Retailers have always gone after famous musicians to hawk their clothing lines, particularly for fall, when sales reach yearly highs due to the impending holidays. With TV and movie starlets practically replacing the Supermodels of yore, it seems that rock and pop stars were a natural progression.

After seeing this fall's more prominent ad campaigns featuring musicians, we have mixed feelings. Marc Jacobs hired REM frontman Michael Stipe to do the usual MJ campaign, meaning edgy and uncommon, for the most part.

Wearing a pair of colored Marc Jacobs jeans, Stipe appears topless and awfully hairy, an image that we honestly could have done without. Throw in the kitschy shower curtain and inexplicable photo of a soda bottle on the toilet, and we are left scratching our heads.

Leave it to the Gap to be much more straightforward than the often mystifying Jacobs. They hired Jesssica Simpson ex John Mayer for their fall campaign, and this resulting photo is delicious:

It reminds us a little of Johnny Depp right as he was making the transition from TV to film. He looks very hot here, maybe because looking fabulous is the best revenge, as we said in an earlier post about Jessie. No matter, though we are happy with the end result, though we would have rather seen his nips rather than Stipe's.