Songfacts®:

• Written by Pretenders frontwoman Chrissie Hynde, "How Much Did You Get For Your Soul?" takes aim at famous singers who "sell their souls" by becoming spokespeople for big companies. Her reasoning is sound: these celebrities don't need the money and don't really care about the products, so why do it? In her view, it quashes their credibility:
  
  Who could think that you're for real
  A puppet in a cabaret
  To increase your wealth
• Hynde specifically mentions Pepsi in the lyric, indicating the main target of her ire is Michael Jackson, who had been shilling for the company since 1983 in a $5 million deal.
• In the Pretenders Archives, we found this quote from Chrissie Hynde explaining her resistance to selling out for commercials:
  
  "It's one thing to do something and it's something else to advertise it. Listen, I might smoke cigarettes, I might inject heroin, but I'm not going to get up on television in front of millions of people and tell them to do it too. Advertising is crap. And these guys are endorsing stupid products. Why would anyone who had any consciousness whatsoever do an advertisement for Pepsi Cola? It's the crassest form of pollution. People are going out and getting all that dough to endorse some garbage product when they don't even need the money anyway. What the f--k are you gonna do with 15 million dollars? Buy a fleet of Rolls Royces? Pepsi Cola is a crap product. It has no redeeming value whatsoever."
• Bernie Worrell, best known for his work in Parliament-Funkadelic, played keyboards on this track. He joined the band on the tour for the album in 1987, but was fired midway through, as his sound wasn't what Chrissie Hynde was after.
• Neil Young was on board with this message as well. In 1988, he released "This Note's For You," where he also blasts singers for pitching Pepsi... and Coke, and Budweiser...