Analyse this!

[peachboy]

Anyone like to hazard a guess/analysis on what's interesting (relatively speaking) about this tune from Korean pop sensation "Girl's Generation"....? There's something weird about it and I've been scratching my head over it all morning:-

 

[skylark]

When you say "about this tune," are you meaning to ask about the melody? The chord structure? Or maybe you mean the track, the technology? Can you be specific about what it is that's pokin' at ya?

[peachboy]

Ah I guess it didn't jump out at you then. I was trying to be ambiguous so as to check whether it was me being delusional or whether someone else could replicate without bias.

 

It's an interesting tune but specifically, something in the chord progressions / key and overall structure.

[peachboy]

Okay well it looks like it's just my brain then so I may as well spill the beans.

 

The track is interesting because sections of it are in D-minor and other sections are in D-major. Not only that but it appears to have two separate choruses. The title of the track is called "Oh!" so it would be reasonable to assume the D-minor section that possess "Oh!" as the principle lyric is the principle chorus, and structurally speaking this also makes sense, particularly as the piece leads out on this section. The problem is though that the D-major section that contains the lyrics "brand new sound" can just as easily be processed as a chorus section, if not more so than the "Oh!" section - it certainly isn't a bridge, nor is it a verse. So what you end up with is a song with potentially two choruses, both of which are in harmonically conflicting keys...which brings us to the overwhelming quandary of whether to classify the overall piece as D-Minor, or D-Major.

[lookatthisguy]

Uhh… well, my initial analysis begs the question, "Isn't there a rule somewhere that indicates a maximum amount of performers in a singing group? Nine seems a little heavily stacked…"

 

D minor, with changes across the parallels. Sure, the intro is in D major, but there's a lot of stuff I hear going on that lends itself to more contemporary rock genres, which I'd say tend to the minor. Plus, as you said, the "namesake" chorus is in minor, which is also where the tune ends, and in a context like this, I'd weigh the ending key more heavily than the starting key.

 

Not sure why you wouldn't classify the "Brand new sound" as a bridge, though. It's not strictly conventional, but sounds bridge-y enough to me (to say nothing of the fact that there's a lot of pop music these days that contains A, B, C and even D sections—song form is more relevant to melodic and harmonic structure than to what's most important these days: DA BEAT.)

[peachboy]

I'd weigh the ending key more heavily than the starting key.

 

Agreed. I think it's safe to call it as D-Minor. Actually if you listen to the very first two bars there's a little square wave ditty (which I had overlooked) that arpeggiates a D minor triad. It's almost as if the composer is saying "Hey...in case you were wondering, this tune is in D MINOR. That's D MINOR. Got it? Okay good, thanks."

 

Not sure why you wouldn't classify the "Brand new sound" as a bridge, though. It's not strictly conventional, but sounds bridge-y enough to me

 

Well I think that if it weren't for the ending, the "Oh!" section actually sounds more like a bridge that leads up to the "brand new sound" section. There's a psychological element because the logical thing to do is connect the title "Oh!" to the lyrics in the "Oh!" section and grant it chorus status (especially what with the ending), but if you didn't know that "Oh!" was the title of the track, and you didn't get around to hearing the ending, you could be forgiven for thinking it was just a simple filler section between verse and chorus. There's this great buildup that lands on an A-Major 4-3 suspension, and then bang, you're into the "brand new sound" section - which arguably is a lot more catchier than the "Oh!" section.