Wedding Dress

This came about because I like doing “good” translations of songs, where “good” means both true to the original meaning and lyrically, musically, and prosodically pleasing at the end. Most translations (or parodies) only accomplish one of these.

The original song “Wedding Dress” (Taeyang) is pretty great. I picked it up from my K-pop friends, and (later) they came across this translated version (J. Reyez and Tommy C.). This is actually a very good one (I love the nod to “Apologize”), but it loses a bit of the original story. So then to back up my claim that I could do better, I had to go do it better. I don’t read Korean, but I found what felt like a good translation and came up with…this.

When I see the two of you
Fight and cry like you sometimes do
Then my heart leaps for a moment; maybe this isn’t true.
But then I turn and see you smi-smi-smile again
I feel fine but I know that to you, we’re just friends.
Know that I can’t let you start to figure out how I feel ‘bout you

Cause then we’d drift apart, and I can’t stand to lose that too.
Tell myself it’s all right, take a deep breath and hold it tight.
But I turn away so my heart won’t break tonight.

Baby,
Please don’t leave me.
Please don’t take his hand.
Cause you should be my lady
Please don’t let my
Dreams turn into sand.

(The music starts…)
You’re walking down the aisle to the altar,
about to say “I do”, and oh,
how I prayed every night that at the altar
I could be the one next to you
to

See you in that wedding dress (dress).
Girl, see you in that wedding dress (dress).
(It’s not me, no!)
Wedding dress (dress).
Oh, see you in that wedding dress.
Oh no…

Now there’s no tears left to cry
Cause I’ve been up every night
Why is it that he’s your man and I’m not in your life.
I close my eyes and dream that now-now-now was then
But all along I knew that this was how it’d end.
When I’m by myself I talk as if you’re here with me
But in the day a smile hides the love that I can’t let you see.
A quick laugh that we share, and I catch the smell of your hair.
Won’t you please leave him and come with me?

Baby,
Please don’t leave me.
Please don’t take his hand.
Cause you should be my lady
Please don’t let my
Dreams turn into sand.

(The music starts…)
You’re walking down the aisle to the altar,
about to say “I do”, and oh,
how I prayed every night that at the altar
I could be the one next to you
to

See you in that wedding dress (dress).
Girl, see you in that wedding dress (dress).
(It’s not me, no!)
Wedding dress (dress).
Oh, see you in that wedding dress.
Oh no…

(reverse piano)

See you smiling happily
Please forget my misery
Don’t look; it’s gonna be unbearably hard for me.
You know I want you two to be happy so I can take
as long as I need to
try to forget you.

You’re walking down the aisle to the altar,
about to say “I do”, and oh,
how I prayed every night that at the altar
I could be the one next to you
to

See you in that wedding dress (dress).
Girl, see you in that wedding dress (dress).
(It’s not me, no!)
Wedding dress (dress).
(Should’ve been me, shoulda been me!)
Oh, see you in that wedding dress.
Oh no…

From JoMoWriPoShoSto.