Comments | koganbot: Japanese freestyle

koganbot

Japanese freestyle

May 18, 2013 04:34

Japanese freestyle - is there a lot of it? I wouldn't know. Just glad that the style, which is pretty much gone from U.S. airwaves, is still strong in Asia.

( h/t arbitrary_greay, of course)

Tomato n' Pine FAB ("Free As A Bird")

Click to view

The rhythm is simply a hopped-up electrobeat, not freestyle's fast twists and breakneck turns, but the melody, at least in the verse, ( Read more... )

tymee, eurobeat, e.via, italodisco, after school, chocolat, crayon pop, no tiers for the creatures of the night, freestyle, j-pop

Leave a comment

Back to all threads

arbitrary_greay May 18 2013, 16:30:41 UTC

Would these also qualify as freestyle melody style? Because if so, then this stuff was pretty common in Jpop up through the early 00s.

1994, 1993-2005, 1985, 2007, 2003 but kind of cheating because it's from an artist whose music gimmick is 80s era sound

More common, though, was to take that type of melody and speed it up for Eurobeat, especially for anime themes. (Most of said anime themes do major-key modulations for inspirational effect, though.

koganbot May 18 2013, 18:00:17 UTC

Wow! That's an interesting style(s). This is where my lack of music theory is a real handicap. No those melodies are not freestyle, but my adjectival description of freestyle - "sad, but upbeat!" - sorta fits those, too. There seems to be a show-music element in some of them that isn't in freestyle.

Anyway, where description fails, maybe links can help. Some classic American freestyle, '80s to early '90s:

New York:

Cover Girls "Inside Outside"

Judy Torres "Come Into My Arms"

Cynthia "Change On Me"

Lisette Melendez "A Day In My Life (Without You)"

Miami

Debbie Deb "When I Hear Music"

Sequal "It's Not Too Late"

Company B "Fascinated"

koganbot May 18 2013, 18:27:23 UTC

So, what I think is going on in "FAB (Free As A Bird)" is that the verse melody is what I'm calling "freestyle" while the prechorus and chorus are in the style - you get to choose a name for it - that you're identifying.

petronia May 19 2013, 04:05:57 UTC

Yeah, my reaction to the Tomato n' Pine is that the melody is the kind of J-pop I do like (I don't like the current idol type of tune) and was common when I got into J-pop/anime music in the 90s; whereas the instrumental is more deliberately "80s dance" than you would've gotten at the time**, and reads to me as intentionally retro.

I've mentioned this to Frank before IIRC, but the Eurobeat style was pioneered by ex-Italo disco producers -- that's why it's called that. (This guy uber alles, but I think there were others as well ( ... )

Back to all threads