Owen: Woah!
Umu: You're now reacting to the solo artist Zico from Block B
and a b-side song off of his 2019 "Thinking Part 2" album.
The song is about a person living in a dystopia
He doesn't know where he is, or why he's there.
The lyrics describe different ways people try to overcome the unhappiness of the world they live in.
Zico's description of this world is similar to Plato's "The Cave".
He ends the (Elizabeth: Oh) song with the realization (O: Wait-) this world is one he created himself.
O: The- the allegory? Okay E: The allegory (O: Yeah) of the (O: The cave) cave, right.
E: That's the one where...
there's a man chained to a wall in a cave.
O: He has to see only shadows-
E: Yeah (O: of-) he can only see shadows that are being held up by other beings,
and so he thinks that's real and that's what he's seeing,
but like the bigger picture is that
he's being manipulated by other more intelligent forces, in a cave,
that's a small part of a bigger world...
So I think it's supposed to be an allegory for how we as humans assume that
you know, our- O: We're our own- we're our own manipulators, in a way.
E: Mm. When I took philosophy class. I think we talked about it in reference to sort of like identity...
and knowledge. I think it was a lot about epistemology,
So like the study of like what we know or what we think we know, if I'm getting it right I could be completely wrong.
But I think the cave is trying to point out this idea
that, you know, what we're seeing right now, what we think we know, is just a really small...
shadow of what's actually happening... So.
Kevin: I like the white. Everything's white in the album cover. And there's the thinking!
So lots of classic references. Yeah. The thinker. Isaac: Thats the thinker U: Thinking! K: Yeah.
Yes. Three, two, one, dystopia
O: That's a fun pitched tom.
E: It's fun rhythm.
It took me a second to figure out what meter we are in, where the beat was.
O: The tom kind of sounds like a tabla, when you go like that.
E: A little bit.
K: I just can't stop listening to that- that percussion.
But of course another really well-constructed soundscape
Ohh.
Nick: It's very cluster-y.
The chords just have (Aaron: We have a seventh chord) a whole bunch of notes that are really close together (A: Resolution) and pretty low.
So they sound like even more dissonant than they normally would, but they're just like a little jazzy.
K: Oho.
I: Bring back the strings!
K: I like the chromaticism. It's so good.
O: I feel like the- the main interval for this song
is either an ascending half step or a descending half step
It's either da [going down] or da da or da [going up].
I feel like.
That's what I've been finding a lot in the instrumentals and his voice.
Fiona: Dum ta [mimicking drums]
It's interesting to hear what things drop out
rhythmically, when he enters
Daniel: Hm, and some things that remain consistent, (F: Mhm) right, like this uh, the syncopation.
F: There's like constants throughout, but they stop at different times to create different vibes (D: Mhm), and other things are added.
Like this...
part of the song has more words, and like
kind of like longer lines.
A: I feel like this is more
like a story, like exposition, there's like-like the plot setting to it, there's a whole like plot arc
K: What.
A little wind [wind noises]
I: It's a weird song.
F: [mimicking the strings]
[more mimicking the strings]
So whiny, [the] strings, (D: Mm) love it. Me, too.
This is really... like it reminds me when I- when I play Dvorak, like to listen to Dvorak
I'm always caught and just- and surprised in such a good way about how
parts interval to interact so well and interlock,
but also retaining their individual melody quality and still being interesting in their own right.
I feel like that- this is a really good...
O: woAH!!
A: It's thicc
Brianna: What just happened
Where are we
O: Like-
how did-
hoW DID THey dO that. [E laughs at him]
O: Oh my god
iTS A SOLO
DO YOU HEAR THE SOLO
K: Woow triplets
[Isaac, jamming and making guitar sounds in the background]
K: Jeez
James: Ooh
B: Fuck.
K: That's an unsettling note (I: Wow) to leave on.
I: Oh
K: What
E: Hold on I actually want to like listen to this again [Owen talking about rhythms] Okay.
O: That chord. It's just the second chord.
E: It's- it's a minor four isn't it? (O: I have no idea what it is.) I think it's a minor four. U: Mm
E: It's, well the bassline is like
duh duh duh duh [singing the notes of the baseline]
So it's definitely like, kind of the motion of like tonic, predominate, dominant, tonic.
I think it might just be a iv but because it's orchestrated so thickly, it sounds really powerful.
It's definitely a minor chord- it might be it's either a ii, vi or a- let me
Hm, no thats not it.
Yeah, I think it is a iv, cause it's like
O: I think there's also that lets do an add nine hidden in it.
E: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a iv.
U: Yeah, yeah, there's- that's in there too O: Yeah
E: Yeah, there's definitely dissonance, but I think the root of its just
a minor four (iv)...
but with- there's some crunchiness in there.
O: That's the nine... Yeah.
E: Yeah, with the nine in there.
Ooh! Ooh! I heard it this time. Yeah. Okay. So it is a minor chord at the top. It's not a 5 chord.
I'm not 100% sure what it is, but it is a minor chord at the top.
It does have the fifth scale degree in it, but it feels a little bit more- It's ki- it almost feels like a
O: sus(pended) four, minor sus four E: Could be? It does- there's definitely something crunchy in there.
Yeah, perfect pitch people can have a field day with that.
K: I dig it, it's so cool. It's great, it's a-
It's- it's structurally and music-
sonically experimental
they add, you know, it doesn't feel like he's he's biting off more than he could chew.
I: I thought it was really neat. Just how he was trying to convey the aspect of a cave,
and creating that dystopia factor because you felt stuck.
Inside a cave. You're in fi- inside a finite space.
But (K: Mm) then at the same time you transported us with that guitar.
[guitar noises]
U: Yeah the lyrics are "if you're trapped in a cave forever, you choose light or dark.
Easily left as a bat..."
I: Interesting.
K: Nice I think the instrumentals of this song is actually quite...
lively. But for me,
what really
sells the theme of the dystopia and the cave would be his melody.
It feels like he's stuck somewhere, and he's just almost going insane and and he's singing some very minimal,
type of things, rapping to himself almost.
Um... And
there's a rhythm
that he uses in the chorus which is da da da dun.
It's th- it's a triplet, and I know it sounds like Beethoven but um,
It- the Beethoven analogy is probably a stretch,
but the thing is in music, triplets are usually the most fluid
type of writing [giving examples], it feels very fluid.
But here, somehow, he made the triplet sound really stuck, and really stiff, and really rigid.
It's 'cause the rest of the instruments are all [mimics the other instruments] it's so groovy and you got da da da dun.
It's like the instrument- the instrumentals are like the real world, but then he's
forcing only his perception of it.
Like, you know, all of these instruments are so lively the world is so rich,
but he gives it this really really tight da da da dun type of melody.
But then when the instruments go quiet, that's when he raps, and talks about his- what he's truly thinking.
So that's my interpretation.
J: What I took away from this the most, especially like with the whole like the cave allegory, is a lot of times people-
It's- it's very easy to feel like... he was- he was kind of talking about
feelings of like being alone and like,
no one knew my existence.
A lot of times It's easy to feel like the world is like against you like,
explicitly, the universe is out to get you, people are out to get you, like why am I here like
you know living in this sort of like lost state, but I think the whole like,
allegory is people are thrown obstacles that
they can't, you know, overcome easily but a huge part of
success in life, and longevity, and keeping yourself going is how you
respond to the things that happen to you.
And once you realize that, you can kind of take the power back and understand that
yes, the world may throw you curveballs,
but there's a lot of power that you have to kind of like overcome that with your own psychology.
B: I'm definitely gonna hit more like the musical points. I feel like (J: Yeah, sorry) yours was like super extra (J: Yeah) today.
I'm gonna be like a kinda generic, like, analysis of this like basically,
there's certain rappers who like
incorporate singing- like I want to say like Jamie Foxx or like Drake, he's known for this like,
he likes to like sing his lyrics a lot,
and I feel like throughout this if you can tell the elements of singing, but like there's a lot of rapping influences,
even when he was singing, he made sure like his singing was more rhythmic.
I felt like yes, his voice is important,
but he really cared about like how it played with what was going on with the instrumental part.
And I really enjoyed that because it kept everything super interesting.
Another thing I liked is just like, when you- you were talking about like-
just being challenged (J: Mhm) about like what your views are
and I felt like at the end, when we were like shifting modally like
I felt like utter confusion J: Yeah.
B: Just shook-ness. And I feel like that's what he was going for, because it's like
you're shook, you're seeing light, you're seeing a different key,
we were seeing different (J: Yeah) mixture.
And I feel like that's what he's trying to convey, because like I was confused,
but I was low-key happy, like I was here for it.
And I (J: Yeah), yeah, (J: Mhm). It was- it was a nice shift in the modality,
but like (J: Mhm) it still had so many like different like influences of like,
previous motifs, throughout the like song (J: Mm), and I feel like that's kind of what he was going for, but. J: Yeah.
B: It also like, had a lot of like, blues and R&B influence (J: Mhm), and still had some type of tonal center, but it was just like different.
J: Yeah. It literally it felt like the clouds parted.
B: Yeah, and we were- J: And you just have that realization.
You're just like holy shit. B: Yeah, like this shit is better, like J: Yes
[talking at the same time] I have control. You. Have. Control. Over. Your. Own. Life B: You're like the- yeah- when you- Mhm
A: The whole time I literally was sitting here like, okay
I wish he would like to kind of use a little more jazz, like,
or just like a little more like N: Yeah, these are like
funky (N: Thick chords!) voice leading or something,
and then we got to the end (N: Mhm) and that's where I really thought that he was like...
Let the floodgates out! U: Yeah!
A: Here it is!
And I really, like I was just, I mean it was it was awesome like the texture is just kind of like,
overwhelming, like you were just entirely immersed in his sound.
And then there was, I think it was an electric guitar solo, just like absolutely
like melting face, at the end and I was just like this is so awesome.
N: I feel like- A: Like at the end, it's like watching a sunset
U: Oh A: and you're just like...
Overwhelmed by all the colors, and like because you get the full array (U: Oooooh) of the rainbow in the entire sky,
it's like a sunset. And so I just
that's what I was kind of sitting there like thinking about, was like once you get like the,
all of the texture, and the low and like it's like watching the sun.
It's great
Ten out of ten.
U: What did you prefer more Being Left, (O: Stop it) or Dystopia O: Stop that
U: You're not gonna choose?
O: No.
E: I'm abstaining as well. (O: No I'm done) They're both great.