I need something like this: How are the songs chosen for the March Madness theme song?

Aside from the slightly warmer temperatures, nothing signals the arrival of spring quite like March Madness, the annual postseason college basketball tournament where 68 schools compete for a spot in the Final Four. The eight-note orchestral chorus of the NCAA tournament is instantly recognizable, even to the casual sports fan, who only fills out a chart because someone in his office pushed him to join a professional pool at the last second.

But while the catchy melody – as well as the song sung by Luther Vandross “A Brilliant Moment” which is played over a tournament-ending montage shortly after the final buzzer of the championship game — is still the event’s de facto theme, you might be wondering why you’ve been hearing U2’s new single “American Soul” so often throughout March Madness this year. Playing at the beginning of every CBS and Turner Sports tournament broadcast, in and out of many commercial breaks, and even occasionally in the commercials themselves, Bono & co.’s guitar-driven rocker featuring Kendrick Lamar and “Vertigo” was chosen as the 2018 March Madness secondary theme. Songs of experience The track was accompanied by a video shoot on a barge on the Hudson River with the Statue of Liberty in the background.

The performance videofilmed moments after the Irish band’s concert Grammy Awards Performance In the same spot is the latest in a series of NCAA tournament theme songs that began in 2011 following a $10.8 billion deal between CBS Sports and Turner Sports for the rights to broadcast every tournament game. Craig Barry, chief content officer and executive vice president of Turner Sports, helped pioneer what he calls “full music integration,” the idea that music and sports can be combined not just for the broadcast itself, but for the entire commercial campaign.

“One of our core philosophies, especially at Turner Sports, is to create a boundary between sports and pop culture,” Barry says. “You put yourself in a mindset where you think about your audience, your event, the song, how that song interacts with the aesthetic of the action footage — and you look for something that ultimately adds that extra dimension to the viewing experience of the event. We think music is part of that connective tissue that connects casual fans to entertain them while we do our shows.”

Finding the perfect song is of paramount importance to networks that cover March Madness and other sporting events. Several factors go into choosing the best song for the tournament, as many songs from all genres are considered each year.

“There are a number of ways to do it, but it really starts with the song,” Barry continues. “It depends on the tempo, the rhythm of the song, the lyrics and the artist’s relationship to the sport, to some extent. Are they a fan? A lot of those things are intangible, but they’re important things for people who are passionate about the sport.”

So how did U2’s “American Soul” end up being selected for this tournament? Drew Watkins, Turner’s creative director, explains that it took a while.

“They’ve come up in a lot of discussions about the other flagship events we do,” he said, recalling one conversation in which someone asked, “Do we want this older group?” This time, the answer was a resounding yes.

“What you lose in terms of pure demographics, you get back in terms of iconic status,” Watkins adds. “It’s a trade-off we talk about a lot and in this case we felt it was a trade-off worth making. When U2 want to work with you, you want to work with them on an event of this magnitude.”

Watkins also noted that while Turner’s other marquee sporting events — particularly the NBA playoffs and NBA All-Star weekend — have recently featured younger, more current artists like Kendrick Lamar or Migos, they still find a way to incorporate different genres into their March Madness coverage, through short pieces of special interest and commercial outros, for example. “It’s not necessarily the Migos-type demo that we would use for March Madness this year (with U2),” Watkins says. “But when we bring you to the broadcast, we use a lot of young artists, a lot of up-and-coming artists.”

In the case of March Madness — as well as Turner’s other sports broadcasts, like Sunday MLB games, the PGA Championship and the aforementioned major NBA events — Turner Sports works in tandem with artists and labels, giving them a platform to showcase their new music.

Most of the songs in March Madness are set around the release date of a major artist’s album, usually within six months. Past themes have been performed by The Chainsmokers and Coldplay, The Killers, Muse, The Black Keys, Kings of Leonand more. Notably, the 2015 theme song, “American Oxygen” Rihanna’s, preceded the song’s actual release by about three weeks, meaning that for the duration of the tournament, the only place anyone could hear the single was on a college basketball telecast.

But even though the release dates for these records were set well in advance, Robert Rudkin, former music director at CBS Sports and current director of business operations at music licensing company MIBE, says the songs were chosen much later than expected.

“Every year it’s really a watershed moment,” he says. “You’d think they’d plan a year in advance right after the tournament, but I don’t think that’s the case. I remember with The Killers (‘Shot at the Night,’ 2014), it was probably early February and they were still filming (the music video).”

Barry adds that the decision can be made a week before the event: “We think there’s more interest in new music. Any one of us – me, the creative director or one of the producers – hears something and thinks, ‘This would be great for X sport.’ It could be two months before, three months before or literally a week before.”

For this year’s theme, U2’s “American Soul,” everything was put together just two weeks before the concert on the Hudson River was filmed. With so much last-minute production and planning going into the video, the network, already accustomed to working in the live entertainment space, is able to work to incredibly tight deadlines.

With the idea of ​​total integration, these secondary themes can sometimes seem a little overplayed, as a specific song might be played a dozen times throughout a show, during highlights, commercial breaks, etc. But ultimately, CBS and Turner don’t care about that as much: they focus more on the show as a whole.

“You have to remember that the producers and the show’s directors just want the show to look good and sound good, so they don’t really care what we play and whether the song is gone because they’ve heard it a billion times in the last three weeks for March Madness,” Rudkin says. “They worry about their obligations — sometimes they want to include a certain amount of it every broadcast. If you add that up over a certain number of games, it’s definitely going to get repetitive.”

While these side songs may be played quite often throughout each game, Barry isn’t concerned about the track’s potential for exhaustion, always emphasizing the mutual importance of the partnership between the artist and the network itself.

“We’ve never had an issue with over-delivery or over-saturation of music integration,” he says. “When you move to streams and then digital extensions and social extensions, the overall audience engagement goes through the roof. That’s why it creates incredible value for the artist.”

As March Madness wraps up Monday night, CBS and Turner Sports are already gearing up for their next major sporting events, the Masters and NBA Playoffs, respectively, where we’ll be treated to a new set of theme songs tailored specifically for those broadcasts. But if you’re worried about U2 possibly missing from the upcoming games, don’t worry — if Opening day If predictions are to be believed, ESPN will also use “American Soul” throughout its 2018 MLB coverage.