I was going to start listening to the #Bodypump 125 track list so I was at least slightly familiar with some of the music before it launches on 1st July, but I see track 4 has been replaced (artist Aero Chord doesn’t align with #LeaMills values). Anyone know what the replacement track is? Have they done a Shadowboxer and kept the choreo, but totally changed the music?
Also, is it still Diana picking the music, cos I don’t recognise any of the new stuff?
Not an instructor, just a fanboi participant that's been doing LM classes and LM+ at home for 10 years, and pestering my instructors for extra information as well as watching as many public TAP team livestreams as I can.
AFAIK the way they do it now is that there's a back office team in charge of screening music, checking the licensing and creating lists of approved songs, the creative directors pick the music (enough songs for the release with appropriate BPM for each track, plus a couple of extras in case some don't work out), the program director works out the choreo for the tracks (and sometimes that means altering the song - you'll notice often that some sections are longer or repeated compared to the original), they trial it in live classes in New Zealand, then get the presenting team together for a few days, practice it and then film it for instructor training and later release to LM+.
I think in the old days it was much more ad hoc. I'm pretty sure Glen was picking the music himself for RPM and Bodypump, and worrying about clearing it for copyright licensing etc happened later (that's why a lot of the older releases are missing or incomplete on LM+). Now I think it's Diana and they have very different taste in music. There's also more marketing nonsense going on, I'm not sure what demographic they think they're aiming for (seems to be Gen Z/Millennial), but there are plenty of us Gen X and Boomers in the live classes I go to. I know I'm not alone in not recognising most of the songs any more.
To be honest it took me like 4 years of regularly doing Les Mills to realize the songs they were using were actual songs. I always thought they were using music designed specifically for the lessons, because the type of music I listen is so different. So I've never really payed much attention to the music they use. I just a beat to be able to move at the right tempo for a specific exercise.
They used to use a lot of tracks I already had in my collection by bands like Muse, Fall Out Boy, Five Finger Death Punch, The Killers, Panic! at the Disco, Three Days Grace, 30 Seconds to Mars alongside massive hits like Come With Me Now or Uptown Funk. There have been a handful of older Pendulum tracks used in recent release, but for most of it it takes me a couple of goes before I learn the song and can feel when the changes are coming.
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