Usually its like just a few words sprinkled in, or at most like one or two lines…
Literally I feel like they’re just trying to say: “Hey this is a foreign language I’m sooo cooool!”
It’s not unheard of there to be English language tracks that drop in random French, Italian or Spanish words and phrases
It’s just regular cultural exposure to other languages ultimately. No rule says you need to stick to one language in a song, so some musicians throw in some stuff from other languages they’ve heard, because why not
I was gonna say this too. Que Sera Sera, Livin’ la Vida Loca… I’m sure I could think of more.
Psycho killer, qu’est-ce que c’est
Even German: Wayne Newton - Danke Schoen
Or Deak Kennedys “California Über Alles” (the accent is just soo bad)
L’amooooooouuuuuur !!!
You know how many French words/phrases I hear in English songs? Coup de x, raison d’être, déjà vu, etc
Not to mention the use of hors d’oeuvres, cul-de-sac, faux pas, rendezvous, cliche…
And then there’s the German ones: kindergarten, eigenvalues, …
Please show me songs about eigenvalues.
I found two that are at least loosely about eigenvalues:
And a few more containing the word “eigenvalue” but not focussing on it.
Edit: Despite my best effords, I could not find any songs in german about eigenvalues or eigenvectors. Very sad.
Oh, the Fourier transform of revolution In the manifold of dialectic space Comrades, let us normalize the solution To the eigenvalue of the human raceI am not entirely sure I’m going to let that count as English. /s
I believe when the person said what the fuck are eigenvalues? They were intending on mainstream English songs.
Lmao two wildly different concepts
L’amour vs Science.
De hell is “Eigenvalues”??
I feel like at this point, many of those are basically English words now. Like Déjà vu.
As if US music isn’t full of random Spanish words
English contains a veritable shitload of loanwords as well.
But you’re not wrong when you think they’re trying to be cool. You’ll hear this most often in hiphop, which started in English and not every language lends itself to rap. So they throw in an f-bomb here or there. Imitation is the highest form of flattery type stuff.
Also, English is the most commonly learned foreign language on this planet. A lot of contemporary music genres came out of North America. I would say internet culture is most pervasive in English as well. A lot of tech jargon becomes English loanwords in other languages. There are reasons beyond wanting to sound cool as well.
Umm… don’t plenty of English language songs do this too?
Mhmm…The amount that is used in jpop is way bigger.
Of the top of my head I mainly see bilingual english speakers (like spanish/mexican) that use maybe some spanish word sprinkled inbetween.
Meanwhile jpop can sometimes be 10% (and more) english in the lyrics.
Oh well, que sera sera…
you know the saying that english is five languages in a trenchcoat that drags other languages into alleyways to ruffle through their pockets for loose nouns?
english is basically the european pidgin language.
Not just songs, but all the other languages showing up in English comes up conversationally too! When you did something wrong, there’s the “mea culpa”. Or in the courts, there are tons of Latin phrases like “nolo contendre”. I’ve had “perritos calientes” (hot dogs, literally hot puppies) in Spain, but never have I had a “giant cheese” (quesadilla) or “little donkey” (burrito) in the states. And we just borrow other phrases as-is like “Je ne sais quoi” and schadenfreude.
The english language literally steals words from other languages and adopts them.
Macabre Ennui Taco Plaza Café Ballet Cuisine Restaurant Elite Genre Police Patio Rodeo Canyon Guitar Tomato Mosquito Hamburger Wanderlust Angst Pizza Pasta Piano Opera Balcony Volcano Algebra
I can keep going but I think you get the point. Some english songs do throw in other languages at times too.
Many Asian songs, especially Japanese and Korean will often include english because they are all taught english in school and english is used in the business world. When visiting Korea and Japan, in major cities, a large amount of signage will include english to aid tourists.
I feel like English is more of a patois/pidgin than people think. Just the impact of the Normans, French/Gauls, Celtics and then latterly cultural impact of the French/Germans, Indians, Jews greatly shaped our language in the middle ages, which has kind of settled into a language slurry in the last 600 years.
This list has a certain… Je ne se quois about it
♫ Voulez-Vous Coucher Avec Moi Ce Soir ♫
Yes, I can imagine. It’s done literally all the time, in every genre.
Same reason some English songs have random words in other languages I guess.
This happens all the time with music. Especially with bilingual people. Maybe listen to more music, kid.
Recommendations?
Idk how to even get into listening to English-language music…
Should I spotify? But then again that’s corporate… I’d get cancelled here if I start using that…
How are you even supposed to… um… music?
I’m literally just listening to random Cantonese and Mandarin music on Youtube…
The only music I ever had at home was hearing my dad’s Cantopop… that’s my introduction to music…
(And also just random intrumental music I found online… like beetoven stuff)
So C-Pop is what I know most…
(The only English songs I know are stuff similar to “Because of You” by Kelly Clarkson, cuz I just wanted to find songs about the theme of shitty parenting… cuz I had problems with parents and need some songs like that for cartharisis)
I mostly listen to music on Youtube.
Well, that’s technically not true. I mostly listen to music in videogames. They basically ALL have some sort of background track. That seems different somehow.
Anyway. When something makes me think of a song, I’ll look it up on Youtube and play it, then sometimes listen to other stuff that comes up in the suggestions.
I’ve looked up artists/groups because of seeing them mentioned here. I like Eleine (not normally a metalhead otherwise).
I don’t have to because there are? Does no one recall those guts who were Kung Fu fighting? The rumor is that those cats were fast as lightning.
I was in Germany once many years ago, and was riding the train with a bunch of college kids. They only swore in English, everything else was German.
Username checks out.
In Dutch we have a term called “borrowed words”, those are words we stole from a different language.
For example “Portefeuille” is a Dutch word, but it originate from the French. Another example is “computer”, we do not have/use a Dutch variant.
Using these words in a song will sound like your described. But it’s actually still Dutch
Mm, English calls them loanwords. Like we’re going to give them back at some point.
But English itself is an unholy marriage of Dutch and French, each half taking the other half as loanwords. It’s a miracle we get anything communicated.
Like we’re going to give them back at some point.
You might, actually. It’s called reborrowing or repatriated loans, where a language borrows a word from another language that was itself a loanword from the initial language. English doesn’t seem to have many examples of these but there are many examples where English borrowed and then “returned” a word.
