Battle Point Unlimited: Cut-And-Paste Plagiarism

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kei17
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Battle Point Unlimited: Cut-And-Paste Plagiarism

Post by kei17 » Fri Mar 20, 2009 2:17 pm

I happened to notice that many parts of Battle Point Unlimited, an inserted music in DBZ episode 120
have almost the same melodies/rhythms as some songs by a German band "Propaganda"..
You know, this music was composed by Kenji Yamamoto, the person who is going to score Dragon Ball Kai BGMs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-P7UxlrCdE&fmt=18

Giri Giri -Sekai Kyokugen- also sounds like "Immigrant Song Progressive-Arranged", by the way.[/i]
Last edited by kei17 on Mon Apr 13, 2009 10:07 pm, edited 4 times in total.

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Post by bkev » Fri Mar 20, 2009 2:20 pm

To be fair, the guy who composed the main MGS theme plagiarized from a Russian composer, so sometimes that happens. I mean, that doesn't make it any less good IMO.

Unfortunate that it wasn't original though. :(
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Post by Tweaker » Fri Mar 20, 2009 4:06 pm

Oh wow... that really is identical! I thought it might have just been a coincidence when I heard the first comparison bit, but when the slap bass section came in and the chord progression was literally identical, I was pretty taken aback. That's totally uncanny!

Too bad, too; that was, like, my favorite insert song ever. :(

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Post by VegettoEX » Fri Mar 20, 2009 4:09 pm

Nice! We've had a ton of fun keeping up with these musical homages / rip-offs on the podcast, so this is just another one to add to the pile...
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Post by omegacwa » Fri Mar 20, 2009 4:22 pm

Just so everyone knows, pretty much all music has already been written, there are only so many note and chord progressions that sound good, that now there is tons and tons of overlap. For every song out there I am sure you can find another that sounds just like it, and yet the two bands/composers have probably never even heard of each other.

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Post by Daijuken » Fri Mar 20, 2009 4:27 pm

Man, what a shame. That really is disappointing. Although I will give Yamamoto credit for actually making BPU better than the original, so life's not all that bad. :P

Aren't most DBZ songs though a rip of something? Or like a "Unofficial Japanese cover version"? I mean, Faulconer's stuff has a few incidents also..

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Post by Innagadadavida » Fri Mar 20, 2009 4:57 pm

Daijuken wrote:Man, what a shame. That really is disappointing. Although I will give Yamamoto credit for actually making BPU better than the original, so life's not all that bad. :P

Aren't most DBZ songs though a rip of something? Or like a "Unofficial Japanese cover version"? I mean, Faulconer's stuff has a few incidents also..
As a musician, I can tell you, it's very hard to separate yourself from your influences. There have been a couple of incidents where I came up with an awesome bass line and I would show my friends and they're like, "Uh, dude, that's from so-and-so." And that's happened to my friends too. It just happens subconsciously. You come up with something in your head like you normally do and think that YOU made it up. It often takes somebody else to show you that its not original, and if the other person can't tell you that, then you're in trouble.

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Post by damkylan » Fri Mar 20, 2009 5:45 pm

Wow. I actually sent this example in to the podcast e-mails awhile back, but I only mentioned the main melody of P. Machinery, so this was pretty interesting. Nice find.

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Re: Battle Point Unlimited: Cut-And-Paste Plagiarism

Post by Commander_Red » Fri Mar 20, 2009 10:35 pm

This is noticed a lot with songs by Kenji Yamamoto / Monolith. There's a song on Digital Dragonball The World that is identical to the opening of Total Recall. People have noticed it with the Super Butoden arranged tracks too.

Maybe he's grown out of it by now, no ones said anything about the latest stuff like in the Budokai's. That I've seen anyway.

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Post by SSj_Rambo » Fri Mar 20, 2009 10:48 pm

VegettoEX wrote:Nice! We've had a ton of fun keeping up with these musical homages / rip-offs on the podcast, so this is just another one to add to the pile...
Yeah, I've really enjoyed listening to those comparisons you threw into those episodes.

You should really make a list/guide of all of the ones you have found so far and what podcast episode you played them in!

Anyway, great find kei17!

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Post by VegettoEX » Fri Mar 20, 2009 11:20 pm

damkylan wrote:Wow. I actually sent this example in to the podcast e-mails awhile back, but I only mentioned the main melody of P. Machinery, so this was pretty interesting. Nice find.
Did you? D'oh! Totally missed that e-mail. Just mentioned it recording tonight and thanked kei17 for the heads-up... :P.
Commander_Red wrote:Maybe he's grown out of it by now, no ones said anything about the latest stuff like in the Budokai's. That I've seen anyway.
Nah, we've noticed a couple (though not nearly as many). The one from the Burst Limit OST that I noticed was the song "Let's Fight! Fight!" being somewhat similar to Maximum the Hormone's "Koi no Mega Lover".
SSj_Rambo wrote:You should really make a list/guide of all of the ones you have found so far and what podcast episode you played them in!
Fully planning on it.
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Post by kei17 » Sat Mar 21, 2009 1:14 am

VegettoEX wrote:Nice! We've had a ton of fun keeping up with these musical homages / rip-offs on the podcast, so this is just another one to add to the pile...
It's a pleasure to be picked up like that. :)
Daijuken wrote:Faulconer's stuff has a few incidents also..
The music played at around 5:25 to 35 on this video sounds like the BGM used when the player is beaten in a popular video game Ghosts 'n Goblins. I thinks it's just a coincidence, though.
Commander_Red wrote:This is noticed a lot with songs by Kenji Yamamoto / Monolith. There's a song on Digital Dragonball The World that is identical to the opening of Total Recall. People have noticed it with the Super Butoden arranged tracks too.

Maybe he's grown out of it by now, no ones said anything about the latest stuff like in the Budokai's. That I've seen anyway.
That's interesting. Can you tell us some examples with the real songs/musics?

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Post by Commander_Red » Sat Mar 21, 2009 2:28 am

I'll do the Total Recall one because it's the only one I've noticed by myself without someone telling me.

Total Recall Opening Music - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbEJuOfJC3c

Digital Dragon Ball - The World: Track 8

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Post by MajinVejitaXV » Sat Mar 21, 2009 4:05 pm

It happens a lot in music in general. "Dani California" by Red Hot Chili Peppers has a chord progession that sounds similar to Tom Petty's "Last Dance with Mary Jane." Final Fantasy VIII's original piece composed for the Invasion of Dollet, which was in the demo, was removed from the final games because it was found to sound a great deal likes Hans Zimmer's main theme from The Rock.

I'm sure I could think of more, but those are a couple from recent memory that stand out. In any case, the general feeling in Japanese culture at least seems to be that "imitation is the highest form of flattery."

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Re: Battle Point Unlimited: Cut-And-Paste Plagiarism

Post by MCDaveG » Mon Mar 23, 2009 11:14 am

This is not the first time in Dragon Ball Music.... Lot of pieces from Monolith are musical collagges, they are even using beat from Kraftwerk - Numbers))) Or Yamamoto's sampled Queen Intro from track Play The Game on Budokai 3 OST and if I will listen to all that DB tracks, I will find lot of examples..... I tought BPU was composed by Monolith, so I finally get my answer to my original tought that Yamamoto and Monolith are the same. I heard that in music......

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Post by SonEric84 » Mon Mar 23, 2009 8:38 pm

I've mentioned this before, but Yuka's "Brain Dance" and "On the Dark Side" by John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band are somewhat similar.
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Re: Battle Point Unlimited: Cut-And-Paste Plagiarism

Post by Commander_Red » Mon Mar 23, 2009 8:45 pm

MCDaveG wrote:so I finally get my answer to my original tought that Yamamoto and Monolith are the same.
To be precise...

All Produced by Project "MONOLITH" Planning & Sound-Create Department :
remix planning, synthesizer programming, & direction : Hideki Matsutake
remix planning, recording, mixing, editing, & direction : Haruo Saito
remix planning, co-ordination, & direction : Takahashi Uchida
remix planning, medley & new song's arrangment, & direction :
Kenji Yamamoto


:)

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Re: Battle Point Unlimited: Cut-And-Paste Plagiarism

Post by MCDaveG » Tue Mar 24, 2009 9:47 am

To be precise...

All Produced by Project "MONOLITH" Planning & Sound-Create Department :
remix planning, synthesizer programming, & direction : Hideki Matsutake
remix planning, recording, mixing, editing, & direction : Haruo Saito
remix planning, co-ordination, & direction : Takahashi Uchida
remix planning, medley & new song's arrangment, & direction :
Kenji Yamamoto
:)
Thanks a lot, I wasn't able to track these informations down
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Post by jjgp1112 » Mon Apr 06, 2009 1:07 pm

Daijuken wrote:Man, what a shame. That really is disappointing. Although I will give Yamamoto credit for actually making BPU better than the original, so life's not all that bad. :P

Aren't most DBZ songs though a rip of something? Or like a "Unofficial Japanese cover version"? I mean, Faulconer's stuff has a few incidents also..
Yeah. I can pick out a bunch of Japanese BGM pieces that sound like other songs.
Yamcha: Do you remember the spell to release him - do you know all the words?
Bulma: Of course! I'm not gonna pull a Frieza and screw it up!
Master Roshi: Bulma, I think Frieza failed because he wore too many clothes!
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