After about three months I'm back everyone!
Now I'm not crazy about this rookie girl group, but I guess they're worth noticing.
See the scene where all the girls are sitting and smiling at the camera? What does that remind you of? A similar scene in Girls' Generation's "Gee" video which was out back in 2009! Or maybe that's the intended effect?
Debuting just last June, Gugudan was formed after two of the nine members appeared on Mnet's "Produce 101", a survival show where 101 female trainees from various labels are pitted against each other. The girls share a management company with Vixx, who is already famous for its dark concepts, and that being said it's no surprise that Gugudan seems to follow that route. Except of course being a girl group with mostly teenage members Gugudan won't have dark concepts...I can see them becoming a mix of Girls' Generation and Orange Caramel. Girls Generation for the amount of members they have and Orange Caramel for the playful concepts inspired by famous fairy tales.
I can also see member Kim Sejeong, who already gained massive popularity in "Produce 101" (appearance starts at 0:42), as the next Im Yoona!
Thursday, 11 August 2016
Saturday, 7 May 2016
On waiting...
"If 'love' is another way to say 'waiting'...
Then I want to call you 'love' as well."
Fourteen years and counting...
#youknowwhoyouare
Saturday, 30 April 2016
The annual thing...
Happy birthday, Andreas Hermanu!
You never reply my e-mails, hence this public shout-out.
Whether or not you're married, whether you decide to have a barbecue again or go overseas to celebrate, I hope you're surrounded by love on your special day and may your last birthday before officially entering middle age-dom be memorable!
You never reply my e-mails, hence this public shout-out.
Whether or not you're married, whether you decide to have a barbecue again or go overseas to celebrate, I hope you're surrounded by love on your special day and may your last birthday before officially entering middle age-dom be memorable!
Tuesday, 12 April 2016
The vampire/goth edition of K-pop
This one entry is dedicated to Simon Bacon and Eva Gledhill, two world-renowned British researchers with a penchant for vampires, monsters and all things gothic. I met Simon and Eva at the third "Celebrity: Exploring Critical Issues" at Mansfield College, Oxford, UK, in July 2014.
Below are a selection of K-pop videos from 2000-2015 that have a dark theme. In the videos, the dark theme is used in a myriad of ways, from a mere cliche (as in Taeyang's "I'll Be There"), a symbol of lost innocence (in Park Jiyoon's "Adult Ceremony") to a take on Robert Louis Stevenson's "Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde."
So without further ado...
"Adult Ceremony" by Park Jiyoon (2000)
At the time of the song's release, Jiyoon was only 18 years old (international age.) I have already mentioned in a previous entry that while in most parts of the world she was considered legal at 18, in South Korea she was still pretty much a minor, as the age of consent there was 20 (international age) and it wasn't until 2013 that age of consent was lowered to 19. This should come as no surprise as Jiyoon was under JYP at that time, which is (in)famous for sexualizing minors in a variety of dark themes, which would be seen many years later in Suzy Bae (real name Bae Sooji) of Miss A.
"I'll Be There" by Taeyang (2010)
This mega hit by Big Bang's Taeyang (real name Dong Youngbae) is also available in Japanese and English, but his English pronunciation isn't that clear in the song and I'm not a fan of K-pop songs in Japanese, hence this original Korean version. Find Taeyang's tribute to that iconic scene from "Nosferatu" at 02:01.
"Pray" by Sunny Hill (2011)
A main fixture on the lists of K-pop videos to watch for Halloween, "Pray" was released when Sunny Hill was a co-ed group (it remains the only co-ed group in K-pop history) in 2011. In 2014, Sunny Hill's only male member Kim Janghyun left the group after completing compulsory military service to focus as a producer for the group.
"Touch" by Miss A (2012)
The opening scene still kinda gives me nightmares, more than four years on. Oh, and by the way the album version has a rap break by one of the group's Chinese members, Meng Jia.
"Hyde" by Vixx (2013)
Vixx stands out from the rest of K-pop boy groups for its consistency in the exploration of dark themes. If blood and gore are more your cup of tea, check out "Voodoo." For more loose adaptations of famous gothic literary pieces by the six-piece band, take a look at "Error", which is their take on "Frankenstein."
"V" by Lee Junghyun (2013)
Directed by Park Chanwook, dubbed the Korean Tim Burton, "V" by Lee Junghyun reminds me of "House", a 1977 Japanese slapstick horror movie. I totally dig the vampire brides, and my favourite scene is one starting at 03:38.
"Bad" by Infinite (2015)
What makes this one special is that "Bad" was actually released during summer time, a time when K-pop is bombarded by videos around the theme of beach and pool and skin-revealing outfits (hahah here's looking at you Sistar)! I love how the "Bad" video plays with the mirror theme as much as I love Sunny Hill plays around with the crucifixes in their "Pray" video.
Fellow K-poppers, am I missing anything? Which one do you like best?
Below are a selection of K-pop videos from 2000-2015 that have a dark theme. In the videos, the dark theme is used in a myriad of ways, from a mere cliche (as in Taeyang's "I'll Be There"), a symbol of lost innocence (in Park Jiyoon's "Adult Ceremony") to a take on Robert Louis Stevenson's "Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde."
So without further ado...
"Adult Ceremony" by Park Jiyoon (2000)
At the time of the song's release, Jiyoon was only 18 years old (international age.) I have already mentioned in a previous entry that while in most parts of the world she was considered legal at 18, in South Korea she was still pretty much a minor, as the age of consent there was 20 (international age) and it wasn't until 2013 that age of consent was lowered to 19. This should come as no surprise as Jiyoon was under JYP at that time, which is (in)famous for sexualizing minors in a variety of dark themes, which would be seen many years later in Suzy Bae (real name Bae Sooji) of Miss A.
"I'll Be There" by Taeyang (2010)
This mega hit by Big Bang's Taeyang (real name Dong Youngbae) is also available in Japanese and English, but his English pronunciation isn't that clear in the song and I'm not a fan of K-pop songs in Japanese, hence this original Korean version. Find Taeyang's tribute to that iconic scene from "Nosferatu" at 02:01.
"Pray" by Sunny Hill (2011)
A main fixture on the lists of K-pop videos to watch for Halloween, "Pray" was released when Sunny Hill was a co-ed group (it remains the only co-ed group in K-pop history) in 2011. In 2014, Sunny Hill's only male member Kim Janghyun left the group after completing compulsory military service to focus as a producer for the group.
"Touch" by Miss A (2012)
The opening scene still kinda gives me nightmares, more than four years on. Oh, and by the way the album version has a rap break by one of the group's Chinese members, Meng Jia.
"Hyde" by Vixx (2013)
Vixx stands out from the rest of K-pop boy groups for its consistency in the exploration of dark themes. If blood and gore are more your cup of tea, check out "Voodoo." For more loose adaptations of famous gothic literary pieces by the six-piece band, take a look at "Error", which is their take on "Frankenstein."
"V" by Lee Junghyun (2013)
Directed by Park Chanwook, dubbed the Korean Tim Burton, "V" by Lee Junghyun reminds me of "House", a 1977 Japanese slapstick horror movie. I totally dig the vampire brides, and my favourite scene is one starting at 03:38.
"Bad" by Infinite (2015)
What makes this one special is that "Bad" was actually released during summer time, a time when K-pop is bombarded by videos around the theme of beach and pool and skin-revealing outfits (hahah here's looking at you Sistar)! I love how the "Bad" video plays with the mirror theme as much as I love Sunny Hill plays around with the crucifixes in their "Pray" video.
Fellow K-poppers, am I missing anything? Which one do you like best?
Monday, 8 February 2016
First entry in twenty-sixteen
Back from a two-month long unannounced hiatus everyone! Oh and annyeong haseyo to my Korean visitors. I got more visitors from South Korea than ever while I was away.
Been busy teaching short semester (which would be called summer school overseas but Indonesia is a tropical country) and tending to my thesis students - all but one got panicky around a week before the final draft deadline. Talk about typical.
Now on to what I wanna talk about.
I know it's super duper late but I've been crazy about this single lately.
I have almost as many followers on Instagram as she does...which is not a big number. "Clutch Bag", which was out in September 2014, is her last single so far, and as not all solo artists in the K-pop realm are as lucky as IU (real name Lee Jieun) or Eric Nam, there's not a wonder that Hi.Ni is so little known despite debuting in 2012. On top of that, there's very little information about her on the internet. Her birth date is still unknown, and a source mentions that her real name is Won Yuri. If the latter is true, there's not a wonder in the world why she goes under a special stage name (the same source says that "Hi.Ni", which is Vietnamese for "baby", was given by her dad when he was working in Vietnam) because otherwise she'd be mistaken for Kwon Yuri of Girls' Generation.
People who have listened to "Clutch Bag" complain about the rap part a lot, and at first I did find it annoying. But overtime I just got used to it - it didn't grow on me, I just got used to it. And I started listening to the song just as I started to collect clutch bags. Hi.Ni is so talented, she definitely deserves lots more love. For more Hi.Ni, check out her earlier single "Legend of Tears."
Been busy teaching short semester (which would be called summer school overseas but Indonesia is a tropical country) and tending to my thesis students - all but one got panicky around a week before the final draft deadline. Talk about typical.
Now on to what I wanna talk about.
I know it's super duper late but I've been crazy about this single lately.
I have almost as many followers on Instagram as she does...which is not a big number. "Clutch Bag", which was out in September 2014, is her last single so far, and as not all solo artists in the K-pop realm are as lucky as IU (real name Lee Jieun) or Eric Nam, there's not a wonder that Hi.Ni is so little known despite debuting in 2012. On top of that, there's very little information about her on the internet. Her birth date is still unknown, and a source mentions that her real name is Won Yuri. If the latter is true, there's not a wonder in the world why she goes under a special stage name (the same source says that "Hi.Ni", which is Vietnamese for "baby", was given by her dad when he was working in Vietnam) because otherwise she'd be mistaken for Kwon Yuri of Girls' Generation.
People who have listened to "Clutch Bag" complain about the rap part a lot, and at first I did find it annoying. But overtime I just got used to it - it didn't grow on me, I just got used to it. And I started listening to the song just as I started to collect clutch bags. Hi.Ni is so talented, she definitely deserves lots more love. For more Hi.Ni, check out her earlier single "Legend of Tears."
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