Is Disneyland Music too... Cheesy?

[Soulquarian]

So I'm bumping my Musical History of Disneyand Albums on my iPod in my car with my new sub/speakers (pics in the Micechat car club tomorrow ), and I couldn't help but think how ridiculously cheesy Disneyland music. Not music of the past mind you, but the new stuff. I hate the Parade of Dreams song. That pseudo "I'm not really feeling this song but I'm getting paid a lot of money" type of singing doesn't sit right with me. You all know that part where it breaks down (and the guy does the AWhooooaaaaoooooh)? I hate that. And all the new Disneyland music sounds like that.

When I really think about it, ALL Disneyland music is pretty cheesy, but at least there's some artistic merit to it. Grim Grinning Ghosts has a lot of complex parts to it, and the song can be redone in many different styles. POTC serves its purpose of supporting the ride's "feeling" and the music in the loading area and after the waterfall is rich with various textures (the clarinet for example).

But UGH, every new attraction/show has utterly forgettable or downright cheesy music that does nothing but irk the musician inside of me. Anyone else feel this way? Has Disney lost the inventiveness of the Sherman Bros.?

[Disneyfreak]

Here is the explanation

Walt's hand picked artists vs Today's business men just doing a job.

That is the difference between today's people working for Disney and in the past. Walt worked directly with his artists and engineers and it really showed the difference in quality. Not only that but Walt made friendships from his workers which made it more of a family type business resulting in higher quality things including music. Yes I do agree that a lot of the stuff Disney is putting out lately is cheesy especially when the 90's started.

[thejoshualee]

I hate to be in the "Everything in Disneyland that is modern is bad" camp (not that any of YOU are in that camp) but I do agree with you on this.

I do, however, like the new Space Mt. music... and Remember... but most all rides today can't hold a candle to the likes of Pirates or Haunted Mansion or Country Bears.

[MickeyMania]

Here is the explanation

Walt's artists vs Today's business men just doing a job.

Naaaaaaahhhh. Soarin has good music. There's some great music at Epcot, I like the entrance loop at Epcot and the Tomorrowland loop at MK (which has a nod to InnerSpace , weird since that ride was only at DL.) The studio's hits through the 90s had GREAT music, even not-so-great movies like Hunchback. And of course while Disney didn't write the music for it, Fantasia 2000 was very well done (I love the Gershwin segment.)

Meanwhile, our beloved Pixar has only one movie franchise, Toy Story, that resembles a Disney-esque musical. The highly successful Finding Nemo and Incredibles have no such element. Disney's own recent success, Lilo & Stitch, has more brief Elvis tunes as a source of humor and certainly no large musical numbers.

It really has much more to do with pop culture. People have been looking DOWN on Disney movies for a few years for a few cliches, and one of the most popular to complain about is how everyone keeps breaking into song four or five times through the course of the movie. To be fair, Katzenberg's movies did do that a lot! In most of Walt's movies, music bits were done either realistically (such as Princess Aurora singing to herself through the woods), or in a sequence that was so unrealistic that it didn't matter (i.e. mice making a dress, fairy godmothers turning pumpkins into horse-driven carriages, flying elephants, dogs having a romantic dinner, bears befriending boys in the woods, etc.)

The only major Walt film I can think of that was heavy on musical numbers in situations that they didn't belong was Mary Poppins.

Anyway, Disney has responded to this recent criticism by downplaying the score.

[Soulquarian]

I do, however, like the new Space Mt. music... and Remember... but most all rides today can't hold a candle to the likes of Pirates or Haunted Mansion or Country Bears.

I agree with you here tjl. If anything, the new Space Mt. music is less cheesy than the original lol. I love Remember... but I think it's because most of the music is from classic attractions anyway :P

[thejoshualee]

Naaaaaaahhhh. Soarin has good music. There's some great music at Epcot, I like the entrance loop at Epcot and the Tomorrowland loop at MK (which has a nod to InnerSpace , weird since that ride was only at DL.) The studio's hits through the 90s had GREAT music, even not-so-great movies like Hunchback. And of course while Disney didn't write the music for it, Fantasia 2000 was very well done (I love the Gershwin segment.)

Meanwhile, our beloved Pixar has only one movie franchise, Toy Story, that resembles a Disney-esque musical. The highly successful Finding Nemo and Incredibles have no such element. Disney's own recent success, Lilo & Stitch, has more brief Elvis tunes as a source of humor and certainly no large musical numbers.

It really has much more to do with pop culture. People have been looking DOWN on Disney movies for a few years for a few cliches, and one of the most popular to complain about is how everyone keeps breaking into song four or five times through the course of the movie. Disney has responded to this criticism by downplaying the score.

good points all.. but I think this was more about DisneyLAND music.

[almandot]

I like the Parade of Dreams song but it bewilders me how tokyo keeps popping out addicting parade songs and anaheim has to grab them from something a musician did for something else, not to mention all the rest of the float audio being recompilations of the movie music.

What I really can't stand is the Parade of Dreams music getting blasted and the performers being right in your face and then doing wide-mouth lip syncing as if we're supposed to believe the music is just so loud we can't hear them right in front of our face :P

//I know they all don't necessarily have singing talent, but it's not that hard to softly go along with the music without sounding horrible.

[Soulquarian]

Naaaaaaahhhh. Soarin has good music. There's some great music at Epcot, I like the entrance loop at Epcot and the Tomorrowland loop at MK (which has a nod to InnerSpace , weird since that ride was only at DL.) The studio's hits through the 90s had GREAT music, even not-so-great movies like Hunchback. And of course while Disney didn't write the music for it, Fantasia 2000 was very well done (I love the Gershwin segment.)

Meanwhile, our beloved Pixar has only one movie franchise, Toy Story, that resembles a Disney-esque musical. The highly successful Finding Nemo and Incredibles have no such element. Disney's own recent success, Lilo & Stitch, has more brief Elvis tunes as a source of humor and certainly no large musical numbers.

It really has much more to do with pop culture. People have been looking DOWN on Disney movies for a few years for a few cliches, and one of the most popular to complain about is how everyone keeps breaking into song four or five times through the course of the movie. To be fair, Katzenberg's movies did do that a lot! In most of Walt's movies, music bits were done either realistically (such as Princess Aurora singing to herself through the woods), or in a sequence that was so unrealistic that it didn't matter (i.e. mice making a dress, fairy godmothers turning pumpkins into horse-driven carriages, flying elephants, dogs having a romantic dinner, bears befriending boys in the woods, etc.)

The only major Walt film I can think of that was heavy on musical numbers in situations that they didn't belong was Mary Poppins.

Anyway, Disney has responded to this recent criticism by downplaying the score.

They still seem to have as much music as ever in their attractions. And THOSE are cliche'd. As soon as you hear it, you go "Oh, that's Disney music".

And I LOVED the Incredibles Soundtrack. By far my most favorite musical soundtrack (non-vocal) of any Disney/Pixar film.

[MickeyMania]

good points all.. but I think this was more about DisneyLAND music.

I got a bit off the track there talking about movies, but my point was that there's a lot of good music at WDW and it's all the same people at the end of the day.

If the music at Disneyland is bad or not, it's been playing for a long time. Perhaps it's time for some new tunes?

Proof: Is this cheesy? How about this? Almost sounds like an Olympics ad or something to me, but not really THAT cheesy. And yet that's just the entrance to Epcot music. IllumiNations has a lot more music like that which is very good as well.

So I don't think it's that Disney Parks can't make good music, I think the music at DL is getting old and their sound systems are certainly stale.

[eyes_of_mara]

I myself like Parade of Dreams' music. I don't think it's any cheesier than Disneyland's music usually is; people just have a problem w/ the source material (Phil Collins). Besides, it could be worse - they could have gone the Jump 5 route.

I myself don't see what's wrong with the new attraction music. I love the Giacchino stylings of Space Mountain. I thrill along to the Calliope-on-crack soundtrack of California Screamin'. In fact, I think some of the more recent musical cues of Disneyland beat the old stuff by a long shot (coughcoughIASWcoucghcough).

[thejoshualee]

In fact, I think some of the more recent musical cues of Disneyland beat the old stuff by a long shot (coughcoughIASWcoucghcough).

ya know... I've read something about that recently...

http://thedisneydealer.blogspot.com/...-addition.html

[eyes_of_mara]

ya know... I've read something about that recently...

http://thedisneydealer.blogspot.com/...-addition.html

That's pretty freakin' hilarious.....

[Disneyfreak]

I still stand by this explanation:

Walt's hand picked artists vs Today's business men just doing a job.

There will never be another Bob Gurr, X Atencio, Marc Davis, and Rolly Crump. It is an extinct breed. Anyone new with their type of visions are not heard because they are a needle in a haystack which was not the case at WED. Even when they are heard, beautiful ideas get shelved because they are just too "unrealistic" in the corporate eyes of money or they are stripped down versions of the idea. Even down to the music it has to do with the personalized experience of having a little handful of imagineers in a small building come together instead of a corporation that usually just outsources jobs. Keeping the talent in your own building while listening is the key. Why do you think rides like Indy are so rare? It was rare because it wasn't an off the shelf idea; in addition it was not stripped because lucas provided half the budget. New technologies take a huge budget to accomplish. Disney as it is today is not willing to do that sort of thing as often, especially alone.

[thejoshualee]

I still stand by this explanation:

Walt's hand picked artists vs Today's business men just doing a job.

There will never be another Bob Gurr, X Atencio, Marc Davis, and Rolly Crump. It is an extinct breed. Anyone new with their type of visions are not heard because they are a needle in a haystack.

but you are usually so wishy washy and non-commital.

[crpeoplemover]

That pseudo "I'm not really feeling this song but I'm getting paid a lot of money" type of singing doesn't sit right with me.

But UGH, every new attraction/show has utterly forgettable or downright cheesy music that does nothing but irk the musician inside of me. Anyone else feel this way? Has Disney lost the inventiveness of the Sherman Bros.?

I'm afraid I have to argee. Maybe not ALL their recent music, but large portion of it. Especially the live shows and parades.