Tag: music

The Staying Power

Jeannie Marie Leave a comment

This week, one of my favorite bands released a music video. Well, not really a music video. It was a filmed performance of a song at one of their concerts from their last tour which, sadly, I was unable to attend. And just a few days ago, this video made big news.

Why, you may ask? Because it was Panic! At The Disco singing Bohemian Rhapsody.

Now I will be the first to say that my mom raised me right when it comes to music. Even though I pretty much missed the whole “Backstreet Boys” craze thing of the 90s (but hey, I still know almost every word to “I Want It That Way” so I’m not a total loser, right?), my mom raised me on The Eagles, The Beatles, The Four Tops, Duran Duran, Steppenwolf…the list goes on. When I was 8 I could probably sing every word to “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” and “A Hard Day’s Night”, and at the time I didn’t think this was a big deal; I didn’t know why my mom would make me listen to these old bands when all my friends were singing Christina Aguilera at me. But as I got older, I realized that my eternal love for classics was a really, really good thing.

I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with our current pop music. Believe me, I will be the first to admit that I’m that one girl screaming SHAKE IT OFF, JUST SHAKE IT OFF in her room while she’s changing her sheets (but only when my roommate isn’t around, of course). Last year Katy Perry’s “Roar” was my ultimate anthem. Pop music is vital to a country’s culture; it defines how the country feels at the moment, whether it be eternally sick of I’m so happyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy, or falling in love with Sia’s latest brilliance (â”Chandeliers” is seriously gorgeous). People can connect instantly by just mentioning a song they heard on the radio an hour ago.

But then where does that leave Panic! At The Disco? And where did Queen come from, and how did they get so popular? I think one of my favorite conversations revolving around music, especially when you make friends with people who like classic rock, is the “who will stay” conversation.

Starting around the 50s and 60s, brilliant artists emerged who decided to do things with music that had never been done before. Elvis swung his hips and Bob Dylan started a movement, and we remember those artists for their contribution to the art of music, even if we don’t listen to them. You’d be hard pressed to find someone who doesn’t recognize an Aerosmith song, or has never heard of Led Zepplin. But it’s a lot harder now to find artists who are breaking boundaries like these guys did because…well, these guys paved the way.

And the fact is, bands just aren’t popular anymore. Sure, you can lash out at me with about a dozen bands who put music on the radio consistently, but the majority of artists creating music are solo, which starkly contrasts with how it was from 1964 onwards.

So here you have Panic! At The Disco, a marginally popular but by no means explosive alt-pop band, covering Queen’s classic anthem? eulogy? I don’t even know how to classify the epic-ness that is “Bohemian Rhapsody”, but as I watched I seriously doubted if Brenden had the chops to perform such a heavily revered piece of art. I was pleasantly surprised that I did in fact enjoy it, but it made me wonder if my children will like Panic! At The Disco like I liked Queen. Of course, they’ll listen to it – even though I do admit to being a lover of pop I spend more time in the indie realm of music, and that’s where my children will be.

But when I introduce Death Cab for Cutie to them, will they instead be talking about that one Australian girl who tried to rap? I don’t know the answer to most of the questions I’ve asked, but I hope that the artists who work hard, who pour their blood and sweat and tears and soul into crafting lyrical and musical art, that they’ll be the ones that will be remembered – whether they come from a pop background or whether they hardly make the Billboard Top 100.

Right now, a song called “All About That Bass” is number one on the Top 100 chart. So I wonder – in ten years, will I be laughing at someone who covers it, or will I be clapping?

Special shoutout to the Billboard Top 100 for helping with some of the research…I mean really, how would I know that “All About That Bass” is number one right now?

Khalil Fong and the Lost Art of the Music Video

Jeannie Marie 14 Comments

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Throughout my time as a blogger for Arts at Michigan, I’ve talked about music in various ways – through concerts, through single releases, and through innovative lyrics that I find fascinating.

However, I have shied away from the topic of the music video, mostly because, to me, the issue is complex. I really enjoy music videos – I think they can add an interesting component to a song, and I often think of music video scenarios when I listen to songs that don’t have music videos.

But unfortunately, due to an overwhelming number of bad music videos throughout the years, I rarely ever seek out a music video to watch. If something comes up on my radar, through Facebook or some other social media, then sure, if it’s an artist I like, I’ll check it out. But honestly, I don’t like many music videos that I see anymore. I think they can provide a great opportunity to make something great and artistic, and yet most artists (or rather their companies) squander that gift.

But even though I don’t watch many American music videos, I enjoy watching kpop (read: Korean pop) music videos. In that genre, music videos are considered one of the most important aspects of that artists work, and thus many companies spend much time and effort into creating something that is visually appealing and entertaining, and while they aren’t all gems, a lot of them do come out being pretty good, in a way that I haven’t seen in American music videos in a long time. Because of this, though, I’ve watched more music videos this year than I have in the past.

Which brings me to the main point of this whole spiel, which is Khalil Fong.

A friend of mine showed me Khalil Fong a little while back early in the fall semester. She told me that he has an amazing voice and I should listen to him. She also told me that he sings in Mandarin. So alright, I already listen to Korean music, why not Mandarin? So I listened.

Instantly I was blown away by this man’s voice. With a perfect blend of pop, R&B, and jazz, Khalil creates a genre that is almost his own. No matter what he sings out of the three, whether it be a slow ballad with a full violin section, or an upbeat dance tune with a vintage-40s feel, his voice matches it perfectly.

Now, as a college student, I must say I’m very busy, and very bad about keeping up with artists. So when my Spotify told me that Khalil had a new song out, I didn’t listen right away even though I dearly love his music. But this weekend I took the time to listen to his new single 危險世界, which translates to “Dangerous World.” At first, my plan was to listen to a lot of different music that I’ve missed throughout the semester that has been collecting dust on my Spotify playlist. But I couldn’t listen to anything else after I heard – and saw – “Dangerous World.”

First off, this song. While it strays a bit from his pop/ballad roots (most of his songs are slow, easy going love songs), this single is pure gold. It has a distinct, 80s era Michael Jackson feel, but instead of making the song feel retro, vintage, or a copy, he adds in a futuristic, contemporary element that makes it feel like this song is the dangerous world. I honestly have been listening to nothing but this song for the past four days. It has an addictive bass and downbeat that always makes me want to dance, and every time he sings no no no no no, almost going into falsetto, interrupting the pre-chorus and launching straight into the next verse, I feel a small chill run down my spine. The song ends with an elaborately constructed breakdown, which feels like a reinvented dubstep beat until you hear the beautiful violins playing over the random noises and resounding bass. Overall, this song is amazing and I don’t care if you don’t understand him, you need to listen to it.

But the song isn’t it. Khalil also directed the music video, an elaborate 8 minute masterpiece involving gas masks, flying trains, revolutions, an elaborate kung fu sequence worthy of Jackie Chan, and an incredible blend of traditional Chinese dress and steampunk fashion. After finishing the video, I was left wondering what in the world I just watched, and wanted more. I’ve now watched the video multiple times, even though I already know the “surprise” at the end (which I won’t spoil for you). And thus, I’ve come to question what makes me love it so much.

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Is it the cinematography? The compelling story that I don’t quite understand? Is it the myriad of scenes that create convincing and interesting settings for me to watch? I don’t know the answer, but I do know that I want to share this video with anyone who is willing to watch it, and hopefully they’ll like it just as much as I do.

Khalil’s full album Dangerous World will be out April 11. You can pre-order it on iTunes here, which automatically comes with three songs, Dangerous World, Xiao Fang, and Lights Up, his single sung entirely in English.

Also if you watch the video and are extremely confused and would like to discuss theories please comment and I will share my ridiculous and by no means correct theory on what the music video’s plot is. 

A Rant About How Music Makes Me Feel

Erika Bell Leave a comment

Gosh, I’ve been so into my emotions lately and releasing/reveling in how I’m feeling and why I am feeling like that, and I just realized something. Whenever I am feeling some twisted, uncomfortable, gurgling, emotionally-stifled way, I will turn on my music and skip song after song until I find something that speaks to me; speaks to exactly how I am feeling. Sometimes the song will be perfect, sometimes it’s just that chorus, or that line, or that beat, that will cut open my repressed emotions and free everything that I’ve been feeling, giving me an opportunity to breath and release. I mean, I think Bob Marley had it all wrong with that music making you feel no pain thing… music makes you feel everything you need to feel and more. It gives you the words and the rhythm to express the anger you feel because you bombed that quiz, or the happiness you feel because the sun is shining after what has seemed like years of snow and coldness. Persian Rugs by Partynextdoor is my go-to song as I restlessly try and sleep but end up needing a calm emotional release from the 496 thoughts that are circling around my head at night. Old school Love Story by Taylor Swift gives me the perfect feeling of romance and love. Que Bailes Conmigo Hoy by Fifth Harmony gives me the push to walk outside not knowing how finicky the Ann Arbor weather will be, but knowing nothing can bring me down. Sanctified by Rick Ross is my Friday song because Friday is the day to feel like a boss. Anything Jhene Aiko motivates me to get out my homework and drink coffee, but for some reason I always end up pushing the homework away until it’s five hours later… My point is, I’ve been going through a dry spell with my music influences, but I think it is finally over! I can finally twirl around or smash my books against the wall as I blast a cathartic song in the background, and feel like it means something again! Sigh, I love music.

The Multi-Valenced Ann Arbor

Taylor Leave a comment

I really had no other reason to be at this concert besides who I was sitting next to. He asked and I said yes. Luckily.

I glimpsed (more like studied; the room was silent and there was little else to do besides read since my voice tends to fill most spaces even at their largest) at the program and read, “Schumann: Dichterliebe.” Or I at least read Schumann and had a flashback to curly hair, beautiful professor, Deleuze event, and something about “the Refrain.” Lately, I’ve often forgot how amazing it is to be at the University of Michigan, not because it is amazing

(the Central Student Government silences and oppresses the very students it claims to represent)

but rather because there are a lot of opportunities for class and life and interests to have a real conversation. Namely, there are chances to take what I study and apply it to situations OR I can see what I study “in the real world,” which, as an English and Philosophy student, is sometimes difficult. Tucked behind/beside/near the Aut Bar (some could say a gay bar, family restaurant, or gay studies lab), the Kerrytown Concert Hall is one of the cutest venues I’ve been in and I absolutely love the cozy atmosphere. There is a facade of escape at such concerts, and for me the escape is heightened when the music performed isn’t from this century–it is my form of time travel.

(Since, as I’ve said, campus life is beyond unbearable, and this is coming from a person with almost all agent social identities, i.e., I identify as a white, cis-man, middle class, temporarily able-bodied person . . . . And to see not only the student government act atrociously but also other students stand behind such actions makes me (on the tame side of my emotions) want to never look at this campus again. And then when you pile on my queerness, I’m ready to evacuate immediately and call this campus, more or less, a war zone where a majority of my friends and my community remain unsafe on a daily basis. I would like to travel by any means necessary: time, space.)

As the Schumann started, I realized that I had analyzed (or been in the presence of an analysis of) this very piece’s first movement. For a Deleuze Interest Group event. How did a friend taking me to a concert send me spiralling into the philosophico-musical feels? I don’t know, but it happened.

The song melted away, much like when I oil pull in the morning–it starts of granular? or at least in some conglomeration of solid until it melts into a liquid and congeals in some sort of liquid mass of “detoxification and whitening”–and only solidified, perhaps, when I left the venue, walked away, into my night (a drag show). Chords unfinished continued to haunt me as a queen flashed the audience and I was left agasp not at perfectly sculpted breasts but at Schumann, lurking just behind me, never to be fully seen or taken in.

After a few more songs that helped to fill out the theme of “A Lovers’ Discourse” started, happened, and ended, the pianist/composer/friend-of-my-friend-on-the-left-of-me’s compositions began.

The first. Three Frank O’Hara poems. The second. One Sylvia Plath poem.

Now it is dangerous, as someone who “studies literature,” to attend such events. I have been trained to be a snob, although the training has been undertaken, more often than not, by myself. SO. I obviously have a lot of feels about these two songs.

I think what matters most to me, and to this blog, is not how I felt about the composition itself (which I loved by itself, however, I disliked the tenor singing the lyrics of the poetry since I felt there was a HUGE disconnect between form and content, which could be the point even though I doubt) but how I felt inside of someone’s interpretation of the poetry. Live music is not just something I listen to, but I become the music. It fills my nostrils, it enters my body, and fills, yes, “my soul.”

(My soul aches. I am aching because the Ann Arbor campus, a place I was taught and eventually learned to love in some real way, is parasitic to its most important inhabitants. It is a sad thing for an institution to remain passive when individual, one-off microaggressions happen. It is an unspeakable offense for an institution committed to “social justice and diversity” to enact the very crimes it condemns. The rampant racism, transphobia, ableism, homophobia, sexism is abhorrent. I can only hope the University and its various governing bodies take responses like this one to heart and take responsibility, acknowledge their accountability, and do things (not just say things) to rectify what they’ve done.)

And I hated the interpretation. Though it was refreshing to be in a conversation about poetry without using any words. It was like listening to the most beautiful one-sided debate, and I was the other team refusing to speak.

What is beautiful about this campus may be purely aesthetic. I can study, I can read, I can feel, and then I can go and see things enacted, performed, experimented with by those in or near my community.

Days like today I cling to the aesthetic, sit in my corner, and count the minutes I have left before I can take flight.

WOAH IM SO EXCITED I CANT BREATHE, WHAT HELLO WHERE AM I

Taylor Leave a comment

I’m at the point in my life/semester/being where I’m overwhelmed by living–it’s just so damn exciting. I wake up and get to learn, get to work, get to work out, get to read, get to love, get to eat, get to dance (my knee is more or less healed), I get to be.

I get to listen to 2ne1’s new album and RuPaul’s new album. AKA life is good.

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I find myself so excited, or so overwhelmed by emotion, or so confused, that I cannot breath. Akin to panic/anxiety attacks, this type of attack is, what I’ve learned, what it means for me (in this moment) to be alive. It’s like an eternal trill on pick-your-instrument. So exciting, so fast, so pretty, so alarming.

I finished (one of) my favorite book(s) yesterday. I got to jog two days in a row. I frolicked in the sun. I made an amazing meal. I met a friend’s girlfriend. I spent much needed time with a semi-significant other. And, of course, bad things happened, but it’s in this moment that I just need to celebrate the good stuff.

Tomorrow (after 4:30) marks the first inhalation of Spring Break and I’ll be holding my breath until it ends.

It’s like when you step into UMMA, wander upstairs, and see Monet *literally* just peeking at you. It’s like wandering into a club to see your friend DJ-ing. It’s like walking down the street and having someone across the intersection belting Beyonce. It’s like almost slipping on ice and then catching yourself in a bush. Pretty much the best thing ever.

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So even if I’m utterly bored by still being in undergrad. Even if it surprised snowed at me after a Bio exam (#lol). Even if everyone is really a mess. Even if I will have never gone anywhere for Spring Break EVER.

I still have this one panicked breath. And that, really, is all I need.

I Don’t Have Any Big Dreams: Positive Messages in Korean Rap

Jeannie Marie 1 Comment

At first look, there are probably three things that you will tell me about the band BTS.

  1. They are all Asian (Korean, to be specific)
  2. They are singing in a different language
  3. They are very young

And yes, I’m aware of all three of these facts, and yes, I still choose to listen to them. They ended up being one of my favorite bands of 2013, and are going to release a single and album this week, which is one reason why I’m talking about them.

But another reason is the fact that every time I listen to their first single, it strikes me again how odd the lyrics are – but how much I love them.

For reference, BTS is a K-pop band, K-pop being “that one song Gangnam Style.” BTS is also an initialism (not an acronym – thanks Hank Green), short for “Bangtan Boys’ which translates as “Bulletproof Boy Scouts” which, in a weird way, makes sense, since these boys range in age from 16 to 21 years old – basically boy scouts age, when taken in the context of the entertainment sphere.

The song I’m referring to is called “No More Dream”, and with the backdrop of burning buildings and a crashed school bus in the music video, you’d think that BTS, a hip-hop/rap group, are boys singing about being lazy and not having dreams, which, to be fair, is a logical explanation. But thanks to both the internet and the smart execs at Loen Entertainment, the company that reps BTS, the lyrics which are sung/rapped in Korean can be magically transformed into English.

And they convey the exact opposite of what you’d think upon first glance. Oh sure, the first verse starts off well – in English they say “I wanna big house, big cars and big rings, but really I don’t have any big dreams - obviously lending their voice to the youth in Korea. But the boys go on to sing “Go your own way, even if you live for a day, do something, put weakness away” and the main chorus consists of them pointing at the screen, demanding to know “What’s your dream?” and “Is that it?” The last line of the song ends with one of the members stating “For all the youth without dreams,” making it clear who their audience is.

Part of me wants to believe that this is just a song. In truth, most hip-hop/rap groups that are popular in Korea sing about trivial things, and aren’t as explicit nor as raw as the hip-hop in America, because they represent different things. Popular rap (excluding the Korean rap subculture) is meant for consumption by the highly conservative Korean media, not for boundary pushing, which is one reason why I like BTS, since they obviously are taking on the hip hop persona but aren’t actually appropriating or disrespecting the hip hop culture grown and bred in America in order to entertain viewers (although it can be said that the fact that they are even singing hip hop without knowing and experiencing the history behind it is still representative of appropriation, but I’m not as strict with my definition). But because BTS isn’t a group that is meant to push boundaries and sing about things that Korean media would deem inappropriate – what ARE they going to sing about?

And to me, that’s the beauty of the song. I mean, they’re 19 years old for crying out loud. They represent the youth they talk about in their song, which makes them an authentic voice. They’ve also gone on to help write and produce their work in the future, which also contributes to the fact that their singing about what they know, not what a company told them to sing. And in particular, this song serves to criticize the culture they live in, asking their peers to have a dream, even if it’s something as small as studying in order to graduate high school and go to college, which are both things mentioned in the song.

Altogether, it’s kind of funny to me that this group, attempting to come off as hardcore hip-hop, chose to sing about positive messages such as inspiring dreams within kids who are apathetic to the world around them. But maybe that’s the inherent beauty of it – that rap is becoming a mode of social critique in South Korea, just as it’s often viewed in America. And however strange, it’s something that I really enjoy and appreciate, and hope to see more of in the future – both in Korea and here in the U.S.