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Ex music publisher BLIND reacts to Miley Cyrus

Sign or Decline

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Welcome to a very special Sign or Decline as Paul takes on a full songwriter assessment of Miley Cyrus!

Rather than judging Miley Cyrus based on just one song, Paul listens to three tracks spanning his career to get a better sense of him as a writer and artist. This includes:

00:00 - Start
01:54 - See You Again
06:13 - We Can't Stop
11:20 - Flowers
16:19 - Bass Persuades

We explore Miley's journey from "See You Again", released when she was still a teenager and establishing herself as an artist outside of Hannah Montana, through "We Can't Stop", the song that marked a dramatic reinvention of her sound and identity, to "Flowers", one of the biggest songwriting moments of her career, and finally "Bass Persuades", showcasing where her songwriting has reached almost 20 years later.

This episode is a little different from our usual Sign or Decline format, and is closer to how Paul would have assessed a songwriter back in the day when considering whether they had what it takes to be signed. We're looking not just at whether the songs are good, but whether Miley has a distinctive songwriting voice, whether her songs could work outside of her own performance, and how her songwriting develops across her various eras.

Thank you so much for all your incredible support, and we hope you enjoy this one! Let us know in the comments whether you would have signed Miley based purely on what Paul heard, and who you'd like us to put through the songwriter assessment next! :)

20 Comments

@al700000 2 hours ago

Flowers was an “answer song” or “reply track”.
It’s a common song writing technique.
If you think of Bruno’s song representing the man in the relationship talking about all of things he wish he had done to keep his girlfriend, who is now with someone else, and Miley’s song is from the girlfriend’s perspective. Him doing all of those things he regretted not doing wouldn’t matter because she can do them for herself. It wouldn’t have made her stay, because ultimately he just wasn’t good at loving her.

It’s funny because I actually heard a lot of people mention this when flowers first came out.

@insights570 5 hours ago

Not putting "nothing breaks like a heart" is such a crime

@MBSfilms77 4 hours ago (edited)

You have 100% found something special with this type of reaction video. Most people watch reaction videos just because someone is reacting to their favorite artist, but with this people (including me obvi) can enjoy all of your videos.❤

Edit: and of course, people are still going to suggest their favorites, but that gives other people opportunity to listen and fall in love with an artist they haven't heard of. Genuinely good work in the youtube reaction space :)

@v025-b1r 5 hours ago

As a comment it is said that liam Hemsworth (mileys ex) dedicated her the bruno mars song so she wrote this song as a response after they broke up and he had allegedly cheated on her, also apparently the company that acquired the catalog with the bruno mars song is the one suing and bruno is not involved. I feel like there have been a lot of conversations around songwriting credits in general around different artists these days because a lot of artists would take inspiration or use samples, or songs as an initial track that would be edited and turn into another song, etc. Anyways, i hope you all have a great day, the flower song is now stuck in my head💕

@isakohan 5 hours ago

These longer videos are so much fun to watch :D
Would love to see you react to Lorde sometime!

@pokiy1221 6 hours ago

Watching Daisy get lost in these songs is gold!!

@DRE_vid 2 hours ago

She announces her name right there in the first song! Not Miley's best song, but fair for judging since it is her first single. Few people appreciate how fantastic Miley's voice is. I am a fan and a defender.

@cydneybruce6652 5 hours ago

Paul admitting he has heard a song before is a great moment that I hope helps those who question this see how real this series is

@kellykyv 6 hours ago

You can try her sister too, Noah Cyrus .

@Tash.Alexandra 5 hours ago

Love these videos!! I think a Lady Gaga reaction would be so much fun 🤩

@emilieolsen8788 5 hours ago

For the second song it does sound like she’s saying it’s our body instead of party. So I can understand the confusion there.

@rachelcabot3365 18 minutes ago

Yayyyy! I’m so glad you guys took my suggestion! This is such a fun video and so cool to see your dad’s opinions about the range of Miley’s discography.

@timoth666is 2 hours ago

The second song came out in a time in mileys career where she was being criticized for growing up. She wrote this song to say it's her life to live.

@v025-b1r 6 hours ago

This was such a joyful video, i love miley, i love paul and daisy, it's a good day🌼💕

@Caroline-To 2 hours ago

Not putting "nothing breaks like a heart" is such a crime ..

@ZozoCreations 4 hours ago (edited)

Keeping on the track of Disney stars, would love to hear Paul's opinion on Demi Lovato!

I always felt her writing and lyrics are some of the most honest I've heard. Especially her announcing the end of her sobriety to the world with ''Sober', and then her OD one month after its release.

@mortenrollsen 4 hours ago

The two of you are so refreshing an wholesome to watch. Just two honest, down to earth humans that obviously have a very loving relationship to each other.