some lyric tweaks for Ozempic. Comically enough, the newfound popularity of the song led Paton to meet one of his idols, the Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson.
“One of Brian’s band members, guitarist Probyn Gregory, told me Brian loved my song and sang it all the time on their car journeys to their shows,” said Paton.
The Pilot frontman met with Wilson while they were in Glasgow and took a photo together. It became a moment that meant so much to Paton, and it was all thanks to “Magic.”
Related: 1967 Hit, Covered by a Future Oscar-Winner Heath Ledger, Is Still a Pop Culture Classic 50 Years Later
Hence then, the article about 1974 pilot song revived for a drug commercial named one of soft rock s best one hit wonders was published today ( ) and is available on Parade ( Saudi Arabia ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( 1974 Pilot Song, Revived For a Drug Commercial, Named One of Soft Rock’s Best One-Hit Wonders )
Also on site :
- NBC Extends ‘Line of Fire’ With Full-Season Pickup
- Jay-Z and his mother founded the Shawn Carter Foundation in 2003; its 20th-anniversary gala raised $20 million in one night
- In 2008, Celine Dion bought a lot on Florida’s Jupiter Island for $7 million; her water park mansion there sold 9 years later for $28 million