I feel quite depressed when I use this blog to teach my college students the power of pop culture because it makes me feel so old!
For example, take this video Righ' Now by TWIGY ft. Miliyah Kato & YOU THE ROCK. This is a Japanese rap video, which although not a big hit in Japan, is, in my opinion, one of the catchiest songs to come out of that country in a while. (Click here for the video)
Notice how the Japanese versioni visually pays homage to Beyonce's "Check on it". (Click here for music video)I think it's cute how they spelled the seventeen-year-old Miriya's (she's the female vocalist in this video and a rising singer in Japan) name in the African-American style of "Miliyah" (just like "Aaliyah"). Rap music has spread Black standards of beauty to Japan. Now you have young men and young women going to tanning salons and trying to look like Snoop Dog or Beyonce'.
And note how they took the beat from an American song. I think the songwriter grew up listening to a lot of American music. But what song was it from? None of the students in class could identify the original song except a returning student about my age. Can you few lurkers out there (at least according to my sitemeter stats) figure out the song it was from?
So, Vanity Six's Nasty Girl (click here for music video) is now music for middle aged people? Never thought that day would come.My hats are off to those of you in your sixties and seventies. Now I know how you feel when people tell you that the Beatles or Rolling Stones are "old people's music."
