I need to gush a bit more about "Egao no Kimi wa Taiyou sa"; my previous post was made on New Year's Eve from my phone while I was drunk.
But now that I'm sober I think I can express my love for this song in more detail.
Right from the start this beat hits hard with a stomp/clap combo that sets the tone for an aggressive swagger component throughout an otherwise happy, uplifting song; at this point in the video the camera focuses briefly on a center-positioned Sayu, who fronts the intro dance with her own stomps and claps and a determined, confident look on her face, as if she's leading her troops into battle. Easily my heart pounds and my spine chills from this audio/visual combo.
The persistent four-on-the-floor kick drum that I've "complained" about in the past makes a return in this song, appearing right after the initial stomp-claps and during the chorus and post-chorus sections. Rather than existing alone or being accompanied by an equally persistent hi-hat on the counter-step as would be expected, however, it's instead tempered with sporadic-yet-smartly-placed 808-esque snares and a slower tempo clap persistence, essentially cutting the apparent song tempo in half; this simple change, along with the trap-music-style pattern during the verses, brings a huge difference in rhythmic sense from usual H!P fare and makes the song all the better. Even when the beat goes into high-tempo mode during the instrumental break it keeps the same style of flow instead of falling back on the same old house pattern.
On one hand, I would've liked a more fuller instrumentation during the verses, but on the other hand the more stripped-down sound vibes with my own rhythmic preferences and philosophies, making use of "negative spaces" to create funky syncopation through the careful balance of sound and lack of sound. And yet there's still a lot to listen for and enjoy, because 流石つんく.
The vocaloid-style samples kinda makes this song seem like a continuation of "Ai no Gundan", which would fit well with the "leading troops into battle" thing I mentioned earlier.
I also really like the deep-voiced "してりゃいい" line that pops up in the middle of the chorus, it creates a nice sudden break from the melodic sweetness and, by only popping up then and there, maintains its element of surprise.
The way the verse lyrics are structed seem awkward at first, stuffing almost too many syllables in such short timeframes and threatening to disrupt the sense of flow. Yet the more I listen to this song the more appreciative I am of it, because it ultimately avoids being overdone and is balanced by more spaced-out syllable passages. I'm somehow reminded of Kendrick Lamar, specifically [noembed]
[/noembed] with its triplet-stuffed fast-flow-slow-beat juxtaposition. These girls are rapping without actually rapping.
And really, that right there is why I love this song. It's EDM blessed and enhanced with subtle hip-hop flavor, cutesy charm with the right touch of attitude. This is pretty much the song I've been hoping for since the start of "Colorful Era" Reloaded Musume's current sound. "One Two Three" initially hinted at it and I loved that song for doing so, but it ultimately didn't go far enough in my opinion, which led to me responding with
my own remix to address such composition issues. "Egao no Kimi", on the other hand, I feel a lot less motivated to give my own spin on (though there's always a chance I may be inspired later) because it already gives me a lot of what I want right off the bat.
I've said before that I'm the type who doesn't buy singles and prefers albums instead...but between this song and the quirky catchiness of "What is Love?" I'm tempted to make yet another exception ("One Two Three" was the first when I got caught up in the hype of that time) regardless of how the third song turns out, just to let UFA know that I want more of this funky hip-hop bounce in H!P music. "Egao no Kimi" isn't perfect--I would've loved a stronger sound and sustained bass out of the kicks for some extra oomph, as well as some live instruments to counter the heavy electronic sound--but dammit, I'll take it.
Oh, you thought I was done praising this song? I still need to speak on the music video! Here it is again for top-of-a-new-page purposes:
Plain white set with crazy post-production effects. The recipe for those same old "budget" complaints many people turn to when it comes to H!P music videos...but in this case it doesn't look cheap at all. The bursts and streaks of color mesh perfectly with both the dance and the song itself, complementing key movements and key beats to provide some great visual punch to what should theoretically be a bland experience; I just love how such flat shapes transform into pseudo-3D settings. I do wish there was a bit more black in the effects and/or the girls' outfits for balance purposes, though--or the editors should've at least toned down the usage of the rainbow palette overlay.
The dance itself is nice, with the stomp-claps and appropriate bounciness to go with the music, though it kinda loses its luster with the line formation of the chorus. But starting off with Sayu's "y'all can't fuck with us" swagger totally makes up for it, and there's something about how Riho steps out of line to deliver the last lyric of the first chorus that just clicks for me. I'll probably have to wait for the dance shot to get a better appreciation of the choreography.
Zukki gets some decent screen time, which is always a good thing.
And once again I'm amused by the incredible shrinking Riho (someone should totally turn this idea into a fanfic or fanart
)...
(heh, this took longer than expected...consider this a make up for my relative lack of posting in recent months)
Topic: [01/29] Morning Musume '14 55th Single [Egao no.../Kimi no kawari/What is love] (Read 19860 times)