Something that has been keeping me from enjoying kpop recently

Quote from common-nobody

But if you look at western artists that don't write OR produce, they still sit down with the producers, writers, MV directors, etc, to establish what they wanna do

This doesn't happen in kpop. In kpop, the staff are contacted by the company, get their cash and move on to another production

but how do we know that it's that way for all groups

there are a lot (more each generation and as the groups themselves mature) self-producing or groups that write their own lyrics or whatnot...

sure a lot is controlled by the company especially during early on/rookie years but most groups in their 4/5 year have contributed a lot more towards their own music/MV/direction no?

yes it is always like this, kpop is tightly control by the company

kpop is highly manufactred music industry

I agree, everyone was guilty of this even my own fandom, constantly blaming the company, staffs, producers, stylists and choreographers for everything and gives their faves full credits for every success they get. kpop was a mistake, I will admit it

edit: oops wrong thread

anyways I just enjoy the music lol

Quote from Ves

While I do feel this is true for some groups, I'm also cognizant that this image may be heavily tainted by what Western Media wants us to see. When KPOP was rising, the west ran a dearth of articles vilifying it. Did they lie? No, but they certainly tried to make it seem like it's only KPOP that happens in.

Not all western artists write their own work or even gets lots of say in their music. There are western stars that have come out of the industry and told us how their label wants them to present a certain image and they were limited to this or that, etc.

And like you've seen, there are KPOP idols that break that mold. Imma name drop BTS here cause they're coming back in June. ANTICIPATE!!!!

I agree until the last paragraph, BTS? Wtf there are plenty self produced bgs out there. Ehjsuxwjhsjxgsuwhdhjwjh

kpop is not guinue music, kpop is commercialized music

Quote from Ves

YOU KNOW MY NUGU FAVES???? JUNE 10TH!! CHECK MY SIG

You were so fucking cool, unnie. Until the last paragraph that is. My respect for you went down the drain soon after.

i am too tired to reply to this fully rn, so for now i will say this: prod suga is some real shit. and not just him obvi and i hate being that one person but ppl stick by bts for a reason and a lot of it is their own artistry being able to shine through almost all of the time. i mean rm is a fucking genius and the other members are great writers (some producers too!) so i guess this isn't something i've thought abt too much.

i shall add on in the morning.

love u tho

Idols have always been more performers than producers/writers, they tend to be the ones that deliver what the company requires. It's true that is often up to random producers to release a instrumental and do a mixing job decently, but it's also up to the idols to deliver their vocals, raps, dancing and overall performance the best they can, and those are a lot of things on an already perfectionist industry, so that's why writing/producing is more like a bonus for those idols who are truly interested on the creative process of creating a song from zero.

i have gotten a little caught up with this myself and i have become the annoying "they co-produce", "it's co-written by them" & "X producer/choreography/lyricist/etc. also did well!!" person in every reactor's comment section :)

I feel like there are important distinctions to be done:

1) When someone agrees RV has the best female discography (and I do think that) then that one simply find their music the best, regardless of who composed the songs . The reason why I find RV music the best is exactly a consequence of the fact they have several producers with time to compose a plethora of songs for them.

2) Kpop has a prolific output of songs, with every group issue several songs a year. With so much music released I find borderline impossible for a self produced group to issue constant quality music without help of several producers. I usually find SM groups albums pretty good and consistent and it's true they barely write lyrics, so consistent output and not composing music aren't mutually exclusive

3) It's impossible to really gauge how much any group actually contribute in non composing roles, such as art direction and executive production. We can have an idea, but it's mostly speculation

4) Some idols just lack the skill or outright don't want or feel they need to compose a thing and that's not a bad thing in any way. Many of them engaged in idol life because they like performing arts and enjoying being a celebrity and there isn't anything to feel sorry about, unless the idols are being blocked to express themselves freely through their music.

5) Saying western artists in majority actively compose and are the criative minds behind their work is an overstatement. We live in a era where people recording music on their own homes, produced by people who live in Sweden and they never met. Most of Latin and Anglo featurings are done this way, each one recording their own parts and emailing the producers to remix everything together

6) PERFORMING ARTS ARE ARTS. It's 2022 and kpop fan still not accepting that simple fact. If you sing or dance, you are an artist. Boggles my mind how the absence of composition somewhat disqualifies idols to be artists, seems a narrowed definition of what art is. If not writing lyrics does not make you an artist, I suppose not singing live disqualify you to be a singer too, you stan composing dancers, but alas I digress

but why recently lol especially since more and more groups seem to be having more of a say in their music compared to the past

RV have one of the best discographies simply because they have quality music, it's not deep.

And I don't know about other groups currently but Monsta X do have a say in their songs, they sit down and choose what producers have to offer and if they don't like it they can offer something else. That's how Gambler happened, which was produced and written by Jooheon. I assume it's a similar process with other groups, at least in Starship. Doesn't SKZ, SVT and BTS have a say in their songs too? From female idols I never heard much about, but at least Hyuna and g idle I am 100% sure they have a say in their music and concepts too.

Quote

But if you look at western artists that don't write OR produce, they still sit down with the producers, writers, MV directors, etc, to establish what they wanna do

idk about other groups but thats literally what happens with SHINee

Like criminal director invited Taemin over to his house so they can edit together

Quote from common-nobody

Oh I didn't know that '-'

You're always promoting SHINee lol Are u hired by SM cause you'd probably do a good job in marketing

eh na

Its just the truth

Alot of groups become more involved as they get seniority

Quote from common-nobody

it's true they have quality music lol i never denied it but it's given to them by SM cause they have the money to get a good team. if they were from another company then their music wouldn't be as good and you would sll blame it on the producers

Their voices are one of the things I love the most in RV, they sound different from other ggs, so I would probably still enjoy their music. But it's true their producers influence the most on how their music sound, and I'm thankful for that tbh. It's like this all around the globe, if you make pop music and have a shitty producer and tools then your music will suck.

I believe they get a say in albums at the very least, but very little in the title tracks. Even Twice who writes the majority of their albums, is at JYPEs mercy for their titles. Or there are groups that have writing credits but aren't allowed to pick the instrumental

thats the appeal to kpop imo

i dont need every artists to tell me before every albums how special it is, how its the "real them", how it was so much work , etc etc etc, when its manufactured all to hell

ed sheeran(the king of self written) even admitted, he only wrote shape of you after the labeled said he needed a lead single and he didnt have one

the west is too "serious" with music, everything is "personal", and they want you to believe that, but the truth is, it isnt, you probably get more genuine interactions with kpop idols through vlive/bubble then any western artists dropping an album then fucking off

Quote from common-nobody

i'm here for the music too but it gets annoying how stans cherry-pick when to blame the company and when not to. i guess that's my biggest problem. they love to label their fave's successes as theirs but their mistakes as the company's fault

just stan JYPE groups, then you blame the company 100% of the time

Quote from common-nobody

note

I don't wanna convince anyone of anything with this post. It's just a rant of mine. You can give your thoughts!

Blackpink have proven that they decide stuff even about the MVs, yet their fanbase STILL blames their bad songs or lyrics on Teddy and YG

I have a huge problem with this statement. First of all, most of the critics and blames for "bad" songs comes from outside the fandom, the only ever song that the fandom didn't like it as much was BYW, and the problem was the autotune and other major problems the fandom with songs usually goes with the choruses drops or line distribution, outside of those specifics points, we blinks don't have a problem with Teddy producing but we still want other producers to work with BP because of variety.

Now our problems with yg and the music, are very different, mostly we hate how many songs they release when we do know that there is a lot of songs recorded yet they only release a little number for each comeback, also I know it was confirmed by Teddy that supposedly they don't want to overexpose people with releases, but that represents his ideals combined with his history with yg. If you notice every yg acts release fewer songs, so the excuse of overexposing is an excuse for the entire label, not especifically because the girls want that.

Another of our problems here is the non creditation of the girls, we all know the girls were trained to write lyrics and stuff, that is common in yg trainees, yet yg don't credit them. There has been points that even the girls have said they did participate in the writing of some songs like Stay or Solo, yet they weren't credited, and now that the girls have finally got some credits, yg takes a lot of time doing the registration of the songs in KOMCA, a problem that happened with LSG and OTG. Perhaps if you look a more into it you kinda notice that LSG is one of the most loved songs inside the fandom, and not even because we finally got the girls credited, but also because as a song was the variety that we expect from working with differents producers like Jennie and David Guetta.

Finally the only problems with lyrics came with english lyricist as Bekuh who does the english translation of korean raps for the japanese versions, and mostly that, not even onomatopeias usage are problems for us, and outside of those specifics topics I mentioned and explained, we blinks don't have a problem with the music. Its again, mostly kpopers.

Now with your main topic I do agree that not realism in kpop lead me sometimes to not enjoy music, specially with certain labels, like SM. They not only take off the connection of the music with all this lore and overdeciding for their younger artists, but also made everything feel unnatural.

I respect your vision and I think we have to search in music what bring us comfort. If It's important that a group have a say in their music for you to connect with it, It's totally fine.

But I don't really like the conception of saying the ones who don't have a say in their musical direction aren't real artists, when they could be so skilled at and passionate about other form of arts, such as singing, dancing, playing an instrument etc, there are many areas that can be used as a way of self expression in music.

Quote from common-nobody

Well some groups but it's a little amount compared to the majority. And again I'm not saying that idols need to know how to write or produce, but they could at least have a say in their music

Whatching western producers' interviews, they always mention how the artist contacted them and how they worked on the song. The most I've seen in kpop are the idols recording the vocals and das it

There's a video on Genius about how the producers' of Bad Boy made the song, and they specifically said SM contacted them, they never mention RV (just for a clear example.. I don't have a grudge against them LOL)

see a lot of times we don't hear about it doesn't mean it doesn't happen

I'm sure a lot more groups (especially as I said moving towards their middle years and onwards) have a say in not just writing and producing but other stuff such as MVs and outfits and whatnot

now I can only talk about my favs since I don't know about others (since they aren't my favs) but to my knowledge

the only groups within my favs (BP, Twice, RV, Itzy, Aespa, Gidle (and formerly Izone)) who haven't contributed much would be RV and that's more so on SM than RV itself since Yeri has written music for herself

that's why i usually stan groups who contribute their music, sure there are groups that i enjoy their music and contents even they don't have no say in their music, but for those i usually end up being fan at best mostly casual listener

Quote from selfmate

now I can only talk about my favs since I don't know about others (since they aren't my favs) but to my knowledge

the only groups within my favs (BP, Twice, RV, Itzy, Aespa, Gidle (and formerly Izone)) who haven't contributed much would be RV and that's more so on SM than RV itself since Yeri has written music for herself

Only RV ? The only group in your fav who is actually involved in creating process it's (G)I-DLE for the others it is not involved or much too rare.

It's a problem that affects girl groups mostly, the companies give them very little freedom and don't trust them at all. And the BIG3 companies are by far the worst.