“Give me a Break, Give me a Break, Break me off a piece of that Kit Kat Bar!” That’s an iconic tune, and if you grew up in the last 30 years, you know it and even get stuck in your head. Even though the commercials that sang it are from years ago it will still pop in there. For me it’s this and the Double Mint Gum song.
Now thanks to a video put out by Great Big Story, we know some of the inner workings behind the music for the song itself. And you know what? It was written to be a throw away song at first. Kit Kat had already found their “winner” but needed to present the clients with two options. And the one that was meant to be tossed to the side was the one that test audiences loved! It was a total fluke but it turned out for the better.
Michael A. Levine was interviewed about the story by Great Big Story and it seems from our point of view that it was divine intervention that created such a massive hit. If he hadn’t received the phone call that day we might have had a very different version of the song.
They ended up choosing “Give me a Break” for Kit Kat, and by the time he had gotten to the first floor on the elevator he says, “It was written.”
I had a very tiny budget for the whole thing I literally couldn’t afford to hire singers, so when we went to do the actual commercial Chris the producer said well why don’t we have the band sing it? … I ended up being the lead vocalist as a result.
Michael L. Levine
Then they tested the track against the other one and it did so well in test audiences they tested it once more to be sure. It did even better the second time around and from then on it was their first pick. In fact the commercial did so well Levine was told that Hershey’s had to build a new factory to keep up with demands!
Sometimes things just work out and it seems like the universe has some plan. And for this song it seems all the stars were in the right place at the right time.
