You’ve just been Rickrolled, and you probably don’t even know what that means, do you? Melinda Newman of Rolling Stone has a better explanation. For one reason or another Rick Astley’s song, Never Gonna Give You Up, has experienced a fairly big resurgence in recent years as people have decided to keep it alive for one reason or another. It’s not a bad thing, it’s a catchy song and it managed to capture a lot of peoples’ attention, but hearing it in 20 different styles that span decades is definitely a different experience that a lot of us might never have thought about. Just listening to at least half of these styles is enough to make a person chuckle since listening a song in a different manner isn’t a new idea but it’s definitely different depending on the song. While listening to the original song in Rick Astley’s voice is enough for some folks, listening to it in the style of Korn and several others was intriguing as it reminds me of listening to a metal version of Ke$ha at one point and laughing hilariously. The thing about music is that a lot of it is interchangeable so long as the artist performing the piece knows how to translate the words and beats and can adapt it to the different style that other artists use. Some artists, like Weird Al Yankovic, take the song itself and change the words, while the guy in the video keeps the words but changes up the style while keeping the basic song unchanged and flowing in the same way it usually would. The effect is that you get the same song but with a much different feel to it than might originally have been intended, and it’s nothing but sheer awesome for those that can’t help but appreciate the artistry of it.
Some might actually say there’s no artistry there at all, that individuals who do this are basically recycling the music of other artists and don’t have nearly the same level of talent as the original songwriters and performers. In a short and simple explanation, that’s a load of crap that a wise and discerning person would easily laugh off. To each their own and all that, but it does take a certain type of person to listen to a song and then figure out just how it can be adapted in another way and how it can be made to fit into that different style so that it makes sense. Emmy Mack of Music Feeds has more on this topic. It’s not about taking apart a song and slamming alternate pieces together to make it work, as music doesn’t really flow that way any better than a story does. Upon forcing said pieces to try and mesh all that’s bound to happen is that the story, or the song, is going to be completely discordant and take a while to untangle so that it sounds the way it needs to. Those that know how to take the time and make the finished product come together while paying attention to how each piece can bolster and support the project as a whole will find that things do tend to work out if one is able to listen and pay attention to how they might work together in a cohesive unit. In other words, what this guy is doing is art since it’s telling the same story, but in a different voice, which requires at least some time and a willingness to understand how each individual component fits together to create the desired result.
There are those that might read this and nod their heads in complete understanding and others that might wonder just what the hell I’m talking about, but until you’ve created something using something else for inspiration then you might need to simply accept that there is some artistry in what’s being done and while it’s pulling from the works from others it’s no less impressive. When you look at the whole picture, there’s really no artist in this world that hasn’t been inspired by something or someone in their past, as inspiration is the means by which we create, and it typically comes from a source. Why he chose this song and this idea to push to the people is hard to say, other than he’s obviously a music lover and someone that enjoys performing for an audience. One of the good things is that he’s practicing his passion while in quarantine and is still able to bring the people what they’ve obviously been wanting as just looking at the messages he’s received enough people have been tuning into his program to make it worth his while. There is a great deal of artistry there, let no one tell you otherwise, and whether one wants to think that it’s copy and paste or that he’s taking his time and really digging into the different styles, well, that’s kind of on you.
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