Psy Breaks YouTube Records With ‘Gentleman’ — Here’s Why His Success Is Short-Lived [VIDEO]

Psy is having what we call a “bounce.” See, I used to clean up crime scenes for a living, and, frequently, when someone jumped off a tall building or a parking structure, their body used to do a curious thing where it wouldn’t just splat, it would actually bounce a little — sometimes flipping entirely over from front to back.

With his next song, I feel like Psy has achieved a similar designation. You see, when I wrote “Gangnam Style’s” obituary a while back, between you and me, I wasn’t just writing the song’s obit, I was also writing the singer’s. Very few things that are as novel as Psy sustain such heights or relevance (particularly if they don’t have Katy Perry’s boobs). I fully expected Psy to splat on the ground after “Gangnam Style,” but I forgot about “the bounce.”

“Gentleman,” the next single from the K-pop singer, just smashed the hell out of the previous record for most views in a single day. Try 51 million views in 40 hours — not at all bad considering that the previous record — held by Justin Bieber’s “Boyfriend” — was only 8 million views in the same span. Now the song is at 67 million and rising.

But here’s the thing: “the bounce” is not really a “bounce” at all. It’s more like a flop. Superballs bounce; pop novelty acts and dead bodies flop. Sure, this thing is going to be massive initially — there’s a curiosity factor. Even I watched his latest video — but now that I have, I feel confident in saying I won’t ever have to watch another one (unless some asshole hits viral paydirt with a spoof vid). See, even Psy knew he was going to plummet hard, so he packed his video with a lot of repeat imagery. Most of the original players are back — minus the “horse dance” that everyone emulated (wise move there). The video’s not bad, btw, it’s just not anything worth making a fuss over. And in the pop music world, that’s fatal.

Think “The Da Vinci Code” and it’s follow-up … well, whatever it’s follow-up was called (don’t write in to comment. I could look it up if I thought it mattered). The first week, everyone on Earth had to have that book. The second week, everyone used it to balance out that wobbly chair. Sure everyone is taking a look at the Psy video now — they need to see for themselves that they wasted their time looking.