作詞：つんく 作曲：つんく 編曲：平田祥一郎
Tsunku and Shoichiro. I have no other words. Classic combo.
I
generally won’t be talking about the idols in this space too much, but I
am compelled to since this was Ogata’s last single. She looks so great
in this video and she will be missed by me. I don’t think she was a
great singer, but she was a beauty in the top ranks in my opinion, up
there with Dawa and Aarii, in my opinion. Anyways, I am in lust with
Ha-chin and Akane-chin’s little scene at 3:34, I must have watched that
exchange like 15 times now…. Also I am so glad that 12ki got to be
featured in this video. It gives a glimmer of what Musume will be like
in 4+ years…
So this song reminds me of Tribal House Music ,
mainly because of the syncopation and the bongos. I strongly recommend
that you guys really listen to some of these instrumentals of these H!P
songs. They are really fanastic. You can really hear the percussion in
the song. You should check ot this one in particular, it really
highlights the strenth of the instrumental and the strentgh of the
melody.
The most notable thing for this song was YOSHIKO‘s dance routine dance routine (They talk about it in the “180605 FULL CHORUS Morning Musume'18 talk+perf (1080p h265)” episode of Full Chorus), if you can hunt it down. Its very tribal / african,
especially that koko kara deshita part. I love love love it! The girls
don’t have any booty (except my Yokoyan and my Pheromone Diva
Sakura-chan), but they were trying to sling it in this routine. They get
an A for effort. I am going to resist the urge to talk about the
routine for the entirety of the review, but I really liked it.
So
in my book, of the many talents Tsunku has, writing melodies and lyrics
are at the top for me. This dude is older than me but he still can write
lyrics from a young girl’s point of view so well! This song is
literally a young lady who is jealous and in love with a guy she thinks
she probably doesn’t deserve. So she is fixated on making him prove he
loves her by demanding so much from him because she is insecure.
Anyways,its a great story.
So men culminate all the deeds done in
the past and add them up to figure out how they feel about you, but I’m
guessing ladies only think about, “What have you done for me lately?”
We start this song off in a similar way, lol. Basically the protagonist
is saying that, to prove your love for me you need to continually do
new acts of love for me. Otherwise you don’t love me.
Then the
protagonist starts talking about how she envys all these other girls and
she want to be them, likely because they have the type of relationship
she thinks is ideal. They say that in every relationship there is a
person who likes the other person, more than the other person returning
their love, and it seems like the protagonist loves her boyfriend more
than he likes her. Its funny because the girls in Musume have to be like
in like the top 5% of Japan in attractiveness, but they are singing
about these unflattering love positions like common girls, its great.
(Not that beautiful people have more functional relationships, but its
generally not made public like Nakamori Akina for example).
Favorite
Line is without a doubt is the line that makes her seem the most
despirate. Isshoni ita ato wa, fuanshikanai (After we are together the
only thing that lingers is the anxiety). As if she can only believe he
loves her while they are together and in her arms. Otherwise, she is
constantly worrying that he is looking at other girls and stuff. This is
the kind of protagonist I love, and I love the feeling of imagining
these beautiful women as regular jealous girls. Tsunku sure knows how to
write protagonists that I moe over… smh.
As I look over the
lyrics, it really seems like its possible the protagonist could have
been cheated on by her boyfriend and is now feeling really bad about her
relationship and wanting to leave, while still being attracted to the
guy. But still I think that its a jealous girl trying to get her
boyfriend to prove his love, because she is insecure. Either way, I
think the “Are you Happy?” is directed to the boyfriend.
The song
is in Dmin. The melody is superb, especially in the pre-chorus and the
repetitive chorus. There aren’t a bunch of changes in the chord
progressions until the chorus anyways, this is a melody showcase, imo.
In the beginning of the song, the melody basically bounces back and
forth from the 1 and the 5. Then when they get to the motto watashi dake
part, its a 1st, 3rd, 5th, and the 8th degrees but layered as a chord
in the harmonization. Then at the Jishinmonai part that Miki sings she
goes from the 4th to the 3rd to the 2nd to the first degree and then the
5th, but the Second one with “Shiawasei” is 4, 3, 2, flat 5. Then comes
the orgasmic pre-chorus with “you know” chorus which is like that “doitsumo koitsumo” buddist chant thing
Berryz did. Its splendid. The chant has 3 rhythms in it, the sung “You
know” line, then 2 different lines (Aitsu wa iina) chanting the same
words with different rhythm: a constant 8th notes part; and a part
chanted to a rhythm similar to the bongos in the background. So the “You
know” is a 5th sliding to the sustained 4th degree. The chorus itself
(Sugoi suki) Sakura-chan singing 5, 2, 3, then Mizuki singing 5, 7, 6.
So
much like any house track, the beat is mostly percussion and
syncopation. Notable percussion is the bongo, vibraphone / xylophone
(Jishinmonai and sugoi suki parts), and the triangle. There is also the
syncopated keyboard stabs that are associated with house music. Its too
hard to show the syncopation without me recording myself doing it, but
this song has a lot of it. Almost every vibraphone hit is syncopated,
and the bongos are playing a syncopated rhythm. Syncopation makes me
want to dance, so naturally this song has me feeling “as bashful as a
tribal dance.” There is minimal harmony going on outside of the vocals.
The basslines bring it hard and make the melody sound as great as it is,
but outside of that there are a couple of keyboard jabs here and there,
but this is a melody heavy song and I LOVE it!
So naturally I
love Tsunku songs, but this one is one of his special ones, the kind of
song only Tsunku could of wrote and only Hello!Project would greenlight.
Its so peculiar in the pop scene. To a music lover like me its nothing
new, but I can imagine this being wtf to regular idol music lovers.
Tsunku almost drug me back to the 90’s with this one. Anyhow, I hope
people can appreciate that no one else is really making this kind of
music in the idol scene. Ever wondered what real music is.. this is it
kiddos…
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