SHURIKID: "At the risk of entering an unprovable debate: you're wrong. Just because the American musical market's infrastructure happens to be grounded on crappy pop radio fueled by emotionless pseudo-clone-"artists" doesn't mean that's what every or even the majority of English-language musical artists pander to. Your limited musical scope is not the general rule. Heck, even somewhat popular bands like Depeche Mode and The Cure are known for being heavily poetic and introspective with their work. Robert Smith is perhaps one of the greatest lyricists in recent musical history, and he's still putting out quality work.

Conversely, there are plenty of Japanese/Korean/German/Spanish/etc. bands and artists that have no capacity for lyric writing; BoA and the Wonder Girls hardly put out what I would consider heartrending prose. They don't even write their own songs. It sounds like what you're saying is that Utada's Japanese songs are beautiful because they're sung in Japanese: this not only downplays her talent as an artist, it's a very confused statement. A song's quality (or lack thereof) is not predicated by what language it's written in. There are terrible artists from all over the world: there are great artists from all over the world.

To bring everything full circle, if "This Is The One" is straightforward and "non-poetic", it's because Utada decided to write it as such; the same way "Kremlin Dusk" is heavily metaphorical and "You Make Me Want to be a Man" uses plenty of symbolism and allegory because she decided to write those songs utilizing said literary techniques on her own authority as a songwriter. It has nothing to do with language."


Excuse you don't tell me my musical scope is limited because you don't know what type of music I listen to. What I'm talking about is Music that is currently popular here in the states. I'm not saying English lyrics as a whole is meaningless and un-poetic. The music of Janis Joplin, John lennon, Bob Marley and even Phyllis Hyman has so much soul and meaningful lyrics that can touch you and make you feel emotional. That's only a few artists I've listed there are so many more. The majority of Mainstream music today lacks soul, originality and meaning. That is what I've been trying to say. Its a shame that there are so many artists who have so much talent are unsuccessful because artists like Lady Gaga are dominating the charts.

And where are you coming from telling me that I think Utada's Japanese songs are much more beautiful than her english becasue their sung in Japanese!? First off I'm a bigger fan of her English music then her Japanese. When people on these forums were saying how her Japanese lyrics were poetic and meaningful while her english lyrics lacked meaning. I defended Exodus and TITO saying that her lyrics were meaningful and some people could relate to her songs such as Hotel Lobby, Taking my money back and This One. Aside from Utada, 3 songs of BoA and Minmi I do not listen to J-pop and would never say that its much better and has a lot more meaning than English music.