Korean Boys, Lady Gaga, Boats put Video Games in Pop Music like never before

I’ve been meaning to put this into some kind of well typed thing-a-ma-thing for a while now but just look at this sentence I’ve gotten us into already! I don’t have the time to explain it succinctly and accurately and would probably just wind up losing my point and your attention (and probably my own too)… *gah* I’m already lost so I’ll just blurt it out as best as I can and leave it to the videos.

I like pop music nowadays because it’s slowly turning into video game music! There, I said it! It all started for me when a co-worker told me about auto-tune and one particular nautically-themed music video from 2009 and then proceeded to turn me onto Lady Gaga… and Ke$ha. The thing that they — and many others that I’ve admittedly never heard of — all have in common is their growing use of electronic sounds. Even more so than 90’s “electronica“, which was like pop music hitting puberty and silently and internally becoming aware of video game music for the first time but not really knowing how to ask it out, this new style of music is clearly influenced by games; be it directly or through the  music of chiptune artists. The video above, for the song Mazeltov by Child of Empire, is the most evolved form as I’ve heard it today. With processed vocals all over the place it’s built on what, to me, sounds like a cracktro melody, one of my favorites of which appears below.

So there, that’s what I’ve been trying to say for a while now. If this trend continues by the time New Kids on the Block has a comeback Comeback Tour I’ll totally love their new sound because it’ll be co-produced by Hudson and sound a little bit like Bonk’s Adventure. I. Can. Not. Wait!

Post-Break Bonus!! More music I like!! And it’s important to state music, not necessarily the video, the artist, or what they’re saying.

I honestly can’t pick just one Lady Gaga song but this may be one of the more video game-esque tracks. Like most of these songs it’s more the beat or melody than anything else that sounds game-esque.

And some chiptune from 8-bit Weapon cause it’s great stuff and also sounds like a cracktro and brings my point back around to what this has always been all about… video game music!