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Tonight I'm Ducking You
Prodded by Maddie's preferring Seungri's "What Can I Do?" to Enrique Iglesias's "Tonight I'm Fuckin' You" (wish I could agree with Maddie, but I think "Tonight" kills "What Can I Do?"), and also recalling that I have not yet gotten close to writing and posting all my year-end lists/appraisals, I want to officially dub 2010 as The Year In Which, Among Other Things, I Had Trouble Coming To A Consistent Opinion Regarding Enrique Iglesias (the "among other things" is there so that I can officially call 2010 the year of a whole lot of other things as well, e.g., I officially dub 2010 as The Year In Which Pitbull Was Massive, Though I'm Not Sure Massively What, But Jonathan Bogart Was The Only Person In My Critical Neighborhood To Write More Than A Sentence Or Two About Him). So anyway, let's recall 2010 (w/ links for anyone who wants to see the full text).
June 21, 2010: "Confused attempt to come to grips with the new dance-pop 2010... Enrique seems oddly disengaged"
June 23, 2010: "Too much catchiness to be denied."
June 24, 2010, The Iglesias-Pitbull Corollary To The Boney Joan Rule: "Any reason I give on a particular day for disliking 'I Like It' will be a reason I give on some other day for liking 'I Like It.'"
July 7, 2010: "...Iglesias sounds half dead on his own track, Pitbull is reliably energetic, and the hooks keep dancing."
December 9, 2010: "Strange that the gleam of Autotune should be what returns this guy to the American charts, given that his voice contained sweet starbursts all along..."
Actually, when confronted with the video above, I realize that one reason I vacillate on the guy is that I actually find it hard to give a shit about him. The hooks hook me but eventually everything fades into the same OK sweetness. Put "Fuckin' You" at 64 on my long list this year, but I'm sure now that that overrates it. Unless I change my mind.
That vid makes me wish I were watching Michelangelo Antonioni's brilliant L'Avventura, instead.
June 21, 2010: "Confused attempt to come to grips with the new dance-pop 2010... Enrique seems oddly disengaged"
June 23, 2010: "Too much catchiness to be denied."
June 24, 2010, The Iglesias-Pitbull Corollary To The Boney Joan Rule: "Any reason I give on a particular day for disliking 'I Like It' will be a reason I give on some other day for liking 'I Like It.'"
July 7, 2010: "...Iglesias sounds half dead on his own track, Pitbull is reliably energetic, and the hooks keep dancing."
December 9, 2010: "Strange that the gleam of Autotune should be what returns this guy to the American charts, given that his voice contained sweet starbursts all along..."
Actually, when confronted with the video above, I realize that one reason I vacillate on the guy is that I actually find it hard to give a shit about him. The hooks hook me but eventually everything fades into the same OK sweetness. Put "Fuckin' You" at 64 on my long list this year, but I'm sure now that that overrates it. Unless I change my mind.
That vid makes me wish I were watching Michelangelo Antonioni's brilliant L'Avventura, instead.
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This comment is wild conjecture, but it seems that Enrique is no longer on the critical radar in the UK right now. Said radar can easily be breached by a single appearance on X Factor where he would be more than welcome, but I guess "I Like It" peaked too early in the year. He was awesome when he toured here a few years ago but seems to have ditched his emo-vulnerability in favour of sleazy club grinding. Ugh.
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http://www.redbalcony.com/?vid=27896
Or this:
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xg9yby_enrique-iglesias-tonight-i-m-lovin-you-feat-ludacris_music
(If one of these works, tell me, and I'll embed it above.)
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I might prefer facial mole-era Enrique for sentimental reasons, but I think you sum it up nicely with "finding it hard to give a shit about him".
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Do you know who wrote "What Can I Do?" A quick Google search gives me Lauren Christy of the Matrix as one of the co-writers of "Tonight (I'm Fuckin' You)," presumably the one who wrote the melody. All I could find for "What Can I Do" was some commenter saying it wasn't Teddy Park, and that Choi Pilgang and DEE.P (about whom I know nothing) were involved. Maybe it was Seungri himself.
(I'm still fundamentally new to K-pop, don't know what's what and who's who.)
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Lyrics by Seungri/ Composed by Seungri, Choi PilKang, DEE.P./ Arranged by Choi PilKang, DEE.P
02. 어쩌라고 (What About Me) (TITLE)
Lyrics by Seungri/ Composed by Seungri, Choi PilKang, BIG TONE/ Arranged by Choi PilKang
03. 창문을 열어 (feat.G-DRAGON) (Open the Window)
Lyrics by Choi PilKang/ Composed by Choi PilKang/ Arranged by Choi PilKang/ Rap Lyrics by G-Dragon
04. MAGIC
Lyrics by Seungri/ Composed by Seungri, Choice37/ Arranged by Choice37
05. I KNOW (with 아이유)
Lyrics by Seungri/ Composed by Seungri, Choi PilKang, DEE.P., Go MyeongJae/ Arranged by Choi PilKang, DEE.P.
06. WHITE LOVE
Lyrics by Seungri/ Composed by Seungri, Choi PilKang/ Arranged by Choi PilKang
07. OUTRO (IN MY WORLD)
Lyrics by Seungri/ Composed by Seungri, Choi PilKang/ Arranged by Choi PilKang
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Interesting that the translation here is "What About Me?" Google translate gives me "What Do You Want?" Presumably Seungri and crew have decided that the English title should be "What Can I Do?" since that's what they're calling it at the Big Bang YouTube site. Makes him seem less helpless. I've also seen it translated as "What Do You Want Me To Do?"
So, has it been determined what she wants him to do? (Need to make time to visit the Grand Narrative and see what James has been translating.)
Pretty song. Is growing on me.
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By the way, is Big Bang considered teen pop specifically, or just pop (not that that's always a clear distinction)?
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I don't think there's a clear distinction. I can't remember 'teen pop' being used... it's always "idol artists", "idol groups". Although, like in the article above, they often talk about breaking the boundaries of idol music. That's a recurring theme, I've seen it applied to almost any well-liked pop artist there - "too good to be called 'idols'", although with Big Bang (or GD&TOP) they're saying it themselves, distancing themselves from the stereotypical idea of a boy band.
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But then, American Idol in the '00s had an audience that skewed older than the Top 40 audience; when Stephen Thomas Erlewine of allmusic.com reviewed the first Kelly Clarkson album, he praised her for how well she reconfigured her sound for an audience her own age.
So, when did the word "idol" enter the Korean music lexicon?
Odd thing to me in regard to how they're talking about IU is that, though I think she's a good singer, she doesn't have a virtuoso voice, even if she can hit high notes. Her voice simply isn't powerful enough. In fact, she seemed the wrong singer for "Good Day," at least the way they arranged it - which doesn't mean she did a bad job of it, but it cried out for big-lunged disco diva-ing at the start, a Loleatta Holloway or a Donna Summer (depending on the effect you want) and some big-voiced Broadway storming at the end. Not that they couldn't have arranged the track for IU's strengths, done it for a smaller voice. But they didn't; they kept it a stunning bravura track with a singer not quite big enough for it. But it was the highest seller of the last two months, so people are fine with what they got, and it made my top 50.
Lee Hyori, who doesn't have gigantic lungs either, nonetheless seems like more of a virtuoso singer, though IU may catch up with her.
*One of the early Washington DC harDCore punk bands in the late '70s called themselves the Teen Idles.
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Here's where someone with more knowledge about the history of Asian pop should enter. My suspicion is that the Koreans borrowed the term 'idol' from the Japanese when the k-pop scene exploded in the 90s. Of course in Japan the term has longer traditions, and today it's used in a slightly different way than the Koreans do - the latter seemingly use it about any pop star who's not a ballad specialist (30+-year-olds like Narsha (of BEG) and Kahi (of After School) are still called idols, although Hyori is perhaps above such terms).
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1st list: "Music sales", 2nd list "Digital, combined" (online streaming, downloads, BGM sales, mobile services), 3rd list "Downloads", 4th list "Streaming", 5th list "Mobile",
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I've been planning a post on the Korean charts, mainly to ask you guys what they mean, whether they're plausible, and so forth.
And another post on what the hell the Korean music industry's business model is.
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That could be a good discussion!
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Were involved in the EP, that is. Don't know about that particular song.