1974 One-Hit Wonder Inspired by a 'Lazy' Morning Became an 'Inescapable' Pop Culture Anthem Decades Later
If you had to pick one commercial jingle that's always stuck in your head, which one would it be? Probably the most ubiquitous ad of the last ten years: "Oh-oh-oh-Ozempic!"
Of course, as music lovers of a certain age will remember, long before Ozempic even existed, the song that everybody associates with the popular weight loss drug was a huge success: "Magic" by the Scottish band Pilot. Written by frontman David Paton, the song shot to #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1974, becoming the group's breakthrough (and biggest) hit.
As Paton explained in a 2012 interview with Radio Borders, the lyrics were inspired by a comment made by his wife one very early morning.
"I used to have a little tape recorder on top of my piano and when any idea came into my head I would just slap it down on the tape recorder," Paton recalled.
"I had that chorus and it's only a four bar chorus...it was just an idea lying on the tape recorder and one morning I had to get up really early and my wife said to me 'I've never been awake to see a daybreak' and I thought there's a line for a song that will go with that little chorus that I've got on my tape machine," he continued.
That early morning inspiration resulted in the following verse:
"Never been awake
Never seen a daybreak
Leaning on my pillow in the morning
Lazy day in bed
Music in my head
Crazy music playing in the morning light"
Of course, when Paton re-recorded the song for the Ozempic ad campaign in 2023, it wasn't about an early morning anymore, but it still ended up being pretty magical.
"It was a great thrill to be back at Abbey Road, singing my song," he told The New York Times for a piece titled: "How Ozempic Turned a 1970s Hit Into an Inescapable Jingle."
"It's just about the enjoyment of life," he added. "About waking up in the morning, you know? I was 22 when I wrote it."
The Ozempic song was almost a New Kids on the Block hit
Paton never could have predicted his song would become a hit all over again 50 years later, thanks in large part to Jeremy Shepler, who headed the Ozempic launch for pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk.
"The first song I came up with was by New Kids on the Block, the one that goes ‘Oh oh oh oh oh'," Shepler told the NYT. "But New Kids was a bit too young. The average age of our patient was between 50 and 55. Then it came to me: ‘Oh, oh, oh, it's magic.'"
When the first commercial came out, Paton didn't even know his song had been licensed for the ad.
"I learned about it through Facebook," he said. "Fans would write me, ‘I'm hearing "Magic" every 20 minutes on my TV'."
It wasn't the first time "Magic" was used for a commercial, as Paton explained.
"I actually sang ‘Coke, Coke, Coke, it's Magic' back in the '70s," he said, adding, "People always want to use the song in some way or the other."
Having his song associated with such a popular product doesn't bother Paton a bit, though; in fact, he said he's "delighted" by the renewed attention.
"I'm a songwriter. I want to sell my music. A lot of people don't know the name Pilot, but they know the Ozempic song," Paton pointed out.
Not only do people know the Ozempic song, but they clearly love it, too.
"In contemporary advertising, campaigns tend to have pretty short shelf lives," said Jeff Rothstein, chief executive of CultHealth, the ad agency for Ozempic. "Two, three years, tops. Yet ‘Oh, oh, oh, Ozempic' continues to endure. You can do all the market research in the world, and never end up with something like this."
Related: 1977 Soft Rock Springtime Classic Is Having a Major Moment Nearly 50 Years Later
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This story was originally published May 18, 2026 at 4:04 PM.