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An article that used the term “dopa-gaki” (dopamine kids) — applying young people’s social-media- and short-video-honed craving for constant stimulation to recent hit songs — became a hot topic on 5ch’s Geinou/Sports News+ board. Against the claim that today’s hits by acts like Mrs. GREEN APPLE, M!LK, and CANDY TUNE are “packed with too many notes and feel frantic,” the thread saw nostalgic voices for Showa-era pop and ’90s J-POP clash with pushback along the lines of “people have said the same thing in every era.” The discussion also spread to whether any of today’s songs will be remembered by later generations, and to the state of music overseas.
Why Are Today’s Hit Songs So “Restless”? The Music of the “Dopa-Gaki” Era, as Seen in Mrs. GREEN APPLE, M!LK, and CANDY TUNE
Lately you hear the term “dopa-gaki” (dopamine kids) a lot. It’s a mocking term for young people who can’t put their phones down, constantly feeding on stimulation from social media and short-form video — likened to dopamine addicts.
Some view this tendency — losing the ability to spend time savoring a novel or a film, with the mind instead darting straight to momentary pleasure — as a social problem.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Read the original article here
What people said
Showa pop is great.
My parents watch those enka-singer shows, and the songs performed there are good too.
Stuff like "Bus Stop," group songs — tons of classics.
Two years ago they rebroadcast the entire 1971 (Showa 46) Kohaku Uta Gassen, and I recorded it and still have it saved.
Japanese music that year was truly a banner year.
Got no brains
Don't have a single close friend
I'm headed to Tokyo, I am
Nah, don't come here, seriously (riffing on Yoshi Ikuzou's classic 1984 song "Ora Tokyo Sa Iguda" / "I'm Off to Tokyo")
Glad I'm not a dopa-gaki.
It feels less like genuine love and more like "I heard it's popular overseas, so let's give it a listen."
That just means you only know that type of song.
Besides, even among widely-known songs, they're not all like that.
Take Akina Nakamori, for example — she was more an idol than an artist, yet some of her songs are still known today. What about Mrs. GREEN APPLE and the rest?
People were saying the exact same thing about her back then too — that stuff like that wouldn't last for later generations.
Why is Akina Nakamori even the comparison here, lol.
Even though it's supposedly "over," breaking arena tour records is impressive.
Everyone else looks pathetic by comparison.
For this year's Kohaku, Furuppa (nickname) will probably get to perform again.
Kyanchu (nickname for CANDY TUNE), though, is a stretch.
They got slammed for "making minors sing lyrics like this."
It's just turning into "things were better back then."
That's because the public wants Jiro-style ramen, but they're serving trendy boutique ramen instead (Ramen Jiro: a famously hearty, no-frills ramen chain, used here as a metaphor for substance over style).
Idol group songs do have some good ones if you actually listen.
It's just that I deliberately avoid them, and when I see them singing on TV it just looks like a chorus line reciting information, so I switch it off.
I record Kohaku and watch it later, and that's often the first time I hear a song and think, "oh, this one's actually good."
Meanwhile, Boogieman's "PACHINKO・MAN" — a song I found annoying 34 years ago and still don't even like — I can hum it instantly. Why is that?
Because you were sensitive and still young back then.
The US and UK are the same way.
Even in America the top-charting stuff is "that," but country music still sells at a steady clip.
Though these days "country" often has rap mixed into it, so it might look pretty different from what you'd expect, lol.
Ever since Aimyon publicly said she's a Spitz fan, Spitz otaku have suddenly multiplied.
The annoying part is they all act like "oh, I've always loved them."
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
“Dopa-gaki” is a coined term for young people accustomed to the stimulation of social media and short-form video, and the original article used it to analyze the composition of recent hit songs. What divided the thread was whether today’s songs are genuinely overloaded with notes and thin on substance, or whether posters were simply repeating the nostalgic cliché that “music these days is no good.” Comparisons were drawn to Akina Nakamori and AKB48’s peak-era songs, but some pointed out that AKB’s songs were likewise criticized at the time for their lyrics and staging — suggesting the “things were better back then” argument has repeated itself across generations regardless. A comment also claimed country music maintains a certain level of popularity in the US, but this was a single opinion within the thread, and no supporting statistics appeared in the original article.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports News+) thread “[Entertainment] Why Are Today’s Hit Songs So “Restless”…? The Music of the “Dopa-Gaki” Era, as Seen in Mrs. GREEN APPLE, M!LK, and CANDY TUNE.”
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