The Secret Circle

The Secret Circle is a teen witch show, a series that try to ride the teen fantasy craze before it sizzled out. It is based on a young adult book series, because what wasn’t in 2011, but since I haven’t read any of the books I can’t tell you how faithful it is. The same author wrote the Vampire Diaries though so take from that what you will.

The show follows Cassie a young witch who after the loss of her mother in a mysterious fire, moves in with her grandmother and begins to discover her powers. She is quickly swept into the local teen coven, and shenanigans ensue as teenage hormones run rampant, and the elder coven, pretty much the parents, aren’t too happy about their kids leaning magic. They have all sworn off it, you see, after some horrible, horrible, mystery accident.

So Cassie embarks on a journey to understand herself, her past, and unravel a few mysteries and intrigues. Pretty straightforward I’d say if it wasn’t for the dozens of storylines interweaving into a mess of a bird’s nest in a pile of hay.

Personally, I do not recommend. I did not enjoy it, and though it had some nice concepts of magic and okay effects, it was all too glossy and too slow for my tastes.

Pass.

But, nevertheless, let’s examine the pilot episode.

It opens with a narration, rambling something about destiny, as our protagonist Cassie, played by Britt Robertson, is driving home on an empty road. The action doesn’t take long to kick in as another car comes out of  nowhere and almost crashes into hers, and she pops a tire trying to swerve away. But said actions trickles dry just as fast, replaced by awkwardness as a car stops to observe and then flees like a creeper when Cassie asks for help.

She calls her mom instead to let her know of her tardiness, but things start magically going very wrong on that side. A water faucet explodes, the oven catches fire, all the while a creepy man loiters nearby, spilling a bottle and then flicking a lighter. We get some sense how magic works in that universe, so far so good on the build up part.

The creeper starts lighting matches and accordingly the house catches fire burning Cassie’s mother to a crisp.

My only problem here, is that they showed the killer’s face. They could have easily built more mystery and suspense if they hadn’t revealed the culprit right away.

We cut to one month later and teary eyed Cassie staring at some random lake in some random woods with some random pop song playing in the background. It’s here that the series begin trying too hard hitting on the way nearly every cliche in the book.

Cassie moves to a new town to live with her alienated grandmother, alienated because this is the first time the girl’s ever been to her house. Apparently her mother never went to visit her relatives, nor spoke about the past.

Reunion and trying to establish relationship with a relative, check. Mysterious past to investigate, check. Dead father she never knew, naturally. A hot boy neighbour who likes to stand in front of the window shirtless, of course. But that’s okay, they paint him as creepy. Despite the flowy blond hair and all the abs. And for some reason the show is stuck on a lullaby. The narration started with it, the opening title has it, Casie is humming it and the piano soundtrack mimics it. So a mysterious, creepy melody that her mum used to hum, check.

Like in any other teen show ever, Cassie is simply slumped by the fact she needs to start a new school, because school, just ugh. And the list continues, looking at dead mom’s pics before bed, check. All right already, we get it she misses her mom, move on.

So let’s see the new school, meet the president and talk some more about Cassie’s mother and how everyone knew and cherished her, and she was the queen and all, yet she would never talk about her life in her hometown. Spooky! I mean, foreshadowing!

But moving on to creepy-mac-abster, and his equally creepy friend as they whisper around about Cassie like total creepsters. The new guy then proceeds to creepily stare at her. Did I put that across as clear as the series did? And for those who still didn’t get it, it’s all very creepy. But wait, are you sure you got it? Here are two creepy chicks, commenting on how pretty she is in her face without blinking. Just in case you still didn’t, another girl approaches, who also seems to know everything about her, and invites her to hang out after school.

Of course, as a new girl trying to fit in, Cassie goes, and she can’t walk ten metres without someone stopping her to say how much she looks like her mother and how well they knew her. In this case, it’s the owner of the diner she was invited to. Oh look at that, he’s the father of the second creepster guy. Don’t forget to have him ramble about how much he loved her mother, but she chose another guy, but it’s okay, it was all written in the stars.

How long into the episode are we again? Twelve minutes… Holy, fucking, hell. I need a break. But I fear if I take one, I will spontaneously forget I was ever reviewing this thing.

So marching on.

We meet Adam, played by Thomas Dekker, and our most obvious FRI for the day. Remember folks, romantic interest equals long, creepy, silent stares and stuttering every time the creature tries to interact with our Sue.

And the two bitchy witches arrive to save us from the awkwardness. It is replaced, instead, by creepiness, as the newcomers start discussing Cassie’s life and past in front of her, commenting on how hot Adam is every now and then.

Our protagonist tries her best to act human, and reasonable, unlike everyone else, so she gets the fuck away the moment the head bitch blinks.

The two creepy girls proceed to watch her through the window discussing how she doesn’t seem to know, and then using magic mess with the engine, setting in on fire and then locking Cassie in the car. Clueless protagonist and evil witches, check.

It was all to determine if she had magical powers of course, no ill intent, besides Adam was there to save her by staring very hard at the fire to extinguish it.

But I don’t think we had had enough character conflict so far, so introducing Adam’s girlfriend, the girl that invited Cassie to the diner in the first place.

So while Adam and Cassie are cranking up the uncomfortable teen attraction levels, as much as two straw dolls can, the girlfriend decides to actually be useful and confronts the bitchy witch. That’s okay though, she’s only worried about exposure, because you see, they are on the same side. Bitchy witch reveals that it wasn’t her who sent the car on fire but Cassie because she’s strong and has potential and they want her in the club. The trick is, to have any sort of real magical power, a circle of witches is needed and Cassie is the last member. But a chasm forms between miss girlfriend and bitchy witch as one wants to take it slow, and the other not so much.

Around Cassie, things start getting freakier, and she begins to suspect something is off, just not what.

But that’s besides the point, time to walk ten more metres and meet someone else who recognises her and knows everything about her and her mom.

I’ll make it short from here. It continues like this, building up, weird people meeting, talking to her about her mother, the parent figures vaguely speaking about magic and past tragedies, you know to establish that mystery element and all, and girlfriend character deciding to reveal everything to Cassie and take her into their circle.

She does that by leading her into a creepy house to meet the rest of the creepy teenagers. Naturally, the girl freaks and runs the hell away. But that’s okay, captain Adam comes to the rescue and shows her the wonders of magic, but now without some forced romantic tension of course.

Cassie still leaves and the creepsters reconvene to plot some ritual they need to perform to put their power under control. Their group quickly falls apart as bitchy witch is being all bitchy and power hungry.

Meanwhile, our protagonist seeks an answer with Adam’s cryptic, crazy father, but just before he can reveal anything relevant he is interrupted by random street creepster number two that she met earlier in the day. Still he foreshadows the chance her father is alive. Alive and a “very, very bad man.”

But moving on to bitchy getting drunk on power, turning off random lights and starting thunderstorms. A storm, she can’t stop so we can have some tension and maybe action as Cassie rides to the rescue to help them.

Cassie then goes home, creepy parent elements are being creepy, Adams pops for a visit to force spike the tension, she finds a magic book and a mysterious letter from her mother, and that’s it, episode over.

I guess they managed to establish the story and the characters in one episode, kudos to that. But one thing I don’t get. There’s magic in the world, yet this story insists on keeping us locked in this humany, teeny drama as a bunch of adults try to control the use of magic while the kids rebel. While that’s an adequate plot idea, the scope is just too small and too pathetic, the writer could have done so much more if she had escaped the frames of family drama.

Overall, I am utterly unimpressed. The series is mediocre at best and treats its audience like a brain dead horse. And the build up drags on and on with its moody music and establishment scenes. The dialogue is just as obvious and dull, stating everything, all the time, leaving nothing to subtlety.

Though the biggest issue, which becomes obvious through the first few episodes, is that the story is too ambitious. It introduces a lot of trends, and characters, and relations, and mysteries, and themes, and conflicts, and everything, and very early on it becomes clear that it would be impossible to resolve all of it in a few seasons without botching up or rushing the plot.

That was my main problem with the show and the reason I dropped it, it was just overloaded with things doomed to never to be complete as the series got cancelled after one season.

Still, for any witch themes lovers, starved for some hands on magic, it’s something to play in the background on a boring day.

Flash

IMDb

   

Today, Flash. DC’s attempt at connected universe with Arrow. The series follow Barry Allen, played by Grant Gustin, and his team of merry side kicks, as they solve crime and catch other superpowered individuals. Because Barry got hit by a lightning and gained superspeed. Through the series he also investigates the murder of his mother, who was killed by a man in a flash, in hopes to get his father out of jail.

I’ll say this right off the bat, the series did not impress me. It didn’t annoy me as much as Arrow does, but it didn’t impress me either. It’s just same old, rhetoric cliches, with some innovation I have to admit, stereotypical characters and relations, and overall nothing unique to keep me watching.

But that’s my opinion.

Let’s look at the positives. Good CGI, okay action scenes, it all looks very pretty. The actors tend to overact… No the actors always overact and the cheesy, melodramatic dialogues don’t make things any easier. Like Arrow, it’s over the top. Even more so sometimes, though less soap operaish, so that’s a plus.

I give it a tentative, watch if curious recommendation.

Let’s see what the Pilot episode has to offer. Here comes City of Heroes and all of its spoilers.

The episode opens with the obligatory, dramatic, inspiring superhero monologue. Ranting mostly about believing in the impossible, it’s kind of what the series talks about throughout because Barry is the impossible, yada yada, I still don’t see a reason to hammer it in so much. Then Barry gives us his entire backstory in under five minutes. Okay, I can kind of overlook all this nonsense, it’s in the spirit of comic books after all, isn’t it?

Also warm blur filter over everything to make it extra fluffy.

Now this was a trend in Arrow too, but here it’s dialled up, exaggeration and overacting. I can’t speak to the quality of the actors when they are overacting and over-delivering all their lines, but subtlety is not something this show appreciates. In fact, it avoids it like the plague.

Again, the CGI is pretty good, and the shots glossy and well edited, sound design could have used some levelling though. Overall, the same deal as with Arrow, visually appealing, in this case bright and colourful rather than dull and broody, but lacking in substance. As glossy as you make everything, characters and plot will still be as flat as you wrote them.

They did set up everything briefly and competently, the main characters, Barry’s job, as a forensic something, never really got what, but then again I didn’t really care, some foreshadowing, the episode didn’t drag as much as I know this show can.

And of course, we meet the FRI, his step sister Iris, played by Candice Patton, over whom, have no doubt, he’ll swoon over the entire series.

The action storyline for this episode is two robbers shoot a guard, make off with lots of money, and it’s up to Barry to find out where they’re hiding. Just your typical criminal investigation setup.

The bigger plot point of the episode, is the particle accelerator, a machine, that they don’t really make clear what does other than expand our understanding of physics.

    As I mentioned, Flash and Arrow share the same universe. Now, I watched Flash before Arrow, and there are a lot of references and carry ons from there, which slipped past me the first time I saw the Pilot. But that’s not what annoyed me. Later on, you get episodes and what-happened-befores, which refer directly to episodes from Arrow, so to get a full experience and truly understand the series, you need to watch both shows. You can see them separately, just from time to time an event will happen or a plot point will be mentioned out of nowhere or concluded off screen.

But moving on. Barry tries to confess and fails because he’s too vague and she doesn’t get it. Typical in this types of stories. And the dramatic music makes it all extra… dramatic.

They’re gonna do the same thing here as in Arrow aren’t they? Playing dramatic music over dull dialogue in hopes to make it mean something? Sometimes it works, most times it doesn’t.

And for some reason, in the middle of a crowd someone decides it’s a good idea to steal Iris’ bag, where her laptop and dissertation happen to be. I need to ask why. What sense does it make and what is the purpose of this scene other than jab at the audience that yes, indeed, Barry happens to run a lot because circumstances. Seriously though, you’d think people wouldn’t try to purse snatch in the middle of a crowd, at a highly scientific press conference no less, that should have a lot of guards. Speaking of, where are the guards?

Seriously, what’s up with that kid and his obsession with Iris’ bag. He fights Barry tooth and nail for it. But who do I kid, it’s only a scene to introduce detective pretty boy. That’s how they actually refer to him. His real name is Eddie, and he’s played by Rick Cosnett.

Meanwhile, the real cops are hunting the real bad guys, who as Barry deducted, are hiding out at a farm.

Cliches list, bad guys announcing their intention, check. Cop about to retire killed on duty, check. But we can’t make it too bloody, we’re kids friendly, so well have him drop dead from a bullet scratch. Those rabid bullets, you know.

The bad guys flee, but not for long. Their plane is brought down when the particle accelerator goes out of control, raining fire, brimstone and electric storms all over the city. It causes rather selective damage really, but that’s besides the point. Barry gets struck by a lightning, next to a chemical shelf, and for anyone familiar with the comics, that’s pretty faithful to the origins story.

Nine months pass, StarLabs are in ruins, Barry’s in a coma and we meet our main support cast. The comic relief nerd, Cisco played by Carlos Valdes; the cold but hot doctor chick Caitlin, played by Danielle Panabaker; and the mastermind professor in a wheelchair Dr. Harrison Wells, played by Tom Cavanagh.

And then Barry wakes up, no doubt in objection to Cisco playing Poker Face while he sleeps. Of course, he can immediately get up and walk around after nine months of coma. They explain, of course, his metabolism is very high, plus cellular regeneration nonsense, which gave him instant abs. Now I’m not sure biology works quite that way, but I’ll let it slide, believe in the impossible so to say.

No one calls his family of course, he goes to surprise them instead. But nine months have passed, Barry has much catching up to do, and his romantic interest is dating detective pretty boy. Bummer.

And his powers start manifesting in flashes of slowdowns. Of the world, since he’s moving really fast and all.

And here, the episode starts dragging as they go back and forth with dialogues, experimentations and evaluation of his speed. After a long while the plot kicks back in, with one of the robber guys having survived and gained supernatural powers over the weather.

The particle accelerator, it turns out, gave birth to a bunch of supernatural individuals, who we’ll be meeting and hunting down through the series.

And an obligatory cameo from the Arrow when Flashy goes to seek advice. “Wear a mask,” he tells him, the same advice Barry once gave him. Immediately, Cisco has a whole costume tailored to his specific needs. Because Cisco is awesome. And also possibly clairvoyant. But not really. He just happens to have all the gadgets exactly when they are needed.

The police corners the baddie, baddie kicks up a tornado to destroy the city, god knows why, Barry runs really fast in the opposite direction and unravels it. The end.

Meh. That’s pretty much my evaluation of the series. Meh.

Nothing more to say.

Just meh.

Arrow

IMDb

Sigh.

Where do I begin with this one?

DC’s Arrow. A story about a spoiled billionaire’s son who spends five years on a hellish island and receives the epiphany to become a vigilante and right his father’s wrongs. He returns home, where led by a notebook left by his late father, he embarks on his mission to rid the city from the corrupt and powerful.

Doesn’t sound too bad, does it?

Any premise can be ruined by a photoshop filter, plastic characters, cliche plotlines and enough melodrama to keep the local grandmas talking for a few decades to come.

I can’t really put my finger on it. It’s well shot, okay acted, maybe it’s the show you’ll love, a dark brooding hero, some decent action, spiffy sidekicks, some romance, too much family drama and unnecessary plotlines... Yeah, let’s just say I didn’t enjoy it.

For me, Arrow is bland, boring, crowded, and features a toad faced protagonist who hardly moves his neck. Pass.

But let’s take a look at the Pilot episode before burying the DVD’s in the backyard. Oh god... Does that mean I need to watch it again? Heaven’s help me…

Also spoilers ahead.

The episode opens with a man running in a forest. Shortly, we see that he’s on an island and trying to get the attention of a nearby boat by lighting a fire in the most convoluted way. With an arrow, from a hill, hitting a pile, on the beach, and sure if he was far but it looked like he purposely ran all the way to the other side to light the bloody fire.

Luckily, the old chinese fishing couple spots his fire and whisks him away.

Meanwhile, Oliver, as the narrator who won’t shut up, tells us all about how he needed to forge himself into the man who can survive the island. All nice and well and dramatic but why couldn’t we see that through the actual action and scenes and all that? The series do have those, so what’s the point of all the narration?

Is it to keep with the spirit of a comic book? Well, it’s annoying. Narration can be useful, but in Arrow, it’s quite unnecessary and exists only to hammer dramatic tension into the viewer.

That said, I do think the series is well shot and well composed. Apart from the plastic filter that makes things look extra glossy and extra fake. Also the dark, gritty feel can get rather tedious, but that lets off as the series progresses so I’ll leave it alone.

But moving on. Next we get the exposition from the doctor about all the scars and fractures Oli had. “The Oliver you lost, may not be the one you found.” Whooo, dramatic...

Then we meet the whole family, and Rosa, the maid, who we never see again after this episode.

And so we get this nice, overlong establishment of everyone we should care about in the series. Sigh.

When is the action coming back? I’m bored.

So we continue meeting people and the next on the list is Lauren, Oliver’s ex girlfriend. Whom no one bothered to tell of Oliver’s return. Even if her sister died on the boat that shipwrecked. No, poor Lauren need to learn it from the news. That’s okay though, I never liked her anyway. And her addiction/alcoholism issue they play in season 2 was a joke. Did I mention Oliver cheated on lauren with her sister?

And we get more dramatic narration, and more flashbacks, and more new characters... Where’s the guy in the green hood shooting arrows at people that I was promised? Come on give me something to chew on other than endless disappointment.

And an awkward family diner follows. Because of course we need to have one in a family drama. Wait, you say this is comic book action series? I thought it was a family soap opera.

And, flashback.

I’m getting a pattern here. Boring character introduction, boring backstory flashback, I get it, you’re taking it slow in an action series, but my god just move on already.

You know, I’m gonna go real speedy here. Oliver meets Laurel, who hates him, but loves him, but hates him, and you get the idea. She’s boring, and he’s boring, and they’re all boring. And they talk. And she’ll date his best friend. Who’ll die. And Oli will swear to never kill again. But I digress.

About 15 minutes in, we get the first action scene where… oh wait, flashbacks to interrupt our scene. Oliver is kidnapped by some schmuck with a taser who interrogates him about his father. And then he kills them all. Yay... Not before the obligatory snappy dialogue exchange though.

And the sound explodes. Did I mention the sound is really badly levelled through the entire series? It’s something I noticed happen in most DC powered TV projects.

So they fight, and even the action scene drags on forever, yet it’s over in a blink and we go back to meeting characters. Laurel’s father that is, who’s also a detective. With a personal vendetta against Oliver, of course.

And it’s all flashbacks, new characters and establishment until the end. And one obligatory party scene. Oliver also takes down a baddie at some point. In case I forgot to mention. It’s all rather dull.

From what I hear, they also introduced magic, or the like, later on. You know, sometimes, even if your universe contains certain elements, it’s best to keep them separate. Because honestly, you can hardly sell to me that oh by the way magic/super powers exist in a series that have been playing it straight so far.

I think my biggest problem with Arrow, other than the over-packed plot, is the drama. It just tries too hard to build dramatic tension to the point we’re repeatedly smacked in the face with it. The series feels more like a spin off of the Bold and the Beautiful rather than a comic book adaptation. And sure, I understand this kind of purple drama is often found in comic books, but I still find it unnecessary in how overblown dialogue and performances can be. Not to mention soundtrack. Sure, it’s pretty, but if you play dramatic music over a boring scene it doesn’t make it any less boring.

That said, we do get some nice performances though the protagonist is kind of wooden. Might be due to the character, not the actor, but still he can be such a non presence it’s startling. And that’s another problem I had, how exaggerated the characters can be at times. Exaggerated in a single trait that is. Usually brooding, or perky, or dramatic.

The series is not so bad as to make me sick to my stomach, but elements often breach the line between decent and trash making it mediocre at best. Might be just tastes, other people might be tickled the right way by the exaggerations. I certainly wasn’t.

Arrow was boring, dragged out, over packed, exaggeratedly dramatic, and I only forced myself to watch it because everyone else is going crazy over it and I wanted to see what the deal was. I only managed to the end of season 2, when I finally said, you know what, you bore me series, you bore me, I’d rather go watch paint dry.

I just don’t like it. I genuinely do not like these series.

Gaga and Perry

  

There isn't much to say about them really. They are not bad. Well not according to the popular standards set these days. They are not good either. I'd call them mediocre. Uninteresting. Not even worth talking about. Gaga is being Gaga,  and Perry... Well she's trying to be cute. As always.
    Overall the two hold so little relevance to me, and I don't really have any words to offer.

 But then why am I talking about them you might ask.






    Well first its because of the promoting.
    I mean it's not as if these two didn't already have the American pop scene, so radios going at lengths to promote them would seem redundant. No? Yet that's all they did.
    About a month ago, just as the summer was rolling towards its end, and around the time the songs came out, the stations simply would not shut up about it. First it was two days of ranting about how the songs got leaked a week too early. Well guess what? I don't care.
    Then it was the charts, and the votes and all that crap that went on and on for days.

    So what I'd like to know is, why the hell did they feel the need to hype these songs as if they are some newfound miracle that also cures cancer?

Did they finally realize the low quality of the pop industry and gasped: "My god! Are people really going to buy this garbage?" Well guess what, they are buying it anyway, of course they are, but that's besides the point.
    So yeah, the phenomena of the hype online and on the radio has baffled me. Though it still did not make the topic worthy enough to analyze or spend more mental power than what's needed for a snarky sneer.
    No.
    The real reason I'm writing all this for is kind of silly. It is a simple thought. A musing that came to me quite a while after I saw the Perry video. The lyric video, not the other thing... as ridiculously hilarious as it is.  (Also not that Destiny's Child didn't do it before. And I've got to love how she has working cell phone and all these things in the wilds. Yes, yes I know its supposed to be a metaphor or a parody or whatever, it still seems ridiculous to me.) 

    So yeah, I watched it, it was cutsy and all. Again not worthy enough to more than sneer at it. Then few nights after, just as I was falling asleep, I got to thinking about it again. So my brain did this little thing imagining it without the sound, and then I was looking at the pictures moving with the text messages and the cute emotes, where a trophy for some reason is read as "champion," and some weird eye references I would have never gotten, and I am like "Hold on, I've seen this shit before."
And indeed I have. 5000 years ago. Well on artifacts and writing systems from 5000 or more years ago.

Why yes, that is Egyptian Hieroglyphic, Mayan and the evolution of Cunei Form in a slide.

Though its not really fair to compare these scripts to "text language" as they are, technically, more complex.

So, the question I came to ask myself is, why, after thousands of years of lingual evolution, are we going back to the roots of all language in so called text speech. I mean wasn't it bad enough when we butchered the tongue with all the "shortification" of words like you to u and you're to ur? We looked that over since we had limited symbol count and stuff, but then it went on the internet, where it saves nothing but maybe, possibly, if we squint, a few seconds of writing. And then in schools and on paper writings of essays, or so I've heard legends.




And now? I look at the Perry song. This? We return to the forms of ancient language? Why? Why when we have the rich variety of nouns and adjectives and I don't know, verbs maybe. When our language has finally evolved enough to attempt to outline abstract ideas in detail and succeed to an extent? When it can clearly and easily define or describe a thing or event without needing a story teller or a courier to translate and elaborate? Is this a sign of some lingual devolution, or are we simply growing too lazy to think and even less explain ourselves in actual words?

Hispano Madness

http://iambrony.com

So... Hello again.

 [A foreword: this is going to be more ranty and less analytical. Yes, believe it or not I have been trying to actually analyze not just rant. In this case I just don’t think such brainless works of “art” deserve me utilizing the intellectual power for something other than ranting.]

Initially I thought my next post to be on a book, but in the spirit of the dying summer, yes it's over believe it or not, I decided to cover a topic brought to me by a friend. A friend who lives on the other side of the world, yet we both seem to have noticed a rather curious plague spreading through the the radio stations… Hispanic disco songs.

 Everybody seems to go wild about them. Would they be playing so often and for so long else? The reason why someone would constantly request this... I simply cannot picture. The lyrics I don’t get, even with a translation… I mean I understand what they sing, I just don’t get it. Most songs in that genre seem to be singing mostly about dancing drinking and getting laid. And that revelation received only after a careful dissection because the structure and "sentences" quite often don't make any sense. Still, nothing new here. Hispanic songs are about drinking, dancing and sex, and American songs are about drinking, dancing and sex. I guess that's just what the people want in their music/culture.

 The melody, again it’s the same every time. One or sometimes two beats repeated over and over until the melody is so deeply beaten into your brain you want to find a zombie and have it eat it to rid you of this torturous existence. But joking aside, they all seem to sound exactly the same as any other mindless disco songs out there.

Flickr

But let’s get to the actual songs I wish to mention. To be fair they never really got high in the charts around here (higher in Europe) but every time I turned on the radio, entered a store, or went any place public with music, I would hear them at least 2 times. Thus here they are, the top three most annoying Hispanic songs this summer has to offer according to my aching brain and my annoyed friend.

Number one spot, no doubt, goes to Tacabro – Tacata

Well technically Tacabro is an Italian band but with a Cuban singer so they sing in Spanish and I will brand them Hispanic. In terms of melody and lyrics, as you might guess, this is horridly repetitious and mind crushingly annoying. It is easily the song I dreaded most, instantly reaching for my phone and headphones whenever I was unable to make it stop. The problem is: it’s catchy, and crappy, very, very, very crapy. Listening to it just once will make you sing tacata, tacata, etc, inside your head for eternity.

http://www.ponychan.net

When I first heard this song it reminded me of something but it was so vague I couldn’t make sense of it. It was when I did my research that I finally realized what that initial feeling of familiarity was. Paco Paco – Taka-Takata. True it has nothing in common other than those annoying "words" but it’s still worth mentioning. Especially when the original was quite the hit back in its days and definitely better than this crap released today. An honorary mention for Joe Dassin’s version too, which I had actually heard before and was the source of that uncanny familiarity I felt. I couldn’t find more information on those two on the net so I apologize for that.
Inexplicably, the two old songs can’t manage to annoy me, at all even, although they too contain the “taka” thingy.


 Oh I get it, I think! They have other words in them and the singer’s voice is actually nice.

http://mlfw.info/f/1124/

Finally, I felt asudden need to comment on the video… As far as my research went there are 2 video clips for this song. Both I find obnoxiously slutty, and seizure inducing with their blinking light, swirling colour horridness. And here I ignore the cheap looks, kindergarten editing, and god awful choreography, if it can be called such.
As a last commentary I say to the producers: for god sake have some bloody decency, you could have bought the girls a swimsuit or something not make them dance in what looks like their underwear!

But moving on.



Number two: Michel Telo - Ai Se Eu Te Pego  

The Pitbull edition because that’s the one that was popular around here… Do I really need to say anything else? At least he brings in some diversity to the monotonous original song. Wait… No he doesn’t.

Uh all right, I will add to this. Why I don’t like this particular song isn’t that much the repeatedness, although it is one of the reasons. No, I hate it because of Michel Telo’s voice. I cannot begin to comprehend why he became such a sensation when throughout the whole song all I hear is whine, whine, whine; whine, whiiiiiine. Seriously listen to it, it’s like the most annoying sound I have ever heard coming out of a man’s mouth. It’s even worse than Bruno Mars, and god do I hate Bruno Mars’ girly voice strings.

It’s truly sad when the moment these songs come on it makes me wish I was listening to Katy Perry’s Wide Awake instead. Hell, I’d even take Nicki Minaj’s Starships anytime.

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And Number Three:  Willy William feat Lylloo - Baila

This song actually came out around the end of last year, but I am mentioning it here because its popularity reached its zenith this summer.

To be truthful I don’t find it particularly bad, I’d even dance to it in club, if I danced that is. Music and lyric-wise it’s just like all the other mediocre disco crap out there. What I find particularly appalling is… it’s just too noisy. I attribute that to the annoying female singer who won’t stop squealing her lines through the whole thing. How old is she anyway? 12? Or is she on helium or something. Seriously, is it just me, or does she sing kind of like a chipmunk?

Last I wanted to talk about one final Hispanic performer who became quite big this summer. Don Omar. There are two songs I wish to mention - Hasta Que Salga El Sol and Danza Kuduro

Again I don’t find them particularly bad or annoying or anything, really I’m neutral about it but when they just wont stop bloody playing them... Eesh...
Anyhow, it's the same type of lyrics, dance till you die, drink a beer, have fun, lather, rinse, repeat. In both songs there was something about hips. Actually a lot about hips, so I am beginning to think he might have some fetish about it.

They even got their girls some swimsuits!

 Else on the clip of Danza Kudro, it's the same boring crap of men jerking their hands in the air and women in scanty clothes lounging around. It's better produced that Tacata, definitely, but I attribute that to the bigger budget.

Seriously though isn’t there something else that could be playing on the radio instead? I know there must be, so cut it out with the endless hispanics and give me some variety.

That’s what I thought, and well I got my wish... They now play Flo Rida – Whistle…

And about that…
I...
Um...
Well...
Just…

No. Just no!

There. I am out of words. Happy crappy pop song?

In any case I doubt I could have added anything to what Todd in the Shadows already said. Here, watch his review(s) and support the struggle against crappy pop music.

(And yes, I know Whistle is not Hispanic but I thought it deserved some hatred.)

As for anything I could have said about it, here let me illustrate it with another pony.