That famous ad man David Ogilvy said a billboard should contain not more than seven words.
Oscar Powell runs a record label and is also a recording artist. He wanted to use a vocal sample on his song Insomniac from Steve Albini, a singer/songwriter, music journalist and a recording engineer of some renown. So he emailed Steve to ask permission.
Steve emailed back a rant about how much he hated Powell’s music genre but added, ‘do whatever you like’.
And in an inspired piece of promotion, Powell reproduced the whole email on a billboard.
It did not catapult Insomniac to the Billboard HOT 100. Here is the song. Draw your own conclusions.