Korean Job Discussion Forums

Tiberious aka Sparkles · Joined: 23 Jan 2003 Location: I'm one cool cat!

Last night, while drinking a whisky sour at the CNN bar, I realized that the Wonder Girls' hit song, "Tell Me," is remarkably similar to Stacey Q's "Two of Hearts."

Is this plagiarism a la Lee Hyori and that Britney song, or did Park Jin Young get permission to interpolate the song? If the former, I'm guessing Stacey Q could use the money.

whatever · Joined: 11 Jun 2006 Location: Korea: More fun than jail.

I sort of see it. Doesn't have the hook, but...here's the youtube link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-C7FrZh1QEI

by the way...love the video for JYP's 'Kiss'...here's that link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pybihUI3hkQ

Billy Pilgrim · Joined: 08 Sep 2004

I've never cared less about anything else on Earth.

Smile

Ilsanman · Joined: 15 Aug 2003 Location: Bucheon, Korea

If you feel so inclined, then contact the original singer and she can waste her time trying to get justice in a Korean court.

jvalmer · Joined: 06 Jun 2003

Most likely JYP did get permission to use it. He spent a few years in the US learning the producing game.

Do a simple search of "stacey q" and "wonder girls" on naver. Koreans already know the song is a redone version of the stacey q song. The word wongok (원곡) means orginal song...

Of course I doubt that many Korean teens know it's a rip off. I also doubt most of you posters knew many of the songs in America were remade when you were a teenager...

agentX · Joined: 12 Oct 2007 Location: Jeolla province

I had a feeling the song sounded familiar. But I first thought they got the idea from Soulja Boi.
Soulja Boy Tell 'em- Crank Dat Superman
Wonder Girls Tell Me (Korean Police version)
Coincidence? I think not.

Return Jones

mikekim · Joined: 11 Aug 2006

LOL all music today is sampled from an earlier source or remixed. At least they changed the words and added skanks to the video.

itaewonguy · Joined: 25 Mar 2003

JYP has done this many times before..
he finds a song which he things no korean would have heard of and rips it off, well he changes it to his own version.. and takes credit..
I guess its original in some way! hahahha

I was telling my students that the song was an 80's rip off..

they were like "the 80's"????

damn did I feel old!!

I use to love Stacy Q

ohh and also, with a little mix of MEL & KIM - respectable mixed in, then we have wonder girls - tell me...

ardis · Joined: 20 Apr 2006 Location: Seoul

Not plagiarized--it was sampled (a simple google search would show that).

Benicio · Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2007 4:53 pm Post subject:

Yes, it is a ripoff of Stacey Q's "Two of Hearts"(1986).

Funny thing is that it's not the first time that Koreans have passed this song off as their own. Apparently, a girl group did it back in 1988.

Go here, scroll down and listen:
http://summerz.pe.kr/blog/index.php?pl=1089

Even funnier is that other girl, Lee Da-Hae, covering Britney Spears' "I Love Rock and Roll". I bet my next paycheck that both her and Spears have no idea who Joan Jett is!

ruffie · Joined: 11 Oct 2006

LOL...I was just thinking the same thing at the gym yesterday. Pretty bad when you rip off poor old one hit wonder Stacey Q. Is there any creativity here? I recently read in one of the Korean English rags that 70 percent of the Halyu dramas were ripped off from Japanese source material.

lucas_p · Joined: 17 Sep 2007

It is called sampling, not a rip-off. If that were the case, then every song you listen too back home is a rip-off. The house and techno that so many here love is all sampled....hell, under that definition Daft Punk make a LIVING off of ripping off.

Regardless of how you feel about those bands/examples, sampling is used a TON in music today. And songs you listened to a couple decades ago were remakes of songs from the 50s-70s.

That is just the way the music industry works. Madonna seemed to do quite well "ripping off" ABBA.

Benicio · Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2007 5:24 pm Post subject:

Yes, of course, we all know about "sampling"!
Numerous western entertainers have made millions off of it.
That douche bag Puff Daddy is the king of it!
The problem that comes into play is when someone tries to pass it off as their own creation.
I like JYP, but I believe that he has been trying to make people believe that he is the sole creator of these tunes- like when he ripped off Stevie Wonder's "Superstition" several years ago.
If you give credit to whoever you sampled from or "borrowed" an idea from, then fine. If you don't, then you're just a ripoff artist!
The other problem is the sheer ignorance of the listening public. A lot of these kids in the US, Korea, wherever are simply ignorant of music from the past. They have no idea how much their favorite entertainers are "borrowing". That's what makes it so easy for the borrowers.
I like Seo Taiji, but I would never, ever call him a great innovator like most Koreans do. He simply copied what was going on in American hip hop and rock. I guess he was the first one to do it like that, so I guess that would make him a great innovator- of copying!
A true model for Korean entertainers, perhaps!

the eye · Joined: 29 Jan 2004

All art is either plagiarism or revolution.
-Paul Gauguin