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Frank Kogan ([personal profile] koganbot) wrote2010-01-02 12:08 am
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  • Current Music: Untouchable ft. Hwa Young "Tell Me Why"
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Some videos, 2009

I had an ongoing list of videos I liked, then back in May I forgot to keep up with it, so here are some vids from early '09. For further viewing pleasure visit Kat's tumblr.

Will Young "Let It Go": Superhero in his mind, life doesn't cooperate, he tries to adapt. The song hadn't hit me on the album: the chord changes seemed to acquiesce too easily, turned this into a "nice" song while the voice was trying to do something sadder. The video delivers what the music alone couldn't. Will is precisely accurate as the would-be boisterous drunk, flashes of jollity and rage, ultimate defeat, while the bouncers are giving him the old heave-ho.



Untouchable ft. Hwa Young "Tell Me Why": [livejournal.com profile] petronia wrote, "What I'm getting is that the 'interrogation scene' takes place in the head of the male protagonist. His fiancée rejected him, fell into an obvious deep depression and attempted/committed suicide in such a way as to make it seem the relationship was the problem (tearing up photos, etc.), except the guy was basically blindsided - so the rest of the vid is a reification of his warring emotions of anger and confusion (TELL ME WHY YOU DID THIS TO ME) and helplessness at not being able to save the Korean Sylvia Plath from herself (stuck on the balcony watching the proceedings). Why he had to call in a pop group to aid him in the effort I don't know though - presumably Untouchable speak to his emotions during this difficult period in his life?"



The Lonely Island ft. T-Pain "I'm On A Boat"



Enrique Iglesias ft. Ciara "Takin' Back My Love": Modernist design elements become subject and object of "action painting" approach to rearranging apartment.



Nikki Awesome "You Say (It Was Supposed To Be)"



Timberlee f. Tosh "Heels"



Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Zero"



Britney Spears "If You Seek Amy"



Taylor Swift "White Horse"



Taylor Swift "You Belong With Me"



And here's a recent one, "Caesar" by I Blåme Coco ft. Robyn [EDIT: well, this was taken down, and if there's (another?) copy of the music video I can't find it so here's the track but no mv]:

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[personal profile] koganbot 2010-01-04 02:33 pm (UTC)(link)
I like "Eat You Up," but any good r&b singer could be singing BoA's part. This isn't a criticism of it as music, but the track is not a good way to market her here, pushing a single that doesn't convey the singer as a personality. (Of the tracks [livejournal.com profile] petronia embedded on the Wonder Girls thread, BoA's "Amazing Kiss" was the one that was easiest for me to relate to, nice '90s dance pop with a Latin tinge, it seemed, though I wouldn't know if she comes across as a personality in that one either.)

[identity profile] askbask.livejournal.com 2010-01-04 03:16 pm (UTC)(link)
Yes, that's largely been the criticism against her English album -- it's not very BoA-ish (although BoA has an amazing presence in the Eat You Up video) and the same has basically been my my point about Utada . Why would the American crowd buy straightforward r&b by a foreigner when they can get it from locals? If they are sensations in their home countries and someone sees potential for moneymaking abroad, surely that's on the basis of the material that made them big. Utada straight up said she wanted to make rnb that sounded like what's popular in the US, to break into the market. I admire her honesty -- she's always come off as a straight talker -- but that just reveals a flawed thinking to me.

I haven't followed Wonder Girls attempt much, but #76 for 'Nobody' isn't THAT bad. If SNSD try to do the same I'd heavily suggest simply translating 'Gee' -- based on anecdotal evidence most people who I'd never thought would like it are fascinated and nothing really sounds remotely like it on US radio. With pop making a return to Billboard, it seems like a safer choice than rnb pandering.
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[personal profile] koganbot 2010-01-04 03:47 pm (UTC)(link)
I quite agree; I think Utada fundamentally misreads r&b, at least in that statement; no major star in the genre simply makes r&b that sounds like what's popular. The stars make r&b that sounds distinctly like themselves. When you hear a Rihanna or a Beyoncé you know it's Rihanna or Beyoncé the second she opens her mouth. Same in nearby genres from the likes of Britney and Jay-Z and BEP and Katy Perry and Lady GaGa. This isn't to say that music that's generally generic can't be good - I love '80s freestyle and '80s Italodisco, and my favorite two Madonna tracks are "Everybody" and "Justify My Love," neither of which sounds distinctly like Madonna - but being generic doesn't seem to be what works in r&b, either artistically or commercially. Maybe the dance-r&b amalgam on recent hits by Jay Sean and Jason DeRulo and Iyaz will change the game, if those three turn into long-running stars in the U.S. I hate those tracks, by the way, even if I'm swayed by their prettiness. (Jay Sean's already got a history in the U.K., not that I don't find him dull there, too).

[identity profile] askbask.livejournal.com 2010-01-04 07:51 pm (UTC)(link)
This or this is what I wanted Utada to do in English. I'm not sure it would sell, but with Owl City's abhorrent metaphors set to pleasant nothingness reaching #1, well who knows anymore.

[identity profile] petronia.livejournal.com 2010-01-05 12:39 am (UTC)(link)
I don't know if this has something to do with Utada's own history - she was one of the first Japanese pop stars to make pop with R&B influence (which is what I'd call it rather than just "R&B" as Asian audiences called it at the time), so for quite a few years the Hikki 'brand' was equated with R&B. Particularly in contrast to the trance-pop of her sales rival Hamasaki Ayumi (Avex tunes as as recognizable as Xenomania's, and are very East Asian-sounding, with a secondary influence from Italo disco).

She can't go back to that sound, because it sounds irretrievably late 90s; and the sound that she moved toward in the 00s and that has been most artistically fruitful for her is definitely not a U.S. mainstream sort of thing. (Electronic, frequently two-steppy.)









She married the guy who directed these videos, and one sort of suspects the breakup songs on This Is The One are about their divorce, which lends stuff like "Come Back To Me" more interest (she never used to write breakup songs).
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