Subscribe on iTunes and Google Play
In this episode we look at Yaeji, her house music and how I think it’s great she’s representing Asia artists in the United States.
Show Notes:
“Show Notes” are my raw general thoughts about said artist and usually how I roughly structure the episode. An episode may or may not include all of the following details.
Update (1/22/2019): I had Yaeji’s mom like my instagram post about her lol. That was oddly surprising.
This episode will be a compilation of Yaeji’s music due to not a single song hit me exactly but the movement of who Yaeji herself is, is what is important.
- If you’re like me and / outrun you’ll like this music video.
- details about music video (Raingurl)
I first heard Raingurl last year when it first came out thanks to some suggestion algorithm on youtube. First off the song starts with an awesome baseline and keeps going with an atmospheric minimalistic rhythm with her strong female singing lyrics backed by an average looking Asian American girl. her own style
But that’s not to say she doesn’t have this style to her that says, hell yeah she’s cool. I mean just watch one of her music videos, you want to hang out with her.
- her normal looks
Which to me is why I think Yaeji blew up. She is your normal look korean-american girl which in the world of Kpop and plastic dolls, she stands out. She stands out so much that it’s an inspiration not only to myself but to her fans.
- interviews about other asians
I’ve read in comments as well as her own interviews, girls come up to her and say “Hey you look just like me, thank you showing me I won’t be limited by my looks or my culture.” And I love that.
Now I’m a white skater dude from North Carolina but grew up in a middle class suburb right. So how come I am connecting with a young Asian girl.
- why i like her
Well even before I get into what original hit me, she’s one year younger than me. Which is important to me. Because as I’ve been getting older I’ve been fighting this corporate, you’re getting old you’ve missed your chance to do something with your life and just work a job mentality. She made her hit at 24, everyone should be motivated by that.
- house music mixed with korean
But what really hit me was she mixes her culture into mellow house music. Which this was the first time I probably ever heard house music. Well.. weekenders
I watched The Weekenders but I didn’t connect with house yet. But she introduced me to this genre of house music. Specifically Lo-fi house. I want to make house music.
And not only did she introduce me to house music. She made me say to myself, I want to make house music. her style is difficult to copy
Her style is minimalistic in that artistic way of it sounds simple but try copying it. It’s difficult to replicate. There’s that genius in simplicity that is so attractive.
Now to talk about myself, I have this life drive to figure out what am I good at. I’ve yet to exactly find it but because of that I’ve tried a million and one things. I get really really deep into a topic for a bit and then at some point I hit a wall and find the next thing but after hearing her music.
I said I want to make house music. I haven’t exactly dove deep into production of it yet but I did buy an OP-1 and played with Ableton live for a bit and thankfully I think with the time and effort I can create something beautiful out of my OP-1 regardless of house or not thanks to Yaeji.
- thanks for inspiring me. So thank you Yaeji for inspiring me to get into house music and electronic music in itself.
Back to her music though, her biggest hits are the ones that stick to that minimalistic atmospheric flavor. He does an awesome job of blending korean and English into her songs. Which I think adds to the aesthetic of it and probably why I caught me even more. No I haven’t looked too deep into her korean lyrics mainly because at the moment, I view foreign language lyrics are an emotion instead of a direct meaning. Which is think is healthy to a point because then you can appreciate more music without understanding it. drink I’m sipping on – all lowercase
In her song “drink I’m sipping on”, which btw, notice her lower cases some of her songs, she starts off with what sounds just cook korean.
The echo of “그게아니야” throughout the song really makes you want to sing it with her.
Now the lyrics are like 95% Korean but I did find out what 그게아니야 thanks to the Genius interview she has on youtube. Which means “that’s not it” and I did during the process of this translate the lyrics but I want to focus directly on that 5% of English in the song.
The song titled, “Drink I’m sippin on”, English, and we get 5 sentences to make a decision on what she is saying. Now, before today, I just thought it was a party song about getting drunk but now knowing that 그게아니야 meaning that’s not it. Is this really a song about a conflict with why she drinks. Which I think a lot of us face for sure. “Making up for what you can’t see” but having a drink in our hands and letting lose. You know. But what’s interesting is because it’s in korean, I just thought it was about feeling good on the dance floor.
I also think passionfruit is an incredible remix of Drake’s version. Actually Yaeji’s version was the first one version I heard. And I remember going to this upscale new age restaurant that TBH, I think the up and coming chinese kids go to. And I’m sitting outside with my ex and Drakes version comes on and I’m like, I’ve never heard this song before yet I know the lyrics. Then it hit me Yaeji. Later that night I tried sharing it with my ex but she didn’t find as much interest in her music as I hoped.
I did tho share Yaeji with another girl I tried perusing (didn’t work out unfortunately). And she was in the same boat as the other girls I mentioned earlier. She (being chinese) was like, there’s girls in the United States, asian no less that create music like this and have a falling. She was so inspired that for the first time I had a moment with someone who felt the same thing I felt over music. She even started listening to her on the regular.
And to end this, really I want to explain like how to me, music is my life blood. There’s so many opportunities to feel true emotion thanks to something someone decided to put down to lyrics, sounds, feeling and then even had the courage to put out there no less. Then having an opportunity to share that with listeners and then people like me experience it and then it completely changes the rest of my life path. That’s music. That’s why I need to share my emotion to music. That’s why we have this podcast.
