Get Me Bodied vs. Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)

tbh I thought a lot of B-Day was incredibly half-assed. Most of the songs seemed unfinished, unfocused or confused and I wasn't as impressed with Beyonce's voice as I was when Dangerously In Love came out, so I wasn't handwaving things that irritated me about the way the songs were put together to luxuriate in her dulcet pipes (because really that's the only explanation for how hard I used to rep for "Naughty Girl"). I really liked "Deja-Vu", I LOVED "Ring The Alarm", and everything else... um. "Flaws and All" was nice...?

(full disclosure, I should really say "a lot of what I heard off of B-Day" because I never heard the full album due to hating the singles after "Ring The Alarm" so much)

I don't find the vocal line to "Get Me Bodied" to be particularly catchy considering most of it is monotone shouting.

idk it's a monotone but i love the tension of it all - it's so rigorous, it brooks no nonsense and never lets up, not even when the tension releases in the bridge - 'single ladies' by contrast feels a tad sloppy, probably because of that lurching synth line which i could really do without. (the bridge of 'single ladies' is definitely the least fun bit of the song.)

xps, yeah what al said

(i also think 'ring the alarm' is the best track on b'day but i don't see it as particularly comparable to 'get me bodied' - the arrangement might be similar but that's true of most of the album, and her rigorous dance instructor vocal approach to GMB is so different to the deranged scorned hellcat of RTA. though you might be able to tell me this, dan - i've always wondered wtf she is doing with her voice, technically, on the chorus of RTA, it sounds like there's lots of weird tonal shit going on but i don't know exactly what.)

I like that "Get Me Bodied" is just a really energetic and catchy vocal over a brittle rhythm track that doesn't have any real melodic backing. I think "Single Ladies" would sound better that way,

"single ladies" couldn't be much more minimal! i didn't realize just how minimal and amelodic the track is until i heard an instrumental though.

anyway these are more reasons why 'get me bodied' is better:

- drop down low and sweep the floor with it
- do the uh-oh, do the uh-oh, do the uh-oh-uh-oh-uh-oh-oh-no-no
- pat your weave, ladies, pat, pat, pat your weave ladies, watch it while he check up on it
- tick, tick, tick-tick-fight
- pose for the camera now, flick, flick
- do an old school dance, an old school dance
- stop! now cool off, cool off, drop! now cool off, cool off
- wine it back girl, wine it back girl, make your hair touch the floor, wine it back girl
- drop to your knees, arch your back girl, shake, shake it like that alleycat
- shake your derrière in them dereons
- do the scissorleg, touch your heel touch your toes, do the scissorleg
- do the naomi campbell walk! the naomi campbell walk! walk across the room like naomi campbell!
- snap for the kids, snap for the kids, snap for them suckas three times
- touch your body while you touch my body, we touching bodies tonight

though you might be able to tell me this, dan - i've always wondered wtf she is doing with her voice, technically, on the chorus of RTA, it sounds like there's lots of weird tonal shit going on but i don't know exactly what.

It isn't actually that weird, harmonically; she's harmonizing a minor chord but it's in the second position, meaning that the root note of the chord (the main melody line) is in the middle, the fifth of the chord is below it (the second vocal line that comes in) and the minor third is on top (the last vocal line that comes in). It's considered to be a very unstable-sounding spelling of the chord because the fifth on the bottom wants to resolve down to the root; that's part of what adds to the tension and urgency of the choruses (the other being the nasal edge she puts on her vocals to really make them buzz through the sound-effects and the shrill synth chords).

it's "tick-tick-fight"? wtf. I could never figure out what she was saying there, my best guess was "take flight" but the move in the video didn't seem to correspond to that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_chord

for visual reference (2nd inversion pic)

there is a jump up to a respelling in the root position in there, too, that I never really noticed before

xp: It's absolutely "tick-tick-fight" as is made clear by the video

lol sorry that sounded snotty because I didn't see you'd mentioned the video

as an instrumental Single Ladies > Get Me Bodied which is merely percussion (because B is doing a lot more there than on SL(PAROI) sure). i tend to value production in this way and want the music to be as substantial as the vocals (if not more so). that is why i personally prefer Single Ladies.

really? the instrumental of "single ladies" doesn't really even make sense without the vocals, as great as the beat is.

as an instrumental Single Ladies > Get Me Bodied which is merely percussion

lol this is like saying "the beat to 'Grindin'' is merely percussion"

"merely percussion" makes a backing track

I meant a great backing track, but whatever

i dont mind that its so minimal although beyonce isnt exactly the type of melodicist that can make you forget how minimal it is.

single ladies sounds really minimal to me. in a way i like it but i could do with more synths.

the instrumental of "single ladies" doesn't really even make sense without the vocals, as great as the beat is

so how much less sense does 'get me bodied' make without vox?

'Grindin' had the drip-drop melodic thing at least

when DJs use the instrumental as a music bed to just play out or talk over on the radio, i think "Get Me Bodied" sounds a lot better and still sounds danceable.

grindin was a hip hop track though - you dont necessarily need much melody for a hip hop beat.

in fact the less melody, the better.

that's what i'm saying, single ladies isn't much less minimal than get me bodied, except for the bridge! there are more synths but they're basically being used as percussion sounds.

xp

If you're not hearing Beyonce in the context of hip-hop pop, I have no idea how you're hearing her.

so how much less sense does 'get me bodied' make without vox?

it's weird, i totally love the "single ladies" backing track when it's working with the vocal, but it's almost annoying as an instrumental. whereas "get me bodied" just sounds like any ol' beat.

that is the context im hearing her, but id like to hear her in more of a pop context than a hip hop one ;)

but being synths they increase the sound palette, puncutate as events and crucially are a bit more inspiring than looped handclaps (xposts). at least that's the kind of sound i'm more into - irrespective of what's on top of that vocally.

tbh when the first whirring synths come in on Single Ladies it reminds me of a sound from early 90s Amiga game S.W.I.V. and that is probably the #1 reason i heart it

those synths remind me of a david lynch movie, the darkness

i just love that part so much

the handclaps make me think of some sweaty, friendly afterhours club, so i like them a lot

"get me bodied" also sounds to me like a coming-out gay anthem with its feeling of liberation, the joyful shout outs about being yourself, letting go, finally just getting out there and being you.

sub-question: which of these songs shoehorns in a mention of House of Deréon more awkwardly?

I don't think I've noticed the Dereon mention in "Single Ladies", so the other one. "Ring the Alarm" probably wins on that score, tho.

anyway these are more reasons why 'get me bodied' is better:

- drop down low and sweep the floor with it
- do the uh-oh, do the uh-oh, do the uh-oh-uh-oh-uh-oh-oh-no-no
- pat your weave, ladies, pat, pat, pat your weave ladies, watch it while he check up on it
- tick, tick, tick-tick-fight
- pose for the camera now, flick, flick
- do an old school dance, an old school dance
- stop! now cool off, cool off, drop! now cool off, cool off
- wine it back girl, wine it back girl, make your hair touch the floor, wine it back girl
- drop to your knees, arch your back girl, shake, shake it like that alleycat
- shake your derrière in them dereons
- do the scissorleg, touch your heel touch your toes, do the scissorleg
- do the naomi campbell walk! the naomi campbell walk! walk across the room like naomi campbell!
- snap for the kids, snap for the kids, snap for them suckas three times
- touch your body while you touch my body, we touching bodies tonight

― lex pretend, Monday, January 26, 2009 10:35 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark

reasons why single ladies is better:

- it has a chorus

get me bodied has a chorus!

to be less trolly: i think there's a reason why single ladies is/was huge and get me bodied was just a deep cut and that's because the single ladies chorus is really immediate and noticeable and forceful (helped by the way it double tracks when it comes back around)

"Single Ladies" definitely has more of a big major lead single hit event song vibe, and in that sense I understand why it's a bigger song, but it also contributes a bit to my dislike for it.

for that matter, I dislike a lot of her/DC's lead singles (Deja Vu and Lose My Breath especially) for their kind of stifling lead-singley-ness.

yeah i've been ambivalent at best at every big beyonce single before "single ladies" that i can remember aside from "irreplaceable", and aside from me being an unrepentant tricky/dream stan, this one seems way less canned than those (esp. "lose my breath" ugh) and genuinely not-of-the-times in terms of top 40, even tho it is immediately a rewrite of some b'day shit

"get me bodied" also sounds to me like a coming-out gay anthem with its feeling of liberation

weird, this reading never occurred to me - lyrically i can see it but the beat and b's performance are so tense and rigid, it's all about not stepping out of line to me, about working and working and working to get the moves right, even in the middle 8. actually this is the key difference between sasha fierce and her previous uptempo work to me, the sasha fierce tracks are coded much gayer (even 'single ladies', check the no of youtube gays doing the dance as evidence) - it's her drag queen alter ego, really.

It's weird to me how "If I Were a Boy", which kinda screems "3rd single -- Now we are entering the Ballad Zone" took off before "Single Ladies" did.

lex otm about drag queen alter egos

tracer hand otm, those feelings of liberation and inhibition-releasing are one of the biggest reasons i love beyonce and also, for example, kevin barnes

btw thanx dan for the RTA stuff! dredging through my memory for grade v music theory, it's nice that it's still there.

I think after "Irreplaceable" she thought releasing a ballad w/ acoustic guitar as a lead single would be a big smash, but forgot that "Irreplaceable" had a beat and worked as well on urban radio as anywhere else. So that kind of seemed to have a slightly higher promotional priority than "Single Ladies," but then the latter ended up much more popular.

Yeah, "If I Were a Boy" sounds like it could just as easily be Taylor Swift as anything that gets played on urban radio.

"Single Ladies" definitely has more of a big major lead single hit event song vibe

it's easy to say this in retrospect but when it first emerged, wasn't everyone like "uhhh isn't this a tad weak?"

b wants to make her lead singles EVENTS so obviously, i admire that. it reinforces the precision-controlled nature of her career, and the vague feeling that she stays up at night plotting her world domination on, like, spreadsheets and shit. the only lead single she's been involved in which still doesn't scream EVENT is 'deja vu', though i still like it.

i sorta thought these were the same song tbh, in my head i just hear 'get me bodied, get me bodied, get me bodied ALL THE SINGLE LADIES'

back to the TS: Get Me Bodied by a landslide. Single Ladies needed the video and the pop culture juggernaut to get it to grow on me. All Get Me Bodied needed was one play.

"Get Me Bodied" is my favorite Beyonce song, period.

>I don't find the vocal line to "Get Me Bodied" to be particularly catchy considering most of it is monotone shouting.

― Barack You Like A Husseincane (HI DERE)

v. otm - GBM sounds too cluttered, throwing everything to the wall, and totally loses momentum in the last half when she starts speak-singing. It starts reminding me of a louder version of that Lumidee song by that point, all that throw-away clapping. The wailing/shouting/lack of a chorus doesn't help either.

Single Ladies destroys it, no contest

Also lyrically speaking Single Ladies is a great, classic, pop song - a timeless message that will resonate with women worldwide cross-culturally (lol but true)

and the Mexican Breakfast / Gwen Verdon inspired rips of SL are much >>>> than the Sweet Charity rips of GMB

I still think that Beyonce's finest dancing moment was her bust-pump during the Sean Paul rap in the VMA performance of "Baby Boy" back in 2003.

My housemates and I spent some time trying to perfect that.

"Single Ladies" is pretty close though. It's the monomania of the video clip's focus on her dancing that pushes it so far.

Yeah also rev I now worship my idea of you.

actually the best beyonce dance is the one where she smacks her head like she has an itchy weave. there is a clip of it in this hilarious video by rich of four four fame

wow perfect preview point

this one?

xp

really sean paul couldn't make it out for the vmas huh?

at least for the beats and the choruses

sorry, meant to say beats and VERSES

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

ha!

too many people drinkin the koolaid

Yeah also rev I now worship my idea of you.

― Tim F, Wednesday, January 28, 2009 3:03 AM Bookmark

My life isn't that awesome. I am, after all, an interweb nerd.

i meant to post this earlier, but i was really just hoping "Bodied" would get at least half as many votes as "Single," so this is cool with me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIr8-f2OWhs

INDIE WINS!!!! GUITARS!!!!

SO AMAZING

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-GssCjko1Q

that is p seamlessly done musicwise

omg is there an mp3? ysi?

dirpy.com

wonderful

http://craphound.com/images/beyonceblocked.jpeg

didn't put my video mash-up of Single Ladies over FlyLo's 'Melt!' on YT because figured it would be taken down quickly but here's an mp3

Congratulation to Beyonce

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb9eL3ejXmE

DAMN, KILT HIS DREAMS

haaaaa

loooool

:D

http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj21/Yukant_Seame/u-mad1.jpg

would totally kiw that family tho

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wjehii-jjHE

someone sent this to me and I watched it, now my youtube recommendations are all "since you watched little girls going hard," just an FYI