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This is the The Boys album song comparison post, with some ranting at the beginning. You have been warned.
Using the Western staff notation of music, there are only so many combinations possible, and after over half of a millenia of it being around, I'm pretty sure most melodies have been written already, even if only as a passing phrase inside one of Wagner's behemoth opera cycles. It's even more likely for the same progressions to be used over and over in pop music, because if it moved listeners to move their wallets once, why not again?
So the supposed wrong in "This sounds like this!" accusations is not (or shouldn't be) "Has this been used before?" because it inevitably has, but rather, it should be, "Has this been used to its full potential?" and that could be achieved in any number of ways, from meaningful lyrical content, possibly with important historical context, to variations in arrangement, or something that may be unique to the performer, like a particular voice tone, inflection, or delivery.
The problem with the The Boys album is that it never aspires to fulfill those potentials. It picks melodies and arrangements that instantly get you to an association with something great, but then it assumes that that association is enough to do the rest of the legwork and does the bare minimum for everything else. And that's why everything sounds like filler: the songs never move to make anything their own. Basically, they're like AKB48 stage songs. XD And as I just recently said on the lj:
AKB48 stage songs come in a few compositional quality varieties:
Shit
Shit/Forgettable unless your oshimen is performing it/costuming is fetishtastic/dance is awesome
Dirty fucking bubblegum cheaters
Somewhere between good and cheating
By cheating, I mean that they pick an absolutely irresistable melody and then let that alone carry the rest of the song. This and this are my favorite examples of cheaters, especially the latter since it's an actual plagiarism of pop classic "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You".
And you know what? Some of album can't even manage that. They lie somewhere between "Forgettable But For Being SNSD" and Cheating.
Now let me get some things straight: I'm still considering buying The Boys. None of the songs are as good as they should be, but it doesn't necessarily make them bad either. My initial opinion of the album still stands: I like most of the album tracks. Hey, I enjoy me some AKB48 stage songs, too. Hell, The Boys probably seems to have the least album filler-ness out of all of their Korean albums. And all of these comparisons? Solely for amusement. They aren't necessarily pointing to the SNSD song as inferior, either. Some of them are "ah, so that's the genre!" things. The Top Secret comparisons, for example.
Really, it's just me trolling again. I want to cause at least one "LOL CANNOT UNHEAR" moment for all of you. >:D
The Boys
"The Boys" gets its very own mashup post.
Telepathy
Besides the hitchhiker-ness of the rhythm, this song is basically shit. It's also like hitchhiker vaguely tried to modernize Earth Wind & Fire, except that hitchhiker doesn't really know how to write a continuous melody, so we got "Telepathy". There's probably also some other more recent influence I'm not catching because I basically have no familiarity with anything past the 70s. XD But if so, I bet they were at some point influenced by EW&F, so :P.
Yeah yeah yeah, Katy Perry(Wait, is it just me, or is California Gurls pretty much reusing Teenage Dream's chord progression?) is a more probable influence than EW&F. Whatever. I myself had a "LOL CANNOT UNHEAR" moment with "September."
Say yes
There's the obvious comparison to the beginning of the bass melody: "Stand By Me" by Ben E. King and "Mercy" by Duffy. However, this is only for the very beginning of that melody. In the same way "Mercy" quickly digresses from the "Stand By Me" progression(by being in minor and being a blues song, first of all), the melodic composition of "Say Yes" is completely different from the above songs.
This is the new "Echo," tonally, except with a much more fucking awesome chord progression and melody. Compared to Say Yes, Echo is boring compositionally. UGH, WHAT IS THAT CHORD TURNOVER THING. I LOVE IT SO MUCH I'M GOING CRAZY HERE. It's also what made Kissing You so good. I must learn what that is in music theory terms someday.
This Kim Young Hoo goes pretty far back with SMEnt, and other than Shinee's Year of U, his pieces have all been melody-first delights, like DBSK's Beautiful Life and Crazy Love. Holy crap, I think I have my favorite SM in-house producer now. Fuck those norwegian workshops and washed-up American producers, give me more of this guy!
He's also on lyrics duty a lot with SM. This Xperimental Productions group he's in seems to be like the Korean Digz,Inc., and William Young Pyon and Young Hu Kim their STY and HIRO.
TRICK
KARA'S "LUPIN" ROFL (Well, for that one vibe bouncing around the pre-chorus)
The verse is sassy and contrasts well with the pre-chorus, but the chorus is so non-descript I can't even think of a comparison.
Ha, this is totally an updated bad 80s exercise song.
Bomnal (How great is your love)
Ballad. Boring. Minimally better than "Best Friend," which the verse reminds me of. Can't be bothered to find a comparison for the chorus, because normally I don't keep a ballad around unless its chorus is really memorably melodic, which "Bonmal's" is most definitely NOT. (I don't even really like Sondheim classic "Send in the Clowns" for this reason. Sacrilege, I know.)
My J
Arashi's "Wish." 'Nuff said.
And it has a better PV than "The Boys!" Even if I wanna punch them in the face every time I actually see Arashi in the PV, ESPECIALLY MATSUJUN YOU SMUG BASTARD. XD
Please keep in mind I actually like Arashi's songs that are like this. It just kills me out of sheer amusement to hear "My J" be such a hobo version of Wish. Hwang Sungjie clearly has his influences rooted in Jpop. Snowy Wish was like a Kpopified take(faster, more "light"/fluffy, simpler melody, more disco influences) on this song, which itself has minor Jackson 5 stylings.
OSCAR
Lol, it's Kenzie's take on the Remee/Troelsen formula,(Mirotic/Under My Skin, Eat You Up, Perfection) which means there are little bits of old school inserted into menacing awesome, mostly in the harmonies and the way they slide through the notes instead of hitting them straight on, and in especially that "hey hey hey." Sarah Connor better watch her back. The SNSD Terminators are coming.
Top Secret
...Henry Mancini? This is like my Telepathy-->EW&F tenuous connection, I guess, where Top Secret is technically based on another style of music I'm not familiar with that itself was rooted in the Mancini style.
Also...? I blame that organ synth for this comparison.
"Monster Mash" was released three years after the premiere of Peter Gunn.
Hold on, I think I nailed down the style...
60S CHEEEEEEEEEESE 8D
Except as always, slightly updated. :3
Lazy Girl (Dolce Far Niente)
Wait, did I say "Say Yes" was the new "Echo?" Nevermind. *facepalms* Well, this is by Troelsen and "Echo" was by Remee.
Yeah, I much prefer Kim Young Hoo.
Jejarigeoreum (Sunflower)
Hahahahahaha, sounds like the kind of song some shitty movie inappropriately plays against their super awkward sex scene.
Awkward tongue is awkward.
Ooh, ooh, no wait, I found a better comparison.
*cannot take SNSD ballads seriously*
I like One Year Later, Complete, to a degree Starx3, and sometimes Tears. I'll still make fun of them, though. SNSD ballads were made for mocking.
VITAMIN
Duh, "Seishun no Flag." I already made a post about this.
MR. TAXI
Using the Western staff notation of music, there are only so many combinations possible, and after over half of a millenia of it being around, I'm pretty sure most melodies have been written already, even if only as a passing phrase inside one of Wagner's behemoth opera cycles. It's even more likely for the same progressions to be used over and over in pop music, because if it moved listeners to move their wallets once, why not again?
So the supposed wrong in "This sounds like this!" accusations is not (or shouldn't be) "Has this been used before?" because it inevitably has, but rather, it should be, "Has this been used to its full potential?" and that could be achieved in any number of ways, from meaningful lyrical content, possibly with important historical context, to variations in arrangement, or something that may be unique to the performer, like a particular voice tone, inflection, or delivery.
The problem with the The Boys album is that it never aspires to fulfill those potentials. It picks melodies and arrangements that instantly get you to an association with something great, but then it assumes that that association is enough to do the rest of the legwork and does the bare minimum for everything else. And that's why everything sounds like filler: the songs never move to make anything their own. Basically, they're like AKB48 stage songs. XD And as I just recently said on the lj:
AKB48 stage songs come in a few compositional quality varieties:
Shit
Shit/Forgettable unless your oshimen is performing it/costuming is fetishtastic/dance is awesome
Dirty fucking bubblegum cheaters
Somewhere between good and cheating
By cheating, I mean that they pick an absolutely irresistable melody and then let that alone carry the rest of the song. This and this are my favorite examples of cheaters, especially the latter since it's an actual plagiarism of pop classic "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You".
And you know what? Some of album can't even manage that. They lie somewhere between "Forgettable But For Being SNSD" and Cheating.
Now let me get some things straight: I'm still considering buying The Boys. None of the songs are as good as they should be, but it doesn't necessarily make them bad either. My initial opinion of the album still stands: I like most of the album tracks. Hey, I enjoy me some AKB48 stage songs, too. Hell, The Boys probably seems to have the least album filler-ness out of all of their Korean albums. And all of these comparisons? Solely for amusement. They aren't necessarily pointing to the SNSD song as inferior, either. Some of them are "ah, so that's the genre!" things. The Top Secret comparisons, for example.
Really, it's just me trolling again. I want to cause at least one "LOL CANNOT UNHEAR" moment for all of you. >:D
The Boys
"The Boys" gets its very own mashup post.
Telepathy
Besides the hitchhiker-ness of the rhythm, this song is basically shit. It's also like hitchhiker vaguely tried to modernize Earth Wind & Fire, except that hitchhiker doesn't really know how to write a continuous melody, so we got "Telepathy". There's probably also some other more recent influence I'm not catching because I basically have no familiarity with anything past the 70s. XD But if so, I bet they were at some point influenced by EW&F, so :P.
Click to viewYeah yeah yeah, Katy Perry(Wait, is it just me, or is California Gurls pretty much reusing Teenage Dream's chord progression?) is a more probable influence than EW&F. Whatever. I myself had a "LOL CANNOT UNHEAR" moment with "September."
Say yes
There's the obvious comparison to the beginning of the bass melody: "Stand By Me" by Ben E. King and "Mercy" by Duffy. However, this is only for the very beginning of that melody. In the same way "Mercy" quickly digresses from the "Stand By Me" progression(by being in minor and being a blues song, first of all), the melodic composition of "Say Yes" is completely different from the above songs.
This is the new "Echo," tonally, except with a much more fucking awesome chord progression and melody. Compared to Say Yes, Echo is boring compositionally. UGH, WHAT IS THAT CHORD TURNOVER THING. I LOVE IT SO MUCH I'M GOING CRAZY HERE. It's also what made Kissing You so good. I must learn what that is in music theory terms someday.
This Kim Young Hoo goes pretty far back with SMEnt, and other than Shinee's Year of U, his pieces have all been melody-first delights, like DBSK's Beautiful Life and Crazy Love. Holy crap, I think I have my favorite SM in-house producer now. Fuck those norwegian workshops and washed-up American producers, give me more of this guy!
He's also on lyrics duty a lot with SM. This Xperimental Productions group he's in seems to be like the Korean Digz,Inc., and William Young Pyon and Young Hu Kim their STY and HIRO.
TRICK
KARA'S "LUPIN" ROFL (Well, for that one vibe bouncing around the pre-chorus)
The verse is sassy and contrasts well with the pre-chorus, but the chorus is so non-descript I can't even think of a comparison.
Ha, this is totally an updated bad 80s exercise song.
Bomnal (How great is your love)
Ballad. Boring. Minimally better than "Best Friend," which the verse reminds me of. Can't be bothered to find a comparison for the chorus, because normally I don't keep a ballad around unless its chorus is really memorably melodic, which "Bonmal's" is most definitely NOT. (I don't even really like Sondheim classic "Send in the Clowns" for this reason. Sacrilege, I know.)
My J
Arashi's "Wish." 'Nuff said.
And it has a better PV than "The Boys!" Even if I wanna punch them in the face every time I actually see Arashi in the PV, ESPECIALLY MATSUJUN YOU SMUG BASTARD. XD
Please keep in mind I actually like Arashi's songs that are like this. It just kills me out of sheer amusement to hear "My J" be such a hobo version of Wish. Hwang Sungjie clearly has his influences rooted in Jpop. Snowy Wish was like a Kpopified take(faster, more "light"/fluffy, simpler melody, more disco influences) on this song, which itself has minor Jackson 5 stylings.
OSCAR
Lol, it's Kenzie's take on the Remee/Troelsen formula,(Mirotic/Under My Skin, Eat You Up, Perfection) which means there are little bits of old school inserted into menacing awesome, mostly in the harmonies and the way they slide through the notes instead of hitting them straight on, and in especially that "hey hey hey." Sarah Connor better watch her back. The SNSD Terminators are coming.
Top Secret
...Henry Mancini? This is like my Telepathy-->EW&F tenuous connection, I guess, where Top Secret is technically based on another style of music I'm not familiar with that itself was rooted in the Mancini style.
Also...? I blame that organ synth for this comparison.
"Monster Mash" was released three years after the premiere of Peter Gunn.
Hold on, I think I nailed down the style...
60S CHEEEEEEEEEESE 8D
Except as always, slightly updated. :3
Lazy Girl (Dolce Far Niente)
Wait, did I say "Say Yes" was the new "Echo?" Nevermind. *facepalms* Well, this is by Troelsen and "Echo" was by Remee.
Yeah, I much prefer Kim Young Hoo.
Jejarigeoreum (Sunflower)
Hahahahahaha, sounds like the kind of song some shitty movie inappropriately plays against their super awkward sex scene.
Awkward tongue is awkward.
Ooh, ooh, no wait, I found a better comparison.
*cannot take SNSD ballads seriously*
I like One Year Later, Complete, to a degree Starx3, and sometimes Tears. I'll still make fun of them, though. SNSD ballads were made for mocking.
VITAMIN
Duh, "Seishun no Flag." I already made a post about this.
MR. TAXI