Planet of the Bass

The song of the summer is here and it is, apparently, a spoof of 1990s Eurotrash dance hits with a hilarious music video called “Planet of the Bass.”

Years ago I thought, “Hey, I should make a comedy one-hit wonder.” Like it was that simple. I thought maybe something about kung fu? Of course, I had 0% of the songwriting, production or musical skill to do such a thing.

But props to comedian Kyle Gordon, and his alter ego DJ Crazy Times, for doing just that. (It is, reportedly, part of a larger comedy album of parody songs coming soon—exciting!)

I watched this and was laughing hysterically at the ungrammatical English lyrics and vacuous but totally genre-accurate preening:

Apparently it’s a character of Gordon’s going back a long time. An interview:

The thing is...it’s actually a pretty catchy song. Very good production!

And the lyrics are pure poetry: “When the rhythm is glad/There is nothing to be sad.”

Somehow, it manages to be both all in good fun—but takes to the woodshed something that totally had it coming.

I think this particularly warms my heart because it reminds me of being a kid and seeking out Robotech-related Japanese anime. These shows often had a heavy music presence, with good J-Pop songwriting, but the translation of the lyrics—after linguistic and cultural differences—ended up being both on-the-nose and utterly nonsensical.

I can’t find a video with the lyrics in English, but I dimly remember things like, “I only want to feel the true sadness.”