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koganbotIn part one I'd charted "a frequent version of verse-chorus form" as follows, saying that this was the form of "Volume Up":
1st part of verse → 2nd part of verse → prechorus → chorus → [second part of chorus] → 1st part of verse → 2nd part of verse → prechorus → chorus → [second part of chorus] → middle eight → break → chorus
It actually starts with an introduction, where we get the muted sax sample, and what I was calling the "break" was just the second half of the middle eight. Teasing out the parts:
0:00 Intro: muted, moody sax, sets the serious tone that the song will subsequently embellish, lampoon, demolish, reassert, etc., meanwhile, underneath, a keyboard suggests a dance and a counterrhythm → 0:16 1st part of verse: HyunA lays out the predicament but also ends each line with a flourish of staccato syllables, "naw-aw aw-aw-aw, naw-aw aw-aw-aw," "heh-eh eh-eh-eh, wah-ah ah-ah-ah" that, while not being out-and-out parody, are amusing enough to detach HyunA from the anguish that the music is pretending to establish (I'm at a loss to convey how good this is/she is: I imagine her singing each syllable with a vertically oval open mouth while making her eyes as round as her mouth, in faux innocence [EDIT: though perhaps JiYoon or GaYoon is the syllable singer; see Update 2 below]); reading this socially, I'd say that the operatic syllables signal the song's ambitiousness but that the actual sound comes from comic opera, so creates a sense of incipient hilarity → 0:29 2nd part of verse: GaYoon does a couple of vocal descents, not too heavily but with the pang and heat that reminds us there is some angsty young-and-in-unhappy-love business here; back in the mix, piano continues hopping along, readying us for the dance → 0:45 prechorus: GaYoon carries over from the previous part with a long note, something between a wail and a canopy, with HyunA returning, down at ground level, now as a rapper, pushy and tough and teasing and beneficently benign all at once, the music pounding and rising in a slate-cleaning crescendo, "everybody, TIME TO ROCK" → 0:59 chorus: JiYoon grabs the banner as the pounding boshbeat rides us across the battlefield; this doesn't feel like a cathartic chorus so much as the song launching itself forward, JiYoon amplifying the emotion and jabbing us with some savage "eh-eh eh-ehs" of her own → 1:15 second part of chorus: and like GaYoon before her, JiYoon launches herself atop the proceedings and splashes down on the moody sax that mellows us out a little, while a singer — I'm not sure who — pulls some syllabic "oh oh oh-oh ohs" off the grill and starts juggling them to remind us of opera and joy and open-mouthed emotion.
And then we repeat → 1:29 1st part of verse: same as before, energy brought down to the start, but this time it's SoHyun narrating our tale in a soft matter-of-fact voice, HyunA inserting her aws and ehs and ahs, though as I said yesterday we're now more attuned to the sassy little invitations and demands embedded within those syllables → 1:42 2nd part of verse: vocal descent, as before → 1:58 prechorus: canopy and crescendo → 2:13 chorus: pounding etc. → 2:28 second part of chorus: wail and sax and oh oh oh-oh oh.
Which brings us to → 2:43 middle eight: for four bars we've got JiHyun delicately wandering parks and fields, the melody doing the venture-to-distant-chords-and-return thing that I tried to understand back in college but never did; rest of 4minute do something that's probably formal or choral or ???? enough to be called "polyphony"; next four bars are the same except with the sax taking JiHyun's place and being more diffuse and less appealing → 3:12 chorus returns (both parts): guess I should mention what I've gathered from the couple of lyric translations, which is that the love interest had started off not being able to take his eyes off her but then behind her back told people she was too easy (a "tottie" in one of the translations) and now doesn't want to look at or hear her; so the crescendo and the pump-up-the-volume chorus are intended to drown out all that, though in my ears the amusing syllables overcame the alleged heartbreak from the get-go — also, pop songs of heartbreak are rarely about delivering heartbreak anyway, at least they have so many other elements that heartbreak is not a dominant message, though of course that's not ironclad and can differ from listener to listener, what we're set to experience. Ashlee Simpson and Taylor Swift have sure made their moves in and out of desperation signify for me, so I guess what I'm saying is, you know, I don't speak Korean... [UPDATE 1: and see what![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
askbask says in the comments about the group and the agency claiming the lyrics are directed at the treatment of girl groups by fickle and treacherous Netizens rather than about being jilted by a lover (which works as an interpretation, but I've got some skepticism)] → 3:42 outro: sax, w/out keybs.
[Update 2: Checking the live version on Music Bank for who's singing or miming what, I see that it's JiYoon rather than HyunA doing the brilliantly comic (and beautiful) "naw-aw aw-aw-aw, naw-aw aw-aw-aw," "heh-eh eh-eh-eh, wah-ah ah-ah-ah." Except in some other performances it doesn't seem to be she — or anyone — who is mouthing them. My guess is that live all the silly syllables are piped-in, so that the singers don't have to worry about interjections while anticipating or singing their leads. But I'll wager a small amount of money that on the recording those syllables are sung by either JiYoon* or GaYoon or maybe both (one doing the silly verse syllables and one doing the silly chorus syllables). Those two do a big hunk of the rocking and wailing too — though the whole crew are enjoying themselves extravagantly. (While you're visiting the vid, notice how HyunA's on a total lark through "Dream Racer." As for the Sistar songs, Hyorin's singing is as good as its reputation, from smooth to impassioned with what seems like utmost ease. It just took till "Alone" to be put in service of a song I actually like. All the twitching and bending over, though, is still an embarrassment. I assume it's supposed to be erotic and maybe funny, too, but it's like someone continually whacking your nose with a chair cushion. I suppose cheap and tawdry is a better setting for greatness than a jewelry display case would be, but the cheapness doesn't have to be downright annoying.)
*One problem with figuring this out on the basis of who's mouthing what is that in at least some of the versions, JiYoon is singing along with pretty much everything, though not usually into the mic. She must like the song.]
Usually in popular music I don't find what we have in this song, which is (what I'll call) motifs from one part of a song reappearing in other parts and taking different roles in doing so, the "motifs" here being the syllabic fragments, the held-over held notes (wails and canopies and cascades), and the sax sample. But then, I don't usually analyze song structure as attentively as I did this time, so maybe the phrase "I don't find" merely signals that I haven't looked. "Hot Issue," a Shinsadong Tiger song that seems far more direct and spare and simple than this one, actually fucks with structure more, and its variations on counting "1 2 3 4" are a recurring but ever-changing motif. Hope I get a chance to analyze that one as well, simplicity often being harder to analyze than complexity.
1st part of verse → 2nd part of verse → prechorus → chorus → [second part of chorus] → 1st part of verse → 2nd part of verse → prechorus → chorus → [second part of chorus] → middle eight → break → chorus
It actually starts with an introduction, where we get the muted sax sample, and what I was calling the "break" was just the second half of the middle eight. Teasing out the parts:
0:00 Intro: muted, moody sax, sets the serious tone that the song will subsequently embellish, lampoon, demolish, reassert, etc., meanwhile, underneath, a keyboard suggests a dance and a counterrhythm → 0:16 1st part of verse: HyunA lays out the predicament but also ends each line with a flourish of staccato syllables, "naw-aw aw-aw-aw, naw-aw aw-aw-aw," "heh-eh eh-eh-eh, wah-ah ah-ah-ah" that, while not being out-and-out parody, are amusing enough to detach HyunA from the anguish that the music is pretending to establish (I'm at a loss to convey how good this is/she is: I imagine her singing each syllable with a vertically oval open mouth while making her eyes as round as her mouth, in faux innocence [EDIT: though perhaps JiYoon or GaYoon is the syllable singer; see Update 2 below]); reading this socially, I'd say that the operatic syllables signal the song's ambitiousness but that the actual sound comes from comic opera, so creates a sense of incipient hilarity → 0:29 2nd part of verse: GaYoon does a couple of vocal descents, not too heavily but with the pang and heat that reminds us there is some angsty young-and-in-unhappy-love business here; back in the mix, piano continues hopping along, readying us for the dance → 0:45 prechorus: GaYoon carries over from the previous part with a long note, something between a wail and a canopy, with HyunA returning, down at ground level, now as a rapper, pushy and tough and teasing and beneficently benign all at once, the music pounding and rising in a slate-cleaning crescendo, "everybody, TIME TO ROCK" → 0:59 chorus: JiYoon grabs the banner as the pounding boshbeat rides us across the battlefield; this doesn't feel like a cathartic chorus so much as the song launching itself forward, JiYoon amplifying the emotion and jabbing us with some savage "eh-eh eh-ehs" of her own → 1:15 second part of chorus: and like GaYoon before her, JiYoon launches herself atop the proceedings and splashes down on the moody sax that mellows us out a little, while a singer — I'm not sure who — pulls some syllabic "oh oh oh-oh ohs" off the grill and starts juggling them to remind us of opera and joy and open-mouthed emotion.
And then we repeat → 1:29 1st part of verse: same as before, energy brought down to the start, but this time it's SoHyun narrating our tale in a soft matter-of-fact voice, HyunA inserting her aws and ehs and ahs, though as I said yesterday we're now more attuned to the sassy little invitations and demands embedded within those syllables → 1:42 2nd part of verse: vocal descent, as before → 1:58 prechorus: canopy and crescendo → 2:13 chorus: pounding etc. → 2:28 second part of chorus: wail and sax and oh oh oh-oh oh.
Which brings us to → 2:43 middle eight: for four bars we've got JiHyun delicately wandering parks and fields, the melody doing the venture-to-distant-chords-and-return thing that I tried to understand back in college but never did; rest of 4minute do something that's probably formal or choral or ???? enough to be called "polyphony"; next four bars are the same except with the sax taking JiHyun's place and being more diffuse and less appealing → 3:12 chorus returns (both parts): guess I should mention what I've gathered from the couple of lyric translations, which is that the love interest had started off not being able to take his eyes off her but then behind her back told people she was too easy (a "tottie" in one of the translations) and now doesn't want to look at or hear her; so the crescendo and the pump-up-the-volume chorus are intended to drown out all that, though in my ears the amusing syllables overcame the alleged heartbreak from the get-go — also, pop songs of heartbreak are rarely about delivering heartbreak anyway, at least they have so many other elements that heartbreak is not a dominant message, though of course that's not ironclad and can differ from listener to listener, what we're set to experience. Ashlee Simpson and Taylor Swift have sure made their moves in and out of desperation signify for me, so I guess what I'm saying is, you know, I don't speak Korean... [UPDATE 1: and see what
askbask says in the comments about the group and the agency claiming the lyrics are directed at the treatment of girl groups by fickle and treacherous Netizens rather than about being jilted by a lover (which works as an interpretation, but I've got some skepticism)] → 3:42 outro: sax, w/out keybs.[Update 2: Checking the live version on Music Bank for who's singing or miming what, I see that it's JiYoon rather than HyunA doing the brilliantly comic (and beautiful) "naw-aw aw-aw-aw, naw-aw aw-aw-aw," "heh-eh eh-eh-eh, wah-ah ah-ah-ah." Except in some other performances it doesn't seem to be she — or anyone — who is mouthing them. My guess is that live all the silly syllables are piped-in, so that the singers don't have to worry about interjections while anticipating or singing their leads. But I'll wager a small amount of money that on the recording those syllables are sung by either JiYoon* or GaYoon or maybe both (one doing the silly verse syllables and one doing the silly chorus syllables). Those two do a big hunk of the rocking and wailing too — though the whole crew are enjoying themselves extravagantly. (While you're visiting the vid, notice how HyunA's on a total lark through "Dream Racer." As for the Sistar songs, Hyorin's singing is as good as its reputation, from smooth to impassioned with what seems like utmost ease. It just took till "Alone" to be put in service of a song I actually like. All the twitching and bending over, though, is still an embarrassment. I assume it's supposed to be erotic and maybe funny, too, but it's like someone continually whacking your nose with a chair cushion. I suppose cheap and tawdry is a better setting for greatness than a jewelry display case would be, but the cheapness doesn't have to be downright annoying.)
*One problem with figuring this out on the basis of who's mouthing what is that in at least some of the versions, JiYoon is singing along with pretty much everything, though not usually into the mic. She must like the song.]
Usually in popular music I don't find what we have in this song, which is (what I'll call) motifs from one part of a song reappearing in other parts and taking different roles in doing so, the "motifs" here being the syllabic fragments, the held-over held notes (wails and canopies and cascades), and the sax sample. But then, I don't usually analyze song structure as attentively as I did this time, so maybe the phrase "I don't find" merely signals that I haven't looked. "Hot Issue," a Shinsadong Tiger song that seems far more direct and spare and simple than this one, actually fucks with structure more, and its variations on counting "1 2 3 4" are a recurring but ever-changing motif. Hope I get a chance to analyze that one as well, simplicity often being harder to analyze than complexity.
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no subject
Date: 2012-05-05 03:41 pm (UTC)I feel I hear this in a few boshy pop songs nowadays, but it's done to great effect here.
You do a nice job at pointing out Hyuna's strengths in this song. I've been focusing on missing her hard syllables like in her Hot Issue rap verse but she has other tricks up her sleeve.
I'd appreciate listening to the song / reading translations pure and innocent the first times through, but I had read press releases in advance (and press afterwards) in which the Cube representative and the girls talk about the meaning of the song and the words, which is, in their words, not about a man/woman love story but the fickle reception of girl groups, "you used to dance to my stuff, now you're steady hating.. well fuck that, turn up the volume" basically. In fact the snakes in the video are supposed to be netizen haters! (but what about the dog? or the seemingly friendly backup dancers)
no subject
Date: 2012-05-06 01:25 am (UTC)Whatever the intention, though, I like it being about a lover more than being about Netizens. Not that Netizens can't drive one crazy, but it feels better to me that it's a lover whose rejection of her is driving her batty. It isn't as if most Netizens are tearing down idols, or that 4minute has suffered some kind of major rejection from their fans. The Netizens who are nasty are the ones plumping for a rival group. You don't find — or I don't find — ones who'd gazed in adoration at 4minute and then turned on them, do you?
Your link, by the way, was about the video, though it did mention the lyrics. So Tiger and Rado could have written typical vague love-lost-so-let's-get-on-with-it lyrics and when video time came, the decision was made, "Let's have a snake to represent the vipers in audience and media." But before reading that allkpop story you linked, I would have taken handling the snake to have the usual power and sex connotations that one would expect from attractive, sassy women handling snakes. And as a matter of fact, that's how I still take it. I mean, "In this video the snake represents the viperish behavior of Netizens, which is why I'm stroking the snake"!?!
And yeah, what about the dog? And what about the entire video, during none of which do the girls look besieged? Maybe they're just bullshitting the interviewer and throwing a smokescreen at potential censors.
Reassessment, late summer 2012
Date: 2012-09-16 09:45 pm (UTC)Er...
no subject
Date: 2012-05-06 06:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-05-06 06:29 am (UTC)You probably do find tabloid articles hyping them up and then the next day writing some silly stuff about their split legs move, though.
I'm sure I read articles talking about that layer of meaning before the song was released, which is why I expected it more explicitly in the lyrics and instead found something quite vague. So it might be Shinsadong and his buddy wrote the song and then Cube added their spin on it afterwards.
Mostly the girls look to be enjoying themselves in the video. The censors haven't said anything about the groping and sexual undertones in the video/choreography, but then they never ended up saying anything about, for example, dal shabet's "Hit U", with explicit murder after murder, where they've previously R-rated videos for containing laser shot duels with toy pistols. Consistency is not their strong suit. As James Turnbull suggested, their strategy may simply be to now and then show that they're an organ worth keeping alive.
no subject
Date: 2015-11-25 08:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-07-05 06:24 am (UTC)https://imgur.com/a/sGH7Vn2
And for some reason (a) the imgur image won't embed, so I'm stuck with the link, and (b) cubeupload images seem lost, either temporarily or forever and ever, though I'm still keeping their embed code here.
[EDIT: Hurrah, cubeupload is working again. So we've got Gayoon twice!]
no subject
Date: 2012-05-19 12:59 am (UTC)What I noticed making this list is that lots of songs have the same kind of descending synth line (Nalina and Twinkle are two), and Kpop is really color-coded. Now that we're into spring, everything is pastels... when carnality is being played against apathy, it's always warm colors and when desire has slipped away, everything looks faded or blue. Anyway, my art project for the month XD.
no subject
Date: 2012-05-19 12:59 am (UTC)