I always tune into C4 and watch the popular music videos of today. It's nice to enjoy what casual music listeners would, once in a while. The catchiness and simplicity of pop songs should not be undervalued. It serves its own purpose well - to enliven the lives of mainstream demographics (which consist of a LOT of people). Nothing is wrong with that. I was pissed to hear Will.I.Am repeating "Tonight's gonna be a good night" all over again but if some could relate to that phrase and belt it out on top of their lungs out of happiness - Why not?
Yet, today I watched Ashley Tisdale's latest offering and I was pissed. And I could not even see the brighter side of it. My ears tingled when I heard the chorus of the new song. It blatantly copies the one in Pink's "So What". It's disgustingly cheap and it retraces my memories to similar cases with other songs. The chorus of Pink's "U + UR Hand" clearly resembles a song by The Veronicas (though I'm not bothered to find out which song came out first). One could easily sing Ciara's "Oh" on top of Cherish's "Do It To It". On another note, that song by David Arguetta and Kelly Rowland explicitly copies the piano riff from "Clocks" by Coldplay (the band which, ironically, has been accused for plagiarism before).
I'm not a fan of any of those artists and I'm not defending any of them. In fact, I'm ridiculing myself to care so much about pop artists. But as a listener, I do feel insulted. I admit it is justifiable in various ways. The songs might be written by the same people or some kind of agreement might be arranged to 'allow' such ripping off. I don't know. And I'm not glorifying myself here for identifying the similarities since I'm certain a lot of people are aware of it too. But I'm insulted by the fact that I could visualize an evil music producer saying "Let's spoon-feed the public some tried-and-tested melody and make some easy millions here. Who cares if the airwaves are polluted by recycled music? Let's market it through some fresh-faced pop sensation. Who cares if she hasn't got a genuine artistic talent to compensate as long as we make her expose some skin? That'll sell". Let's imagine he finishes these lines with some evil grin and a classic villainy laugh. Include a cuddly exotic cat in the picture too.
Plagiarism in music is by no means a new thing. It has involved artists ranging from various genres and even those who have established respectable reputation in the field (Les Paul, George Harrison, Bee Gees, and Nirvana - to mention a few big shots who have been accused in their careers). So when some new millennium producers attempt to plant some so-called pop sensations' feet in the industry by exploiting an already successful and popular melody line from only a few years back and manage to get away with it, maybe I should ask myself - Who gives a crap?
I must be having too much time on my hand for caring. Hehe.
2 comments:
Ahh good to know that you're back in the blogging world ;)
Anyway, yes, I'm really not a fan of songs written by lazy writers. Even if you're copying someone else's piece of music, make sure you do it in style and turn it into something truly amazing that it will be less annoying. A musician (was it Bob Dylan? I can't remember) said that it's not wrong to copy other people's music as long as you can create something exciting, fresh and fantastic out of it..Or something like that. I think what he meant was to make other people's creation as an inspiration, not to rip off and call your own.
Ok clearly I'm as free as you are now. Haha.
ps, seriously jangan main jauh-jauh lama-lama from blogspot..cause you always write good stuffs ;)
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