the best Mandopop of the month from FloruitShow's heart-wrenching ballads to soft boy indie R&B to boy groups blurring the lines between Mandopop and K-pop
i think its a disingenuous(?? misleading?? uninformed, im not quite sure what it is but its one of these words) to say that wayv's music sounds more like kpop than anything released by current idol groups when both the videos you linked are not only close to three years old, but those groups do not seem to have released anything in over a year, if their youtube channels and admittedly perfunctory google search are reliable. not to mention, the first song is produced by one of sm entertainment's main songwriters, and both of those songs sounds like basically anything and everything most boy groups in kpop are releasing right now, even moreso than wayv's.
I linked a couple of more recent idol groups in the past issue! Feel free to take a look there
I went with these two groups because there's not a lot of active idol groups in the Chinese scene, there's ONER, which I talked about last month, and the Produce Groups which I was thinking of talking about in the future so wanted to link something that's a little different and unfortunately, which Mr. Tyger & NEXT are some of the only active boy groups in the Chinese scene, they're not... that active. (They're trying... I think, well, I hope.) It has a lot to do with favouring individual idols over groups. Apart from them, there aren't really any big active boy groups I've come across, which I think favours the point that WayV fits better in the context of K-pop over Mandopop, no? If you've come across other boy groups, I'd love to hear them
NEXT's "Wait A Minute" is produced by a couple of K-pop writers! They're under YueHua Entertainment which has given them a lot of access to the same resources many K-pop idols have, but I find the music sounds a lot more like Mr. Tyger, melting into the instrumental rather than focused on the performances of the idols—even when WayV do the electro-pop sound they still manage to work in performances that showcase their vocal talents, which isn't really something either NEXT or Mr. Tyger are trying to do in their tracks, both groups just kind of blend into the background. I didn't want to talk too much about K-pop because this is a Mandopop-based newsletter and my main point, in the end, was that Mandopop feels more like a melting pot of sounds where K-pop has its own trends. I think a lot of these trends can be seen in the pre-chorus and bridge: K-pop tends to go a lot bigger where vocals are needed, something WayV achieves with their main vocals, whereas Mandopop doesn't really come that hard on the vocals (Mr. Tyger has pieces of this in the pre-chorus, but I think a lot of that has to do with how the idol scene in China is shaped by the Korean one, which comes to the point that perhaps something can be both). I definitely feel like the half-time bridge is a K-pop signifier, I haven't really seen any idol group do that in the Mandopop scenes (if you have an example, though I'd love to see it). Even groups that sound closer to the EDM-sound like CRAVITY are taking on these techniques. Also, you can note a lot of the ad-libs and high-notes that WayV are putting in, which doesn't really seem like anything any group in the idol group scenes is going for within China, more of a K-pop technique
i think its a disingenuous(?? misleading?? uninformed, im not quite sure what it is but its one of these words) to say that wayv's music sounds more like kpop than anything released by current idol groups when both the videos you linked are not only close to three years old, but those groups do not seem to have released anything in over a year, if their youtube channels and admittedly perfunctory google search are reliable. not to mention, the first song is produced by one of sm entertainment's main songwriters, and both of those songs sounds like basically anything and everything most boy groups in kpop are releasing right now, even moreso than wayv's.
I linked a couple of more recent idol groups in the past issue! Feel free to take a look there
I went with these two groups because there's not a lot of active idol groups in the Chinese scene, there's ONER, which I talked about last month, and the Produce Groups which I was thinking of talking about in the future so wanted to link something that's a little different and unfortunately, which Mr. Tyger & NEXT are some of the only active boy groups in the Chinese scene, they're not... that active. (They're trying... I think, well, I hope.) It has a lot to do with favouring individual idols over groups. Apart from them, there aren't really any big active boy groups I've come across, which I think favours the point that WayV fits better in the context of K-pop over Mandopop, no? If you've come across other boy groups, I'd love to hear them
NEXT's "Wait A Minute" is produced by a couple of K-pop writers! They're under YueHua Entertainment which has given them a lot of access to the same resources many K-pop idols have, but I find the music sounds a lot more like Mr. Tyger, melting into the instrumental rather than focused on the performances of the idols—even when WayV do the electro-pop sound they still manage to work in performances that showcase their vocal talents, which isn't really something either NEXT or Mr. Tyger are trying to do in their tracks, both groups just kind of blend into the background. I didn't want to talk too much about K-pop because this is a Mandopop-based newsletter and my main point, in the end, was that Mandopop feels more like a melting pot of sounds where K-pop has its own trends. I think a lot of these trends can be seen in the pre-chorus and bridge: K-pop tends to go a lot bigger where vocals are needed, something WayV achieves with their main vocals, whereas Mandopop doesn't really come that hard on the vocals (Mr. Tyger has pieces of this in the pre-chorus, but I think a lot of that has to do with how the idol scene in China is shaped by the Korean one, which comes to the point that perhaps something can be both). I definitely feel like the half-time bridge is a K-pop signifier, I haven't really seen any idol group do that in the Mandopop scenes (if you have an example, though I'd love to see it). Even groups that sound closer to the EDM-sound like CRAVITY are taking on these techniques. Also, you can note a lot of the ad-libs and high-notes that WayV are putting in, which doesn't really seem like anything any group in the idol group scenes is going for within China, more of a K-pop technique
Really enjoyed this issue, especially the discussion on Mandopop as a genre and labels like "Asian pop" and "C-pop"! Looking forward to more.