One of the songwriters of K-pop girl group CLC’s comeback single “Helicopter” has praised the girls for their efforts in bringing out their best for the song.
Melanie Joy Fontana is one of the composers of “Helicopter” along with Hyuk Shin and Park Jisoo of 153/Joombas, and her husband Michel “Lindgren” Schulz, who also arranged the track. The lyrics are by Yoon Kyung Jo, CLC member Yeeun and BreadBeat, while Fontana is also credited for the lyrics of the song’s English version.
“Helicopter” was released on Sept. 2, signalling CLC’s comeback after releasing “Devil” in September last year.
Fontana told Manila Bulletin Entertainment this is the first time that she and Schulz have worked with CLC.
“This is our very first time working with the girls! Their aesthetic is really amazing. Lindgren and I stand a strong identity,” she said.
As of Sept. 17, the music video for “Helicopter” has amassed 30.5 million views on YouTube.
“The video is perfection. Like a Cinderella glass slipper to the song. I’m so proud of the work the girls put in on this one. They sound amazing and it translates beautifully in the MV,” Fontana said of CLC.
While singers have always been the attraction of a song, songwriters are an important part of the team. “Without the songwriter there is no song,” singer-songwriter Shontelle once told WIPO magazine.
For Fontana and Schulz’s participation in “Helicopter,” she said they exchanged ideas with the other team members.
“We sadly did not get to communicate with the girls while writing the song, we did it all via ‘satellite,’ teams going back-and-forth sharing our ideas with the artist. I did, however, exchange DMs with Yeeun and we both agree we want to write more together!,” Fontana said.
For their work in “Helicopter,” Fontana said, “We started it together at a writing camp at 153 Entertainment here in LA. It took us about 10 hours to get it right.
Lindgren (aka Michel) actually came up with the concept and title ‘Helicopter.’ From there, we made sure production was on point and danceable. Good hard days work!”
She said it took several hours on the initial writing day to write the English lyrics of the song.
“I went back and forth with my collaborators Nive, Lindgren and Shin for a while, pitching little hooky rhymes back and forth. Then a few months later, CLC and their team came back and asked me to write a second set of English lyrics to match the newer ‘concept’ they’d come up with for the song and MV. That took me a bit longer because I knew it’d be coming out soon and I wanted my lyrics to be perfect for them,” she narrated.
Fontana said “Helicopter’ was “made from scratch. We had in mind an idol band such as CLC putting their stamp on it. Once we pitched the song to their team and everyone approved, we made sure to perfect it at that point alongside the girls/the Korean lyricists to give it that magical CLC signature.”
Fontana’s career as a songwriter saw her stamping her creativity on the works of many artists including K-pop stars.
These include Justin Bieber’s “Home This Christmas,” f(x)’s "Boom, Bang, Boom," Tiffany’s “Yellow Light,” Britney Spears’ “Mood Ring,” The Chainsmokers’ “Setting Fires,” BTS’ “Euphoria,” “Boy With Luv,” “Mikrokosmos” and “On (feat. Sia),” TXT’s “Crown” and “Runaway,” and TWICE’s “Trick It.”
Fontana is looking forward to working with CLC in the future, saying, "Hopefully it will not be our last time working with CLC! We love the team at Cube ."