Source: crommelincklars / CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)

SUSHI RAMEN remixed Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy” with bodily sounds and the result is strangely catchy

If you follow music, then you know Billie Eilish. The 18-year-old has experienced runaway success. Her 2019 album "When We Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?" was a Billboard 200 hit and the best performing album of the year. She has appeared on nearly every American talk show and even Saturday Night Live. She has five Grammy Awards, two American Music Awards, two Guinness World Records, three MTV Video Music Awards, and one Brit Award. What’s more, she recently released "No Time to Die." The 2020 single will be the theme song of the next James Bond movie.

The young musician has even caught on in Japan. Despite the current pandemic, she is slated to play a stadium show in Yokohama in September 2020. And tickets aren't cheap—they range from 9,500 to 15,000 JPY ($88-138). If you're interested, more information is available here.

Billie Eilish has a robust following among Japanese netizens. The Universal Music Japan upload of her hit "Bad Guy" has over 3 million views. Numerous YouTubers have covered her work and received thousands and even millions of views in the process. The musician also has a strong presence on Japanese SNS. The Japanese hashtag for Billie Eilish is full of fan art, cover videos, and retweets of the singer's media content.

SUSHI RAMEN's Bodily Sounds Cover Video

They say, "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery." But in the case of YouTuber Sushi Ramen and Billie Eilish, I'm not so sure whether or not that is true. Particularly that bit about flattery.

Recently, YouTuber Sushi Ramen experienced a surge of views on his cover of Eilish's "Bad Guy." The attention is well deserved. Indeed, the vlogger accomplished something special; he recreated the hit single scene-for-scene using sounds generated from his body. Why don't we have a look:

SUSHI RAMEN begins the video replicating the bass track by kicking the studio room floor. A metal can crashing on his head recreates the drum track while some weird PVC pipe rig appears to mimic the opening bass line.

As the video continues, Sushi ramen relies on unusual found sounds as well a microphone techniques to remake "Bad Guy." He recreates a snare drum by a popping balloon. He mimics snapping by brushing his hair across a string, and he sits on a vibrating plate to add some extra tremolo to his vocals.

While the audio track is creatively recorded, the visual component of the video is perhaps more impressive. Sushi Ramen manages to recreate several scenes, several of which are bold colored rooms. There are also the essential small cars from the original. My favorite, however, is the bloody nose scene. In the original, Eilish is bleeding on her all-white outfit. In the case of Sushi Ramen, it's ketchup dripping from corn dogs. Pretty creative.

Just like me, fans gushed over the video:

  • “This is like a fever dream.”
  • "People are coming here to listen to this every day."
  • “This video will still be studied 100 hundred years into the future.”
  • “I want Billie Eilish to see this for herself, that’d be really interesting.”

The video also received numerous English comments from overseas viewers, something unusual for Japanese vlogs:

By - Luke Mahoney.

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