I’ve been doing a bit of a deep dive into Twice’s title track to celebrate the release of Talk That Talk, and I noticed that More & More and Scientist stick out in a bad way when compared to Twice’s other title tracks. At first, I was like ‘well it’s just cause they’re not that great,’ but the songs aren’t inherently bad. In fact, I think that if they were released by any other group I would have liked them more. So why do they feel so awkward in Twice’s discography? I listened to the songs as well as their instrumentals and compared them to Twice’s other more recent songs, and when taking a look at the credits, I noticed something.
In the credits for More & More and Scientist are artists that have barely worked in k-pop. Then I remembered that both songs were throwaway tracks meant for western artists Zara Larson and Anne-Marie and then everything clicked. The reason More and More and Scientist stand out is because they don’t sound like true k-pop songs, they sound like western pop songs with a weak k-pop filter over them. The cheese may be k-pop but the meat and potatoes are western pop. JYPE sprinkled some kpop over songs with western pop structures and used them to try to push Twice into the western market and it just didn’t work.
It’s also why the songs sound awkward when compared to the rest of Twice’s discography, they weren’t made from the beginning to be kpop songs. And Twice are k-pop through and through. If someone is getting into k-pop and wants an introduction to the genre, Twice is a very good place to start because they are a perfect example of what it sounds like. So of course putting two barely kpopified western songs into a group that’s signature sound IS stereotypical kpop would make those songs stand out in a bad way, especially since they’re title tracks.
I’m just mad at JYPE for being so lazy when it comes to More & More and Scientist. Instead of hiring producers using the money Twice made them to make songs that, from the beginning of production, are meant for Twice; they decided to buy two random songs from mid-tier western pop acts and pass them off as Twice songs. And these songs are Twice’s least liked title tracks amongst the fanbase so was it really worth it? I just hope JYPE learns from the less-than-great reception Scientist got and won’t be so lazy in the future. They need to spend more time picking out quality title tracks, not just picking rejected songs from a different genre. I just wish More & More Scientist were b-sides instead of title tracks. Moral of the story, give Twice title tracks made with their sound in mind. If I get another rejected western pop song I just might lose it.
Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk.
TLDR: Scientist and More & More were two western pop songs shoehorned into the discography of a girl group with a very kpop focused sound and it just didn't work.