Secret Spice!

I want to say one word to you. Just one word. (Yes, sir.) Are you listening? (Yes, I am.) Branding. (Just how do you mean that, sir?)

Here's how I mean that: When it comes to bands maximizing their potential — when it comes to bands being "successful" — branding is all-important. Remember those days when people howled at Jimmy Page and Pete Townshend for selling music to commercials? Those days are long, long gone. History. Today, it's not just about selling old music to commercials; it's about linking your new music to an entire company. And that's called branding. Good? Bad? Necessary? I'll leave that discussion for another time. But here's an example:

Tonight (Dec. 4) at 10 p.m. (Eastern) on CBS, you can watch the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show — featuring the VS supermodels in the photo above, shown prepping to jet to the show on "Runway Angel," their own Virgin America plane. (Nice to know that the VS supermodels are virgins. But I digress.) In addition to music by Seal and will.i.am, the Spice Girls will appear in their debut reunion performance. But that's just the beginning of the branding between the Girls and Victoria . . .