fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2495 ]

[ SECRET POST #2495 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2495 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[ ----- SPOILERY SECRETS AHEAD ----- ]

07. [SPOILERS for Legend of Korra]

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09. [WARNING for rape]
[repeat]

Notes:

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Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It's just as manufactured and terrible as the shit back home, and it's always about the same bullshit just like the shit back home

well, I guess that's correct, in the sense that it's equally incorrect to say those things about Western pop music as it is about Jpop/Kpop. But, no, I don't agree with you. I don't think that pop music is terrible. I think a lot of it is really good considered as music. I don't think that the themes that pop music addresses are bullshit - mostly they're themes that matter to people, matter really deeply and immediately, being addressed in ways that are not subtle but that are powerful and immediate and affecting. Even if it deals only with desire and the shit that people feel when they're out dancing, those are not unimportant things or bullshit. If you say that it's manufactured, I don't know what you mean. It's made by people (usually not the same people who sing it, but still - written and produced by people) and each product is unique in the sense that it's a different song. Is it made within a system, does it sometimes sound a bit same-y, is it largely corporate? Sure - but the same could be said for most music across most genres, it's hardly something unique to pop.

I don't want to get into the loudness war stuff (b/c I don't really care one way or the other) except to say that I don't think that the difference in mixing sound levels means that the music is any better or worse.

Basically pop music rules and that's a fact (it's cool if you're not into it though)

My point was that if people are saying that Jpop/Kpop is better/deeper, what they virtually always mean is that it has deeper themes/the artists have more say in creating it/it's less homogenous. But it's not. It's objectively not. If you don't care about those elements, or you're interested because of those elements (as you seem to be), then obviously you'll love it. But if you hate those elements in Western music, Asian music isn't going to be magically better.

For me, it's the monotony of pop music that I can't stand. I could stomach some of it back in the 80s/90s when it was objectively less homogenous than it is now, but I cannot stand the same shit over and over. I just can't. That's personal taste, of course, and if someone likes listening to the same melodies over and over (and louder and louder), that's their business. But if they're like me and can't, Asian pop isn't going to be any better.

Personally, I disagree with that as someone with a music background. I don't listen to much K-pop so I can't judge it, but my experience with J-pop has been that there is far more stuff that has what I consider to be genuinely pretty tunes and good vocal work.

And by "pretty tunes," I mean things like these:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWoJLdXJt0E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WQEeKL2IO0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcFmWZEBzNU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aHqlX58uVA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZDrB0Jtrps

Songs where the instrumentals support the vocals instead of the other way around, in other words. The only English groups I've found that come close to having tunes like that are things like Evanescence, Within Temptation, Fireflight, and Paramore.

Put another way, I can put a J-pop radio station on and listen to it to hours and enjoy most of the music they play. (Most, not all, because like anything else, it has its duds too.) Western popular radio? I can't stand even twenty minutes of it.

I'm not as familiar with the rest of the artists, but using Utada Hikaru for comparison to your usual pop dreck isn't exactly fair; while her songs might be popular, she writes music and for a Western equivalent is closer to singer-songerwriters like Nora Jones. Of course her work is going to be higher quality.

But most Jpop? Augh, it cannot drive me out of the store that's playing it fast enough (just like the top 40 stations back home).

Wiki'ing the last one (that song is lovely, btw) Shikata Akiko appears to also be a singer-songwriter and composer who plays multiple instruments. So more like Vienna Teng.

Vienna Teng/Norah Jones =/= Katy Perry/Ke$ha, is what I'm saying. The former just write music, some of which happens to be popular. The latter do pop music. You like the Japanese version of the former. Which is awesome!

EDIT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wgm3GkpohEA

...This is not pop, for example. In other news, I have a new composer from whom to buy all the CDs! Thank you, DA!

Edited 2013-11-02 06:15 (UTC)

Haha, you're welcome! If you like Shikata Akiko, I would also recommend checking out Shimotsuki Haruka, as her music is in a similar vein.

I admit, I don't much care for stuff like idol groups or even most idol singers, but there are enough gems like the ones I linked to make it easier to find things I like. And I do like a bunch of groups that are more traditional pop music, like SID, GRANRODEO, L'Arc~en~Ciel, T.M.Revolution, LiSA, BUMP OF CHICKEN, etc. (I also admit to a deep and lasting love for Ayumi Hamasaki and Namie Amuro.)

Western music... ehhh. I don't think I like even one of what's considered the popular groups/singers these days. My favorite group is Poets of the Fall, which... isn't even American, so I don't know if that really counts!

Bah, Ayumi Hamasaki is part of the old wave who was producing before the homogenization/loudness wars kneecapped mainstream pop with the blandness hammer. As is T.M. Revolution.

And thank you thank you thank you for the recs! I could not be more delighted with their work.

Don't mention it! I absolutely love their music and I'm always happy to introduce new people to it.

And throwing in just a few more recs-- Ceui, KOKIA, Lia, Yoshioka Aika, Amano Tsuki(ko), Suara, and Fujita Maiko are all singers I also enjoy a great deal.

I linked songs by Ceui and Fujita Maiko up there, but here are some songs by the others:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgwvEyE67Ig - Suara
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOI9Jq8NH9Q - Amano Tsuki(ko)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fey6trfOWpQ - KOKIA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NgBeWedqQ_w - Yoshioka Aika
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYb5GLACWMY - Lia

They all have beautiful voices, and I know Amano Tsuki(ko), Yoshioka Aika, Lia, and KOKIA are songwriters too.

My point was that if people are saying that Jpop/Kpop is better/deeper, what they virtually always mean is that it has deeper themes/the artists have more say in creating it/it's less homogenous. But it's not. It's objectively not.

Well, I agree with that point, really. I don't think that Jpop/Kpop are different on a fundamental level from Western pop music. But that's not really the thing in your post that I was disagreeing with (nor is your personal dislike for pop music; taste is taste). What I'm disagreeing with is the stuff about pop music being manufactured, terrible, about terrible topics, banal, dull, repetitive, etc. Pop music can be and often is good music. If it sounds repetitive to you, that's not the same as it being repetitive.

And with all due respect, if your defense of the validity of personal taste is "It's all just personal taste! It's fine if you're an idiot who likes to listen to the same awful, shitty melodies constantly repeated", that's kind of BS. I also think that it's unfair to define anything that you like or that's successful out of pop music (re: your other posts) - it doesn't stop being pop music just because it's well written or thoughtful, any more than stuff from the 80s and 90s that you liked stops being pop music. Ke$ha is not the sum total of pop music.

Basically what I'm getting at here is that pop music can be good and there is nothing wrong with liking it, because some of it is good. It's not intrinsically shit, it's not all repetitive. If some of it is repetitive shit, some of it isn't. Pop music is not the enemy.

If it sounds repetitive to you, that's not the same as it being repetitive.

No, as per the study I linked, it doesn't just "sound repetitive to (me)", it is more repetitive than it has been in 60 years. And it is getting progressively more homogenous. That's not a personal opinion of mine - that's a fact. That there are exceptions (that's great!) does not change the overall trend/the overall effect of listening to Top 40 for hours.

If some of it is repetitive shit, some of it isn't.

More and more of the former with every passing year. Less and less of the latter.

Pop music is not the enemy.

I never said it was "the enemy". I said I don't like it, and I told you why. It's growing more and more homogenous with every passing year (not an opinion), and that - in my own personal opinion - makes it worse. If that doesn't, in your own personal opinion, obviously you're still going to enjoy it! Or rummage through the ever-increasing monotony to find the gems. I don't care to, personally. You might.

I'm always going to be a little skeptical of any study that has such a headline-grabbing thesis... More importantly, though - as you do point out - that kind of broad study is only going to have validity on the level of very broad analysis, not on the level of analysis of individual pieces of music or performers. If you think that pop as a whole is getting worse over the passage of time, to me, that's a different opinion than saying pop is intrinsically shitty. The first one is at least considering it seriously and giving it the option of being good and allows you to consider individual songs on their merits; the second one is the one that just dismisses it out of hand. Rummaging through monotony to find gems doesn't bother me; what annoys me is the idea that there couldn't possibly be any gems because 'pop music is awful'.

Again I don't really care whether you listen to pop music, I'm just saying, it's not all awful and it's not all about awful topics. That's just not true.

I agree, "all" is very different from "most", and "an increasingly greater proportion". I did not mean to imply that all pop is shit, and I apologize for giving that impression. I've personally been done with the genre for a while, and I was just explaining why.

Rummaging through monotony to find gems doesn't bother me

Well then, I bow to your perseverance! It is far greater than my own. Enjoy your gems.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ SECRET POST #2495 ]

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