It’s time for another episode of Kpopalypse Plagiarism Fun Times!

Before we get started, your ready reference of plagiarism-related trufax:

• Introduction to plagiarism
• Plagiarism explained a bit more because people kept fucking asking about it
• Plagiarism explained even more in a desperate last ditch attempt to shut people up (no such luck)

These links might be helpful if you’ve never read anything that I’ve written about plagiarism before.  Once you’ve read them, continue as we discuss

GFRIEND

Firstly, what do I actually think of them?  Or in other words, how biased am I?  Firstly, the songs:

“Rough” is really good.  “Me Gustas Tu” is pretty good.  “Navillera” is also decent.  “Glass Bead” is by far the worst feature track, fairly boring.  Nothing of theirs is truly horrible (as far as feature tracks go), but they tend to do the same thing with only minor variations anyway so they’re not exactly taking a lot of risks, their songs so far are four versions of pretty much the same thing.  Gfriend are the Brian Johnson-era AC/DC of k-pop churning out basically the same shit constantly and that’s fine, it’s k-pop not some up-the-ass trendy bullshit music that 18 year olds with big bushy beards and one-speed bicycles listen to.

Do I like the girls?  Umji has coveted status as 2016’s “no reason” sidebar girl, which of course means that the answer is “mu” (무).  Mu as a response loosely translates to “no thing”, which doesn’t mean “no”, nor does it mean “yes”.  It’s the absence of both “yes” and “no”, the suggestion that the true answer lies outside of these boundaries, so the literal meaning could be translated into Australian as “shove your simplistic false dichotomy up your cunthole” (perhaps using Eunha’s jaw as a wedge to get it as far up there as possible).

Now that we’re all thoroughly confused, let’s move onto the plagiarism accusations:

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #1: Gfriend’s “Glass Bead” sounds like Girls’ Generation’s “Into The New World”

It’s true that the two songs do sound alike, especially in the chorus.  I noticed this straight away, as did many others, to the point where Gfriend themselves even commented and said “well we’re still young so this is our only opportunity to rip SNSD off before we age past the material“.  However sounding alike and plagiarism aren’t the same thing.  Blues, jazz, reggae and country music all literally couldn’t even exist without “soundalikes”.  All music sounds pretty much the same – if it didn’t, you probably wouldn’t like it.  That’s because people process music relative to other music that they’re already heard.  Really innovative things happen in the pop sphere very rarely – most shit sounds like other shit, and you can get just about any song and find another one that sounds similar.  Things really do need to sound exactly the same to a large degree for there to be a case here, not just “gosh that seems similar”, but many k-pop fans can’t tell the difference between “similar” and “identical” because tone-deafness is an incredibly common thing.  It’s not k-pop fans’ fault if they have trouble discerning pitch accurately, but maybe they shouldn’t go around acting like they know stuff for sure that they don’t, lest they be made an example of by contemptuous snarky k-pop bloggers.

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #2: Gfriend’s “Trust” sounds like “Girls’ Generation’s “Complete”

What, you’re saying that all disgusting k-pop album filler ballads sound the same?  Gee, someone stop the presses.  I’ve been saying that they all sound the fucking same for years.  K-pop’s terrible ballads are not plagiarism but just shitty music, mind you I’m happy to pretend that it’s all plagiarism if it gets a few of these awful songs banned off the face of the planet.

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #3: Gfriend’s “Navillera” looks like Oh My Girl’s “Liar Liar (v2)”

Speaking of liars, this accusation comes courtesy of a hilariously biased-in-tone article from Koreaboo, a trashy website who aren’t afraid of engaging in a bit of actual plagiarism of their own.  The logic would go that it takes one to know one, but the article hilariously suggests that Gfriend’s real roller skates are plagiarising Oh My Girl’s fake rollerskates.  I swear I’m not making this up, this is a real article that suggests not more than one girl group is ever allowed to wear roller skates, ever, without being legitimately accused of plagiarism.  If we’re going to go down this route, I think no girl groups should wear underwear because SNSD wore underwear once.  Seems fair.  Oh and did I mention that Oh My Girl’s rollerskates aren’t actually real rollerskates anyway?  Just pointing that out.

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #4: Gfriend’s “Navillera” tennis clothing looks like some other tennis clothing

Already debunked by the clothes manufacturers themselves so no need to repeat it all here except to say that imagine a world where wearing clothing was copyrightable.  You wouldn’t be allowed to wear anything at all, because a while back someone else also wore it.  It scares me that netizens who comment on k-pop articles and think stuff like this is actually an issue may one day become important people in society making actual decisions that affect others.  Humanity is in a bad place.

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #5: something to do with Apink, fuck I dunno

Fuck, k-pop fans are dickheads.  Every k-pop girl logo ever has a heart in it or some bullshit.  Also, budding brides, don’t hold flowers while posing for photos, you’re plagiarising Apink!  Also remember that only Apink can wear white dresses!  Don’t wear black ones either, you’re probably plagiarising Rainbow!  Probably safest to just not get married. girls.

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #6: Gfriend’s “Navillera” intro sounds like Infinite’s “The Chaser” intro

So an intro to an older k-pop song was great so Gfriend’s agency decided to do something very similar to it so they could also sound awesome?  Good!  They’re learning by others’ good examples.  That’s how music evolves into a more awesome thing over time, by people getting what was cool and mimicking it, slightly changing it as they go.  Not plagiarism, but evolution, which of course bothers netizens who are not very evolved creatures and thus jealous that biology has left them behind.

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #7: Gfriend’s “Compass” sounds like f(x)’s “Airplane”

They’re copying f(x) album tracks too?  Thank fuck for that, f(x) are one of the only groups in k-pop who actually have some decent fucking album tracks.  Let’s support Gfriend’s copycat mission all the way!

Gfriend plagiarism accusation #666: Umji’s look is plagiarising 1980s era Bruce Dickinson

This accusation comes direct from KPOPALYPSE and is therefore PURE UNADULTERATED TRUFAX.

It seems that Umji has completely plagiarised the image of one of the world’s greatest heavy metal singers, Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden.  Clearly this face style, long flowing locks and undeniable good looks are plagiarised.  Can you even tell who is who in these pictures?

It’s not just the physical appearance – the iconic dance moves are similar.  People wonder why Gfriend are so good at dance, it’s because they learned from watching Iron Maiden videos over and over in their dorms.

Who can deny the similarity?  Clearly, Iron Maiden should sue Gfriend’s agency.

To top it all off, both Umji and Bruce are well-versed in INCREDIBLY SKILLED AND CONVINCING TV LIPSYNCING.

Clearly Kpopalypse has identified the only plagiarism controversy in Gfriend that really matters.  You’re welcome!

It’s time for another Kpopalypse roundup!  Let’s check out this week’s new releases!

Pungdeng-E

BeatWin – Your Girl

This song is pretty decent but the constant falsetto really gets on my tits.  There’s a reason why T-ara’s “Roly Poly” ripped off everything about The Bee Gees except the stupid male vocals.

Gavy NJ – Shubirubirub

Did you know that Gavy NJ is the longest-running girl group in k-pop?  Well now you do, mind you there’s no original members left so I’m not sure if it counts.  In fact I don’t even know who these girls even are.  Fuck it, song’s okay I guess, plus they look good, what more do you want – just don’t tell them that it’s “shoobedoobedoo”.

Solbi – Get Back

Solbi’s obviously after Dara’s crown as k-pop’s queen of stupid hair.

D.Action – Millionaire

Actually this isn’t too horrible but I want him to do a song with D.Holic just for the puns.

Dynamic Duo, Primary, B.Bio, Crush – Highfive

The Korean hip-hop veterans are here to show all those nu-school trap assholes that they can yolo just as lamely as anyone.

Jiyeon & Junhyung ft. Yoon Yo – Summer Love

Essentially this is part 2 of that MBK project song from a year ago as it has a lot of the same melodies and textures.  No video for this yet because life is cruel, but here’s a video of Jiyeon showing off her fighting skills, no doubt honed in the danger of the jelly arena.

Laysha ft. Nassun – Chocolate Cream

They could have left out that sax riff, as those are getting annoying these days, but the rest of this is actually pretty decent and I’m not just saying that because I want to look at the video because I’m all for putting pervert stuff in the bonus section where all the shit songs are for later use.

CHINESE BRACKET WHICH TAKES UP AN UNREASONABLY LARGE CHUNK OF EVERYTHING HERE JUST LIKE CHINA’S TERRITORIAL CLAIMS

ZTAO – Black White (AB)

Don’t worry kids – World War III totally isn’t going to happen.  The US and China will just wave their floating metal penises at each other for a while and then both will go home happy that they’ve shown the other one that they mean business.  Unless that shit’s still going on if/when Trump gets in, then all bets are off because he’s clearly nuts and capable of whatever.  Or Hillary for that matter, she’s a warmongering cow with a track record of making stupid military and trade decisions.  Oh wait, those are the only two choices the USA has?  Okay, so we’re probably all fucked soon.  Which means I’ve got nothing to lose by saying this song ain’t all that (although I’ll admit the piano that comes out of nowhere is pretty cool).  China, come at me bro.

Zhou Mi – What’s Your Number?

The Chinese government probably already hates me for the cao ni ma thing anyway.  But hey, if their warships have commanders who look as good as Jiyeon I guess I don’t mind surrendering, as long as they promise not to play me this Zhou Mi song in some kind of Guantanamoesque torture facility.

f(x) – All Mine

People are saying that this sucks and I agree but what the fuck the same people liked about “4 Walls” I dunno because they sound pretty similar to me.  Maybe the novelty of f(x) doing this bullshit style of music has just worn off now.

Fei – Fantasy

My fantasy is for Min or Jia to have been given this concept instead.  Can you imagine Min doing this with the curves she has now?  It would be the best k-pop video ever, but instead we get Fei who looks like she donated 50% of her body weight to Project Luhan.

Kris – From Now On

From now on he’s going to release shitty ballads and generally suck, I guess.

OTHER SONGS I DIDN’T PLAY

Boni – It Was You

Just your typical bullshit cancer song.  Keep scrolling, do not hit play, thank me later.

LaLaSweet – Garden Heart

Not sure of the translation here, it could actually be “Heart Garden”, or perhaps even “Garden Of Love“.  I don’t think Bletch would have signed this group though.

MoonMoon – Roach

His guitar has no strings on it.  If only!  Mind you the song does get better about two and a half minutes in but that’s a long time to wait for a pop song to stop being shit.

Seoul Siblings – Breakfast Of Holidays

This is boring Bob Marley style reggae that everyone hates and has given the style the reputation as worthless hippie garbage, and not cool dub reggae.  Pity.

Seoul Siblings – Seoul Real Eastate

Their other song is better, but not by much.

The Solutions – Ticket To The Moon

Wow, look how bored they seem when playing their own song.  Who can blame them.

Yellow – Ainos

This band are so boring and shit that they named themselves after a Coldplay song so you know exactly what to expect.  Thoughtfulness 10/10.

That’s all for another Kpopalypse roundup!  More next week!

It’s time again for everyone’s favourite series highlighting Korean pop music videos nobody gives a shit about – Kpopalypse Nugu Alert!

Come with Kpopalypse once again as he explores the depths of Korean nugudom for your entertainment!

After the extremely positive reaction to Hexagonal Water’s “Adduddu” in Episode 19 of Kpopalyspe Nugu Alert, I thought you guys might enjoy an episode entirely devoted to Korean trot music!  Or maybe you’ll hate it, which will be hilarious!  Either way, here it is!

So what is trot music anyway?  Korean trot is an early form of Asian “traditional” pop music, of which there are similar derivatives in Japan and other Asian countries.  The word “trot” is derived from the word “foxtrot“, a western dance style that originally accompanied ragtime music, but the Korean trot music that we know today doesn’t have much in common with music that people would foxtrot dance to and is more heavily influenced musically by the more commercial end of pop music that was prevalent in the US in the 1950s and 1960s.  I’m not talking about stuff like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones or even Elvis Presley (all considered “rebellious anti-establishment rock music” back in the day) but rather the very commercial end of 50s and 60s bubblegum pop style that has been largely forgotten.  Korean performers of the day absorbed and replicated the style of trending western commercial pop hits in order to help increase their popularity with American soldiers stationed in Korea, which then in turn influenced the genre overall, making Korean trot a more westernised form compared to its Asian counterparts.  The result is that Korean trot heavily favours the western diatonic major and minor scales and has similar harmonic rules to the blues and country music (predominance of I, IV and V) that was the musical ancestor to America’s 1960s pop hits.

Korean trot has also evolved some other stylistic quirks, such as bold brass stabs bookending the verses and choruses, these usually being played on a keyboard rather than actual brass instruments.  Drum machines and synthesised bass are also common, making trot the perfect music to recreate on an arranger keyboard, although plenty of trot songs with live drumming and bass guitar also exist.  The other common instrumental element is electric guitar, which is frequently distorted, as sustained lead guitar sounds are used liberally to reinforce melodies.  On top of all this is the singing which tends to conform to fairly conventional phrasing characteristics, with vocal phrases usually lasting two bars and containing predictable, regular gaps.  Visual presentation is generally quite formal favouring classy suits and dresses, dancing tends to be rudimentary rather than technical, and backing dancers in MVs and live stages (when present) are more commonly mixed gender to the performers instead of the same gender, the opposite to the norm for idol pop.

If the above doesn’t make much sense, don’t worry – watching some examples will certainly help, so let’s get down to it!  As usual, regular Nugu Alert rules apply:

• Less than 20,000 YouTube views on official channels
• Nobody outside Korea cares
• Relevant to Kpopalypse

Please now enjoy the following selection of hand-picked nugu trot videos!

Lim Sehoon – Oh My Love

There’s benefits to being a nugu solo trot singer.  One of them is you get to shoot outdoor scenes in busy places without the need for a security detail or cordoning off streets.  Lim Sehoon walks happily through the streets of downtown wherever in “Oh My Love” and doesn’t get bothered by a soul, so I think it’s pretty safe to say that he’s as nugu in Korea as he is everywhere else.  However he also makes a point to explore the lush Korean countryside, as well as practice his dance steps with his backing dancers in the interior of a room which looks like it might be the shower block from Project Luhan.  Star of the show however is definitely Lim Sehoon’s shoulder-slam judo move, deployed in the chorus to accentuate the punchy rhythm and let the viewer know that even though he looks about 18 years old with all that BB cream and pink lipstick, trot singers are tough on the inside.  After all they’ve had to watch the gradual global rise of idol pop leave them behind, they know what it feels like to do the hard yards in life.

YouTube views at time of writing: 6649

Notable attribute: camera angle at 1:34 makes it look like he’s walking on water, making Lim Sehoon officially “trot Jesus”

Nugu rating: very high

Kim Keunsan – Song Requests

Kim Keunsan mixes up his trot music with a slight ska feel in the interludes before the first and second verse, and it’s definitely a nice change, but a shame that the song doesn’t carry that flavour for a little bit more of its length, as I think a full ska/trot song is something we need.  Musical style is not the only thing that he mixes up however – I watched this video quite a few times and I’m still not certain if the guy in drag is actually Kim Keunsan himself deploying a bit of double-up camera trickery, or just someone else blessed with remarkably similar features.  Whatever the case, both of them certainly look like they’re having a good time, and you can see what appears to be Kim visibly trying to hold back his own laughter in several takes.  There seems to be some kind of story being told in the video but I can’t really work out what it is, other than it probably has something to do with karaoke and flashing belly buttons, but I don’t really care and when you’re watching this utter madness you won’t either.

YouTube views at time of writing: 370

Notable attribute: “female” protagonist brazenly waves a large bag of weed at 2:49 in solidarity with idols going through drug scandals

Nugu rating: very high

Kim Soonju – Inclement Rain Falls At Night

Trot isn’t always played for laughs however – sometimes it’s time to get serious, and not many trot performers reach a greater level of seriousness than Kim Soonju in “Inclement Rain Falls At Night”.  Kim Soonju gives off the aura of an old-school veteran of the trot scene, however her videos don’t seem to have millions of hits or a huge international following, which I find to be strange.  What’s even stranger than this is the inappropriately fast editing which unlike other crimes against the retinas like T-ara’s more heavy-going videos isn’t even noticeably synchronised with the music’s beat in any way, making each individual cut even more jarring than it would otherwise be.  Add Kim Soonju’s bold fashion statements into the mix with some tasty grain film effects and fade-to-white dissolves straight out of Windows Movie Maker, and you’re in for one hell of a visual rollercoaster ride, and that’s before you even get to the music which adds intense vibrato and traditional Korean instruments into the lushly orchestrated trot mix.  Thank me later.

YouTube views at time of writing: 409

Notable attribute: stylish “earthquake” effect punctuates each verse, creating visions of Kim Soonju stomping all over your face

Nugu rating: extreme

That’s all from Kpopalypse for this edition of Kpopalypse Nugu Alert!  Kpopalypse will return with more nugus at a future date!

Hi everyone, it’s Kpopalypse back again with more Kpopalypse interviews!  Once again it’s Kpopalypse who is going to be interviewed, this time about the “Korean Wave” so hang onto your hats!

I remember all too well the days of being a financially and mentally struggling University student.  I’m all about helping University students out with their tough assignments, so when the following request came through my email, how could I say no?

My name is Sarah and I am a student in South Australia. I am working on a research project about the Hallyu Wave and how it has taken over the world! After reading your blog (which is very amusing and entertaining might I add 😃), I think that you’re an absolute expert in this topic and was wondering if I could send you a couple of short interview questions to answer and send back to me? I would greatly appreciate your help!

Thank you very much,

Sarah

Naturally I told Sarah that I was interested and that more questions were better than less, so she quickly replied with a bunch of questions that I will now answer here for your entertainment!  A lot of these don’t actually have anything to do with k-pop, but as an “absolute expert” I will try my best!

What do you think are the main differences between Korean and Western fashion (appearance/style/colour)?

Well, firstly, I’m colour blind so I’ll skip the “colour” part of the question completely as I really don’t know any shit at all about that.   I’m not really a fashion expert either, but I do spend a lot of time looking at girls so I’m not sure if that counts for something.  The main thing I notice with Korean fashion is the predominance of random English text on things, I’m told that this is because Koreans think that English is “cool” or something.  This would make sense as it correlates to the use of English in k-pop songs where it’s used a lot on the upbeat dance numbers that are trying to go for a trendy sound and all that horrible yoloswag kind of stuff, but you hear it a lot less often in the ballads where they’re presumably going for a more “serious” tone.  Of course my main exposure to Korean fashion is through k-pop videos, I’m sure that’s pretty different to what the average man and woman on the street wear, and I haven’t been to Korea so I really don’t know, maybe they wear all the boring shit that we do.  Adelaide has a fairly large Asian population especially around the places where I live and work so whatever “Korean fashion” is, I’m probably fairly used to seeing it anyway.

Which type of fashion (Korean or Western) do you prefer and why?

I like many aspects of the faux-1950s “psychobilly” look which is popular in the alternative music scenes in Australia.  Anything that looks very “tailored” always looks great.  School uniforms are good, military stuff too, Nazi uniforms in particular are always great.  I don’t care how peace-and-love someone is, even Martin Luther King would have to admit that while Donal… sorry I mean the Nazis had an odious ideology, they also had great, stylish uniforms, which is why everyone from Pritz to Star Wars constantly uses them as inspiration.  And startling confession, I don’t actually mind lolita fashion, I think it looks amazing on the right person, but only certain people can rock that specific look.  Given colour-blindness, I think that the best colours to wear for any of this are always black and/or white!

How do the prices of Korean clothing compare to Western clothing?

I wouldn’t know firsthand.  I’d imagine cheaper because of the cheaper Korean currency, but then the Abbott and Turnbull governments in Australia have wrecked the economy here with ideologically-based mismanagement to the point where our currency will probably be worth about as much as theirs soon.  How these clowns in our government right now ever got a reputation as “the party that manages the economy better” is beyond me, if you look objectively at the data it’s bleedingly obvious that this isn’t the case, on every single measure we’re far worse off now than when they first took office.  Maybe they’re riding on the reputation of John Howard but he only did well because he was running the show during a global economic boom and a blind monkey could have made Australia turn a surplus during that time.

What main features do Korean fashion highlight?

I don’t know, but they should highlight boobs.  I try to help with my occasional fashion posts.  Ladies, make sure you do a search on my blog for the word “fashion”, the results will change your life for the better.

How similar do you find K-pop, J-pop and other Asian types of pop music?

Fairly different.  K-pop is very closely aligned with western trends, being essentially western pop anyway, as in many cases it’s western songwriters that are commissioned to write the pieces, or who will shop the pieces around to Korean agencies.  There’s a whole process behind the scenes for this now including specialist websites which are “song-shopping” services that cater to different markets.  K-pop is really interested in engaging globally which is vastly different from the j-pop industry which is deliberately insular and tries to make it as hard for the rest of the world to access their music as possible.

What do you think differentiates Korean entertainment from other types of entertainment?

Depends on what type of entertainment we’re talking about.  I imagine that their strip bars and brothels are similar to here.

Do you prefer Korean dramas over American TV shows? If yes, why?

I haven’t even sat down and watched a full TV show of anything since 2002.  Between work, blogging and other activities I just don’t have time for TV.  The quality of my life has only increased as a result, I highly recommend not watching TV to anybody.  I’m talking about broadcasted channels only – I do some very rare TV watching via DVD or downloaded stuff etc, because then I can put it on when I’m ready to watch it rather than whenever the broadcast is, plus not have to endure advertising.  From my experience Korean dramas are absolutely fucking garbage, but then so are western shows generally, although for slightly different reasons.  Western TV shows tend to be terrible because it’s really hard for the writers to avoid cliche.  Once you’ve seen a few of them, you know the drill – you know who is going to end up with who, who will backstab who, who lives, who dies, etc. – it’s little wonder that the west has almost stopped making these shows altogether and are now focusing on “reality” shows.  (With reality shows, the game is to throw different pre-formulated archetypes into a setting, and run the cameras while waiting for a reaction like a chemical experiment.  Most of the time not much happens, but then the cameras will edit out everything else and magnify the little which does happen so the whole process seems more interesting and “happening” than it really is, and there’s your “drama”.  It’s equally as pathetic as the average scripted drama, but it’s more cost-effective.)  Korean drama on the other hand is trash for slightly different reasons, partly it’s the incredibly over-reacting to everything – if there’s a joke or a funny situation they’re never subtle or clever about it, they’ve got to make it as big and dumb as possible, like you’re an idiot and you won’t understand it if there’s any subtlety at all.  They really play to that lowest intellectual level constantly, it’s like they’re actively trying to stop you from thinking about what you’re watching.  The serious stuff isn’t much better – the plots are often ruined because they work on a short shooting schedule so the scriptwriters can track netizen opinion to decide what should happen next so they can “please the masses”, which is the perfect way to make your drama as predictable, uncreative, boring and not worth watching as humanly possible.  Just another one of the many ways in which people overly caring about the thoughts of netizens is ruining all that is good in the world.

Why do you like K-pop and K-dramas?

I like k-pop because I like pop music generally, and k-pop tends to be in my radar because there’s a much higher density of activity in that scene.  Also the activity is higher quality on average – not because it’s “from Korea” specifically, but just because of the super-competitive environment where people are trying to create smash hits all the time, so the songwriting isn’t sloppy, they’re really trying hard as fuck.  If that same environment with the same kind of focus and market pressures existed anywhere else in the world, the music would probably evolve into similar quality.  That’s not to say there isn’t a wealth of garbage though –  nyone reading my roundup posts on a regular basis will know that I tend to dislike about 90% of k-pop stuff that comes out but that’s just me opening my ears and being a bit discerning, most pop music isn’t that good generally.  Contrary to popular belief pop music is the hardest style of music to create.  It’s not necessarily the hardest for the performers to perform, but it’s definitely the hardest from a writing and engineering perspective, no question.

As for k-dramas, I assume people only like them because of some sort of fascination with Korea as a country.  As I don’t have that fascination with Korea (or any country, including my own), I don’t have the rose-coloured view of k-dramas.

Do you prefer K-pop over Western music? If yes, why?

I do prefer k-pop over western pop.  I don’t prefer Korean music over western music as a whole.

If we’re looking only at Korean pop vs western pop, then the reasons why I generally prefer k-pop are:

• Higher competition in a more condensed environment means better song quality on average, as well as better and more varied musical productions.
• I can’t understand the words, this is a huge benefit as pop music lyrics are generally cringeworthy and awful.
• K-pop has a greater and more interesting variety of visual presentations, whereas the west will tend to stick to one known-to-work flavour more.
• I’m not constantly getting exposed to Korean pop to the point where I get sick of it, I only hear it when I choose to seek it out.  For instance I didn’t mind “Gangnam Style” when I first heard it but after the 500th listen of hearing it everywhere I went, I got sick of it.  The same would happen if all k-pop was huge in Australia and I would probably try and seek out other music as a result of the overexposure.  I would probably like certain western pop songs a lot more if I didn’t constantly hear them every time I went to the supermarket or wherever.

It’s only in the commercial pop realm where Korea has these advantages.  Turn to just about any other style of Korean music and the output is almost always very far behind the west in terms of song quality, production quality, visuals, etc.

I have noticed that Korean bands have many members. Do you think this impacts the popularity of the band? 

Yes and it’s a deliberate marketing tactic to achieve exactly this.  At close range a short-barrel shotgun is a much more effective weapon than a sniper rifle (pretend you’re in the real world and not computer games where sniper rifles are laughably overpowered). As a sniper rifle fires just one bullet, you only get one chance to hit, but the shotgun fires many different pellets of buckshot in a spread pattern, you can be a really bad aim and one of those pellets has still got a pretty good chance of hitting the target.  K-pop agencies employ a similar “buckshot” style approach to their groups – they’ll hit you with up to thirteen members at a time, and you’re probably not going to like all of them, but the more people there are in the group, the chance that you’ll fall in love with one of them increases, and one is all they need.  The agencies pushing these groups hope that in your heart you’ll be able to latch onto that person and zone out all the other competing groups in favour of the group they’re pushing.  Remember that in Korea fans tend to focus on one group only, it’s not like in other countries where it’s quite normal for people to claim to be huge fans of half a dozen or more groups, so the stakes for the hearts of fans are higher.  Of course the agencies also have to weigh the benefits of this against the costs of training up the extra people.

Has your like for K-pop and K-dramas influenced you to further investigate other aspects of Korea, such as Korean language, culture, lifestyle, e.t.c?

Only “investigate” in the sense that I might hear about something really stupid happening in the world of k-pop (like people actually caring about the opinions of oxygen-wasting moronic netizens who write comments on gossip portal sites) and think “well, why the fuck is this dumb shit happening?” so I investigate it and it turns out that the reason is often “cultural”.  The only things that interest me about Korean culture are their pop music, food and the occasional good horror or action movie.  I don’t have any interest apart from this and Korea actually seems like it would be a horrible place to live and work.  Korea seems to have a “keeping up with the Joneses” mentality, where everything in life seems to be so much about what things appear to be in the eyes of others rather than what they actually are.  I think that’s incredibly unhealthy for both individuals and society as as whole, and it certainly explains why lies and gossip has so much more power than truth and why their scandals generate so much unnecessary fallout.

How effective do you think Korean dramas portray the Korean culture and lifestyle?

Having not experienced the “Korean culture and lifestyle” firsthand I can’t answer this question objectively, but I don’t see why Korean TV would be all that realistic about it, just like I’m sure that CSI is nothing like how people really behave behind closed doors in a police department in the USA.  I wouldn’t recommend anybody look at fictional portrayals of something on TV and think to themselves that it was an accurate reflection of anything other than what the TV station executives thought would make you willing to watch their advertising.

How interconnected is the Korean media (social networking) compared to other countries?

All social media is interconnected by definition.  Korea has much better Internet than anywhere else, but they’re not “more connected”, their connection just works a little better (or a lot better if we’re comparing it to Australia where the useless current government is too stingy to provide proper broadband).

How popular is K-pop and Korean dramas in Korea? Does everyone watch it?

As far as k-pop goes, it’s like any pop music anywhere.  Your average person on the street only knows a few of the groups at most, and certainly doesn’t care about any of the gossip or scandals surrounding those groups.  It’s only the really crazy fans who follow everything closely that know about all the groups etc. and people would be amazed how little impact some of their favourite groups have with the general population in Korea.  Obviously long-term performers in the absolute A-list like BigBang or Girls’ Generation are household names, but it gets pretty sketchy once you go beyond that point.  Not-so-commercial pop stuff like J-Rabbit and Jaurim would have more currency among the average Korean than something like B.A.P or Secret.

I wouldn’t know – or care – about the popularity of k-dramas, but I hope as few people watch that trash as possible, for their own sake.

What are the major differences between Korean culture in comparison to other Asian countries?

I can’t answer this due to lack of experience.

Does the popularity of Korean culture change/affect prejudiced views of Asians?

I doubt it.  There’s always going to be racism and racial tensions between different people, it’s not something that’s ever going to go away, and the popularity of Korean or any other culture won’t make any difference.  If the solutions to racism were as simple as promoting a culture form another country then there should be no racism anywhere in the globe given how many multicultural performers and cultural ambassadors exist in the world across almost all forms of music, art, etc.  I don’t know what the solution to racial problems is but I know that “let’s put [people of race x] over here in this spotlight so the world can see how wonderful they are”, while certainly worth doing, definitely doesn’t achieve anything on that particular level.

What do you think is the main reason for tourists to travel to Korea?

YONGMA LAND.  Just go to fucking Yongma Land, kids.  Make sure you take photos of yourselves holding up signs saying “Kpopalypse sent me here”, and send them to me, I’ll put you in the next Caonima Creativity Corner post.

Have you noticed a rise in popularity of not just Korean entertainment but Korean culture in general in Australia (e.g. more Korean restaurants)?

Actually I’m really shitty because my favourite Korean food-court restaurant in Adelaide’s Chinatown district actually closed down a few months ago.  They had the best spicy chicken rice out of all the different Korean restaurants in the area, plus it was dirt cheap and the girls at the counter were super cute IU lookalikes.  So with all those aspects working in its favour it still closed down, so I’d say that there isn’t a rise in popularity, or of there is it’s certainly very gradual.  Blame the shitty economy and useless government here I guess.

Do you have any further comments?  My research is on the appeal of Korean Culture and the effects of the Korean Wave so if you think there is anything else relevant to add in, please do so!

As this interview has probably made very clear, Korea doesn’t appeal to me culturally at all.  Having said that, I wouldn’t say that I’m all that fascinated by Australian culture either, and when I do post about Australian cultural differences I do it more in the spirit of trying to remove international communication blockades rather than promote Australia as “the best thing” which it definitely isn’t always.  All countries have their “cultural quirks” and more often than not these quirks are anomalies that the world would usually be better off without.  Of course if everywhere in the world was exactly the same that would be fucking boring, but I think it’s okay to say “I like X about this culture but I don’t like Y”.  I think that these days being a nationalist fuckwit is getting trendier, and I think that’s a bad thing, because when people get nationalist they have trouble admitting that their own culture has flaws, but the fact is that all cultures are the result of human experience and we’re all flawed creatures of some type so it’s natural that any culture that humans create is going to have issues.  Maybe one day machines will take over and then we’ll have a culture in the world that actually makes some degree of sense overall – but probably not, because humans built the machines, and humans are idiots.  So I don’t worry about it, and I just listen to k-pop because occasionally there are songs that I like, and not because of a “Korean wave” or whatever, which isn’t really on my radar of concern.

That’s it for another Kpopalypse interview!  Kpopalypse will return with more posts soon!

It’s time again for Kpopalypse roundup!  Let’s check out this week’s new releases!

Astro

Oh My Girl ft. Skull & Haha – A-ing

I don’t know what I wanted from Oh My Girl’s comeback but this ultra-fluffy dancehall reggae-lite wasn’t it.  Still, it’s not too bad considering and could have been a lot worse, like…

Unicorn – Blink Blink

…this fucking shit, for example.  Everyone’s trying to be Red Velvet lately, not realising that Red Velvet still haven’t really worked out how to be Red Velvet yet.

Taewan – Problem

This is good but just a little too heavy on the breathy castrated R&B style vocalising and Michael Jackson-ish creepy panting for me to actually get behind it fully.  If someone who couldn’t sing all that well did this song instead it would sound so much better.

HiNi ft. Jerry K – So Shall We Dance

Warning: scat vocals.

Park Hyunbin – You’re So Pretty

I briefly considered this for my trot edition of Nugu Alert until I did some research and realised that this guy is one of the most well-known trot singers there is.  Fantastic camerawork here, you can actually see each individual hair of these ladies’ moustaches.

UNWELCOME SWEG SECTION NOBODY ASKED FOR OR WANTED

Hyuna – How’s This?

Hyuna is back and she’s clearly malfunctioning.

Sangchu ft. Don Mills, Esna – Still Hot

You know it’s going to be rubbish from the very first second.  R&B vocal intros are never a good sign, because you know that if they think that bullshit is a good idea, they’ll think all sorts of other crap is also a good idea.

#Gun ft. Crucial Star – Beep

In this video the rapper opens a portal to the horrors of “It G Ma” with a $5 can of spraypaint, and as soon as he steps through his whole sound is ruined.  I could have told him that beforehand.

Luizy & Flowsik – Recipe

This needs an Immortal Technique or KRS ONE over the top rapping about something that actually matters, to suit the grandiose sound of the backings, and not these dickheads rapping about how they’re “cooking the the kitchen” or whatever fucking bullshit.

Keebomb – Summer Summer Summer

For someone who says the word “summer” 63 times in the song (I counted) he still rugs up for the cold with a grey hoodie.

Microdot – Auckland City

Usually you’ll just have to take my word for it that yolo music has no rap flow but this one’s mostly in English so you can hear for yourself how pathetic the raps in this style of music usually are.

Beenzino ft. YDG – January

First it was sagging pants and now these slobs couldn’t even be bothered getting out of their dressing gowns.  They’re only “swerving” to avoid tripping over their own clothes.

Soom – Because Of The Alcohol

Look at her shaking her pussy at 2:37.  Put it away girl, nobody wants to see you do that.

BONUS SONGS

Electroboyz ft. Seo In Young – Sunglasses

All I wanted was Seo In Young’s boobs in the video so I could finally fucking figure them out but instead I got this weird cartoon about some guy with X-ray Spex being a pervert.

MAAN – Night

Look at these kids bopping around.  They’ve never heard music this extreme before.  This is like Napalm Death to them.

NCT 127 – Taste The Feeling

He holds up a piece of sheet music and it’s for a Beatles song, so you know that this is going to be trash with such bad influences.

Tarin – Someday It Will Be Wither

This is what you get when you try to do IU’s “Modern Times” album in your bedroom with an acoustic guitar and some clearance-price white lace curtain material from Spotlight.

Choiyeguen – Gloomy Story

Koreans actually like this crap but anyone from any other country will just write “wow this song is great omg so talented” on YouTube and then forget it exists in a month’s time.

Fling – Here She Come Shine

Look at how naive this is – bubble-blowing, water pistol fights and hula hoops.  I wonder if they know that the English bands who did this stuff back in the 80s were loaded up to their eyeballs on every kind of drug known to man.

Coco Avenue – TTMU

The larger girl has a great body, I wish I could see more of this type of body in k-pop videos in general.  Pity about the song, you can tell it’s Chad Future-ish western hopefuls and not a Korean production without even looking at the video because Koreans get production right about 99% of the time these days even if the song sucks.  The mixing here is terrible, the main problem being that the backings are about 6dB softer than they should be, making the whole thing sound more like a karaoke mix than an actual single.  What’s the point of programming all those fancy drum-machine build-ups when you can’t even hear them.  I guess there’s one benefit – having such quiet backings will make it easier for all those idiots who still believe in MR Removed to remove them.  Oh and by the way did you know that popular v-logger MRJKPOP is going to highlight the stupidity of the lame MR Removed fad for you all soon?  Bless him, hopefully finally people will believe what I’ve been saying for years about how MR Removed doesn’t do the job it’s supposed to and then that trendy pointless bullshit will finally die.  But probably not, because k-pop fans are stupid and they will continue to believe anything, even when faced with hard evidence to the contrary.

That’s it for another Kpopalypse roundup!  More next week!

It’s time for another Kpopalypse fanfiction!  This one’s all about everyone’s favourite k-pop solo artist and ex-member of 4Minute, Hyuna!

Picture this.

It’s 2012.  You’re a 25 year old male k-pop fan, and your bias is 4Minute’s Hyuna, because why wouldn’t it be?  Hyuna always looks great and has a sexiness that for you is just above other idols, plus on top of that her solo work and songs in 4Minute are excellent.  Sure, she’s not the best singer or dancer, but you don’t care about that – you know what you like, and you like Hyuna and that’s enough.  While you certainly appreciate what the other four members of 4Minute bring to the group, there’s no doubt that Hyuna completely outshines her groupmates in terms of presence and sex appeal, and as much as she tries to be an inclusive team-player in interviews it’s hard not to think of 4Minute as “Hyuna and the other four”.

You don’t follow k-pop media much, after all most of it is very negative about Hyuna which you don’t appreciate, so there’s nothing for you there of interest.  However you do participate in the 4Minute forum “4MinuteFuckYeahGetADogUpYa”(4MFYGADUY for short) quite often.  The forum is run by a like-minded 4Minute fan, someone who like you is mainly in it for the girls and their songs, rather than for then “fandom crazy” aspect, and the site keeps you up to date with all the latest news of 4Minute, new videos, all their scheduled activities, and most importantly, new pictures of Hyuna.  You’re not a nutty fan who is interested in stalking them or anything, and if Hyuna had a relationship at some point with some male celebrity you’d be honestly happy for her.  You just like the site for the pictures, videos and music, and you’re happy to enjoy 4Minute vicariously (i.e fap) from afar… although meeting Hyuna would certainly be cool.

So it was more in the spirit of “why the hell not?” that you applied for this:

You didn’t put much thought into it, you just sent something in because you could, you were bored, and also just in the spirit of participating in the forum and keeping the community active.  After all, it’s not like there aren’t tons of other fans on the forum who are far more crazy than you are.  You looked at some of the other entries:

HyunaSweg69: OMG HYUNA IS THE BEST OMG PLZ GIVE IT TO ME PLZZZZZZZZ PLS PLS PLS PLS PLS PLS PLS OK THATS 25 WORDS I COUNTED

4niacation: 4Minute are just the best at everything!

YoloSwag420: Hyuna’s fake boobs cushion her from stage faceplants, clumsy idols should take note and “volume up”

You thought to yourself that these entries don’t seem all that great, but you were sure that one of them or the hundreds of others just like them would be picked, after all why not give the prize to a really die-hard fan, one who truly would appreciate it the most?  Hey, if you won the prize that would be great, but certainly no big deal if you didn’t.  So here’s what you wrote.

I honestly don’t know if 4Minute are the best group, but I like Hyuna a lot, so they’re the best group for me.

It must have struck a chord somewhere, because a week later you received an email from the forum admin:

Well, you definitely didn’t expect this, but on reflection you think about it and it does make sense – if you were a celebrity, you would probably prefer to meet someone who wasn’t a complete crazy fan but who was just honestly appreciative.

A few weeks later, your pass arrives in the mail, a plastic card in the 4Minute “pearl violet” fandom colour, attached to a 4Minute lanyard, plus some basic instructions: go to the fanmeets, make sure you’re wearing the pass, flash it at security and they’ll move you up to the front of the queue, you get to meet Hyuna and chat with her for a minute or so, and you get to do this once per year until such time as Hyuna is no longer employed by CUBE.  Seems simple enough, you think to yourself.  You check the CUBE website for the next 4Minute fanmeet at CUBE HQ… spring of 2013, about six months away.  That’s fine, you can wait.

It’s been a good time to be a 4Minute fan lately.  Their new mini album “4Minute World” has come out, and the feature song from it “What’s Your Name?” is doing great.  Of course, Hyuna looks great in the video as always, and so do the other four you suppose… they’re no Hyuna but then who is?  You’re on the bus heading over to the CUBE building, with your special keycard around your neck and your copy of “4Minute World” in a small bag, for Hyuna to hopefully sign.  You even brought a permanent texta in case she doesn’t have one, or maybe she does but what if it ran out just when she went to sign your copy?  Now that would really suck.  You step back a bit mentally and think to yourself that okay, maybe you actually are becoming a little bit of a crazy fan.  But not too much.  You’re not going to be chasing Hyuna in taxis or anything.

The bus pulls up at your stop, and you get out, right opposite the CUBE Entertainment building.

You walk through the glass doors and try not to let the imposing modernist architecture unsettle you.  You emerge into a large glass-walled foyer, there’s a lot of people here milling about.  It’s clear that they’re all 4Minute fans who are here for the fanmeet.  Most people are around your age or younger, and it’s a roughly even split of males and females.  You wonder how many of them are Hyuna fans, when you notice something.  A few people are looking at you strangely, out of the corner of their eyes, a weird expression that you can’t quite place.  When you turn to face them, they try to pretend that they weren’t staring at you and carry on talking to their friends.  Hmm.

“You’re here for the fanmeet, I see”.  A voice behind you.

You turn around, it’s a security guard.  He smiles at you.  “Yes!” you say.

“Give me a moment” the guard says, as he removes a black hand-held device from his belt, then grabs your keycard and inserts it into the device.  A couple high-pitched beeps come from the device, and a green light flashes.  The guard smiles again.  “Okay, you’re the one.  Congratulations, you’re about to meet Hyuna!  Come with me.”

The security guard walks off down the room, not waiting for you.  Lots of people are looking at you now.  You start to realise why – they know what the card is for, and they’re jealous.  No time to be stared at now though, you quickly catch up to the guard and start walking directly behind him.

“People are looking at me weird.  Why?” you ask.

“Jealousy!” replies the guard, cheerfully.  “They don’t want to have to wait in line!  It’ll be hours before they get to see her!”

“Wow, are people really that hung up about it?”

He laughs.  “Oooh yes, you better believe it!  We’ve even had a few impostors try to get in, they heard about the competition and forged cards just like the one around your neck.  They didn’t know that it’s a coded smartcard that goes through a security scan, they just painted an old credit card or bus pass so it looked the same and hoped it’d work!  Desperate people.”

You think to yourself that maybe you shouldn’t have gloated on that damn 4Minute forum so much after you won the competition.  The guard comes to a set of double-doors and then stops.

“Behind this door is Hyuna, setting up for the fanmeet.  Nobody is in there yet besides the members of 4Minute and their personal crews, plus the technical people.  Now are you calm?”

You smile.  “Yeah I’m calm, I’m not 13, I’m not going to spazz or anything.”

“Good, that’s what I want to hear!  So here’s how it goes.  We’ll walk up to Hyuna, you get about a minute with her, or maybe longer, that’s up to her.  Walk onto the stage, there’s a table there, sit down opposite her and have a chat.  You can look, you can talk, but be cool, also no taking photos and absolutely no getting physical or the staff will only be too happy to also get physical and you’ll be out of there real quick.  Also try not to get in the way of staff or equipment, remember that this is a work environment and everybody is just doing a job.  You got it?”

“Got it.”

“Good.  Also, I need to check your bag.”  The security guard motions to your bag with his head.

You nod and open up the bag for him to inspect.  “4Minute World!”

“Okay, great, you can get that signed.  She won’t sign any of her older stuff though.”

You shrug.  “That’s okay, I didn’t bring any.”

“Alright, here we go.”

A rush of excitement hits you as the guard opens the door and ushers you through, into a small auditorium.  The firs thing you notice is Hyuna, who is on a stage at one end, sitting down at a chair.

There’s various other people about doing… you don’t know, stuff?  You don’t really focus on them.  You don’t see any other 4Minute members either.  You and the guard walk up to the stage.

When you reach the stage, the guard grabs your pass and waves it at Hyuna, without removing it from around your neck.  Hyuna looks at the pass, then at you.

“Come and sit down.” says Hyuna. She seems pleasant, but a bit tired.

You gingerly approach the stool opposite her and take a seat, with your bag in your lap.  Hyuna points to the bag, you open it and give her your copy of “4Minute World” which she quickly opens, signs the inside page of and gives back to you with machine-like precision, like she’s done this a thousand times before.  You don’t doubt that she has.  When she hands you back the album, she flashes you a smile and it’s like her face comes alive, like she instantly transforms into the girl from the videos.  The admin from 4mfygaday was right – she is “sexy af”.

“Thanks for buying our album, we worked on it very hard” she said.

“It’s a great album!  What was it like working with Bravesound?” you ask.

“Same as working with anyone.  They tell you to sing stuff, you sing it.  He just says his name more.  Oh and he always uses the last bit of coffee in the coffee machine, just when you want some.  But better than working with Tiger.  I don’t think we’ll work with Tiger again.”

“Why not?”

Hyuna pauses.  “Personal differences.  Good songwriter, but… hey I appreciate you bringing our new material here.”

“The guard said you wouldn’t sign your older releases – is that true?”

“Yes that’s true.  We want you to support us by buying the new product, so please always take the latest album to a fansign, not what we did years ago.  I can’t even remember what I did years ago.  Hey, do you want to meet the other girls in 4Minute?”

You go to say ‘no but then you hesitate.  You suddenly realise that if you say ‘no’ then you’re worried that you look rude plus you don’t want to make your lust over Hyuna too creepily obvious, but you don’t want to say ‘yes’ either because it’s dishonest – you’d really not rather meet them.

“I see you’re hesitating.  That’s the correct reaction.  You’re a good fan, I like you.”  Hyuna smiles again, that winning smile.  You blush a little, this feels awkward.  You try to think of something to say.

“I hope you do well with your next solo song, when is it?” you blurt out, to try and lighten the mood.

“Not for a while.  I have to do some group stuff first, got to keep the wheels turning.  Hey I need you to do something for me.  Can you do something for me?” Hyuna asks.

“Sure, anything!” you say.

“Keep that pass safe, other fans will try to get it off you any way they can.  Make sure you visit every year.  I don’t want that thing falling into the hands of some crazy asshole and then I have to talk to them first.  You seem like a good fan, someone who is sensible, this is better for me that you have it.  See you next year, okay?”

You nod your head, and Hyuna flashes you that smile one more time.  She waves at you as the guard ushers you out.

-=-

When you get home you start a threat on your favourite forum, 4MFYGADUY.  In it, you give a blow-by-blow description of the conversation between you and Hyuna.  You wait for the reactions.  You don’t have to wait long.

HyunaSweg69: ITS NOT FAIR THAT PASS WAS MINE

Heart2Heart: That pass is wasted on you, you should give it to someone who is more of a fan.  You seem like you barely even care.

4niacation: This is lies obviously!  Hyuna wouldn’t be this mean!  Don’t try to smear her by saying she doesn’t love all of us true fans!

YoloSwag420: And you didn’t even cop a feel, what a waste.

You look down at the keycard, still around your neck, and turn it over and over in your hand.  Hyuna was right – you’re a good fan.  It’s better off in your hands than these crazy people.

-=-

A year goes by, and as usual 4Minute’s fame and fortune only seems to increase.  You really enjoyed their recent comeback “What’cha Doin’ Today?” and the group have been very busy.  Fortunately they haven’t been too busy to hold more fanmeets at the Cube building, which is where you’re on your way to right now.  You’ve grown apart from the 4MFYGADUY community a bit – you still talk to the moderators and admin there, but most of the fans are just creepy and they give you shit in threads all the time about how you have the pass to meet Hyuna and they don’t.  If you knew that it was going to be this much of a pain in the rear to have the pass you probably wouldn’t have bothered with the competition at all, but Hyuna wants you to keep the pass so you feel a sense of obligation to make sure that none of the crazies get it.  You don’t even understand what the big deal with it is anyway – they can meet Hyuna if they want too, they just have to wait in a queue for longer, if they really like her that much why is waiting in line so troublesome?

It’s a sunny day as the bus pulls up outside the CUBE building and you walk out onto the street.  You stand and look up at the imposing structure.

You walk through the glass doors and into the foyer.  Just like last year it’s packed, but this time it’s different – as soon as you walk in you sense several heads turn in your direction.  Two security guards come up to you, one of them you recognise as the guy from last year.

“Give me a moment” the more familiar guard says, as he removes a black hand-held device from his belt, then grabs your keycard and inserts it into the device.  A couple high-pitched beeps come from the device, and a green light flashes.  He nods at the other guard, and both of them flank you as you walk the familiar route to the double-doors together.  The green eyes of jealous fans glare at you while you traverse the foyer.  You can feel the invisible daggers of fan envy behind you, standing your hairs on end.

“Wow, everyone’s so pressed about this pass”, you say to the familiar guard.

“That’s why we’ve increased your security!” he replies, smiling.

“FAKE FAN!” someone yells at you as you walk past.  The heads of both guards swiftly turn in the direction of the voice.  Whoever said it isn’t showing themselves, they’ve vanished into the crowd.  You and the guards keep walking.

Eventually you end up at the double-doors to the auditorium.  The guard turns to you.  “No photos, no touching – you know the drill, no need to go through it all again.  Only one change – she’s not signing stuff this time.  This is a meet and greet only.”

You shrug.  “That’s okay, I didn’t bring anything for her to sign this time.”

You walk through the doors and look at the stage.

There’s tech crew members all over the stage, setting up lights and stage props.  Hyuna is seated at a table, there’s four other chairs on her side of the table, presumably for the other 4Minute members, but none of them can be seen anywhere.  “Come on down!” Hyuna says into the microphone.

You walk up to the stage, with the guards following you.

Hyuna motions to the two guards.  “Guys, go watch outside.  This guy’s okay.  There’s much scarier fans out there that need supervision.”  The guards nod and leave you both alone.  You take a seat opposite Hyuna.

You don’t know what to say.  “Er… hello again!” you splutter, awkwardly.

Hyuna smiles and laughs, putting the microphone down.  “Hello!  I bet you’ve gone through a whole lot of shit this year, just for having that pass, right?”

You nod.

“Good.  Well, not good as in “good”, but… I mean, thanks for sticking with it.”

You think of saying “I probably would have sold the pass on the 4Minute forum if you hadn’t asked me to keep it” but then you think she might be offended by that, so you change the subject.  “How’s your year been?”

Hyuna sighs a bit.  “Not great.  I’m worried.  Something bad is happening.”

You’re confused.  “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know.  But I can just tell.  You know, when you can just tell, that things aren’t right?”

“Errr…. no?”

“Well just trust me on this one.”  Hyuna leans over to you, closer.  “Listen closely.  My groupmates, they want to work with that shithead Skrillex, okay?  That is not fucking happening on my watch, like, no way, I won’t even consider that.  I won’t allow it.  He sucks, everything about him is fucking shit – his music, the way he looks, the way he looks at me, he’s just a turd.  But they all want him to do a song with us, the other girls.  I’m saying no and they hate me for that, because that’s all that’s stopping it from happening – my word means more than theirs because I’m the one who puts money in the bank for this group, their opinion doesn’t mean shit in comparison, I can veto anything I want and they know it.  I don’t trust those dirty bitches though, they’ll try and get their Skrillex song somehow so I have to watch out.  I have to be careful, they’re capable of anything.”

You’re shocked but also confused.  “What?  Why are you telling me this?”

“Everyone who hangs around me, everyone I know, is in the business, or works with the business.  You’re an outsider, you’re not involved.  That means you haven’t been corrupted, you could be the only person I could trust.  You’ve proven that you’re a good fan by hanging onto that keycard.  Take this.”  Hyuna hands you a folded piece of paper.  You go to open it, but Hyuna motions for you to stop.  “Don’t look at it now.  Look at it at home, and don’t share it with anyone – no forum posts, don’t put it on your SNS, don’t show anybody.  But – if you ever see us do a song with Skrillex, it means something bad happened and I’m in trouble!  You must come to the CUBE building – and remember what’s on that piece of paper!  Can you promise me you’ll do this?”

You’re now even more confused.  “Umm… okay?”  You scrunch the piece of paper up into your fist.

Hyuna looks very serious.  “Good!  See you next year!  Wish me luck!”

“Good luck Hyuna!” you say as you slowly get up and walk toward the exit.  As you move back out through the foyer, the queue for the fanmeet to see Hyuna has formed.  Many of the people in the queue glare at you menacingly as you walk by.

-=-

Hyuna has you paranoid so you deliberately don’t open your hand until you get home, keeping your fist tightly clenched all through the bus ride.  When you arrive back in your bedroom you unscrunch the piece of paper and take a look.

You have no idea what this means.  Are you supposed to even know?  You stash the piece of paper in a bedroom drawer, resolving to commit the letters and numbers on it to memory and to then destroy the piece of paper.  You think to yourself that Hyuna seemed very serious, so surely it’s something important.

-=-

Another year goes by.  4Minute releases their new song “Crazy“, and Hyuna also has her solo comeback “Roll Deep“.  They’re alright songs – but certainly not like the 4Minute and Hyuna of old, the music that got you into them.  Most disconcertingly though, Hyuna looks different now – you didn’t mind so much that she had the boob job because k-pop girls all pad anyway so really what’s the difference what the pad is made from, but why did she have to mess with her face at the same time?  She had a characteristic appearance which now seems a little bit lost.  But then, maybe it’s just the makeup in the music videos and promotional shots making it look that way.  You look forward to meeting her in person to see what she really does look like behind the makeup and lights.  Surely she’s still the same person underneath.

In the meantime you’ve disconnected from the forums completely.  Sometimes the forum admin chats to you via SNS (just about trivial stuff, you don’t let out any of the details of your second conversation with Hyuna) but apart from this you don’t communicate with any 4Minute fans and you don’t visit 4MFYGADUY or any other 4Minute related websites at all.  The hate that you receive as soon as people realise who you are is just too much.  You’ve had several death threats online but the last straw was when someone found out what school you went to and posted up all your high school pictures with “ugly” and “fake” written all over them.  Who would do such a thing, just over a keycard and the ability to have one minute of conversation with someone once a year?

For the third time you’re on the bus, making your yearly pilgrimage to the CUBE building.  You get off the bus and stare down the street at the front entrance.

As you get closer to the entrance you notice that movement in and out of the building is restricted with cones, traffic crash barriers and red tape, creating a funnel so there’s only one way to get in and out.  You follow the approved path to the glass entrance doors and step inside.  As soon as you enter, half a dozen security guards rush to your side and form a protective circle around you.  Nobody bothers to scan your keycard this time.  The room is packed.  Several angry fans start yelling at you as you slowly work your way through the mob.  A couple of young male fans try to rush under the security guard circle but the guards quickly respond, closing in on you tighter and elbowing the unfortunate fans to the floor.  A second group of security then ejects the fans from the venue as you press on toward the double doors.

“This is crazy!  I never wanted this!” you say to the guards forming the circle around you.  None of them respond, they’re too busy concentrating on the crowd, trying to ascertain where the next threat is coming from.  You hear the sound of glass breaking, and a couple of the guards shield their faces, as a bottle thrown from someone in the waiting mass of people smashes into shards on the wall near their head.  Another group of security converge on the assailant and you can hear screams and yelling as they are presumably restrained and removed from the building.  You do your best to keep your body profile low as you move with your human shields as quickly as possible through the crowd.

When you finally reach the double-doors to the auditorium, the guards don’t say anything, but usher you in as quickly as possible and close the doors behind you.  You look to the stage.

Hyuna is there.  She’s distracted by one of the tech crew and hasn’t noticed your presence.  You walk up to the stage and take a seat.  Boy, her face sure does look different.

“Hello Hyuna!” you say.

Hyuna turns to you.  “Hello” she says, completely deadpan.  There’s a faraway look in her eyes that you don’t recognise, like she’s still focusing on the tech crews behind you.

You try and think of what to say.  “How have you been this year?”

“I’m fantastic!  The song Roll Deep just came out, I love my solo comeback!  Did you know that it’s nominated for Mnet Asian Music Award for Song of the Year?  It’s also nominated for Mnet Asian Music Award for Best Dance Performance!  I hope it wins both, winning awards means so much to me!  Please support Roll Deep!”  Hyuna smiles at you, that smile which still looks amazing, even though it looks slightly different now.

“Are the 4Minute girls good?” you ask.

“We’re great!  We’re all so close, we’re like sisters!  We can’t wait to release our next song!  Thanks for supporting 4Minute through the years!”  Hyuna seems chirpy but also kind of weird.

“Hyuna, I want to ask you something.  That piece of paper, what does it mean?”

“The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!”

You sigh.  “No, I mean the piece of paper you gave me, last time.  CE:154-D… what is that?”

Hyuna pauses, then repeats: “The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!”  Hyuna smiles at you again, cute but uncanny.  Several of the tech people around you immediately turn to look at you.

On the table, a red light starts flashing.  One of the tech members starts waving to someone.  Two guards come running up to the table.

“Fanmeet over, let’s go.” says one of the guards.

“What happened?  What’s wrong?” you ask, looking up from the chair.

“Hyuna needs a rest.  Come on, let’s go, NOW.” the guard says as he roughly pulls you up from the chair into a standing position by your clothes.

“Okay, OKAY, I’m going!” you say, hoping that the guard will take the hint and stop manhandling you.  The guard uses a little less force but keeps holding you by your jacket as he marches you back towards the double-doors.  You turn back to look at Hyuna who is completely non-reactive.  All of a sudden you hear someone yell “WAIT!”.  The guards stop.  4Minute’s Jihyun comes running up to you.  At least you think it’s Jihyun.  Maybe it’s Sohyun?  Honestly, all the girls in 4Minute who aren’t Hyuna tend to blend into each other a bit for you.

Jihyun (presumably) snatches the keycard from around your neck and yanks it off your body with one swift arm movement.  “I’ll take that, thank you very much!” she says angrily, then runs off as quickly as she first appeared.  The guards then resume escorting you out of the auditorium.

Upon opening the double-doors into the foyer, a scene of chaos emerges.  Several of the fans have started attacking each other.  It’s unclear what they’re fighting about, but many of them have objects in their hands – empty bottles, chairs, ashtrays.  Half a dozen people are laid out on the floor, bleeding and writhing in pain, their blood spread thinly across the tiled floor surface, causing other fans to slip as they either continue to fight each other, or look on at the others fighting.  The security guards quickly ignore you and start joining the rest of the security in the foyer, trying to control the more general situation of chaos by neutralising with their fists anybody who is wielding an improvised weapon, with limited success.  None of the fans seem to notice you, you think to yourself that maybe now that you don’t have the pass anymore, you’re just another face in the crowd.  You decide the best scenario is to get as far away from this situation as possible, so you quickly move through the foyer and out into the street.  As you walk away from the building, ambulances and police vehicles with blaring sirens arrive at the front entrance.  You continue walking away from the carnage as inconspicuously as you can manage under the circumstances.

-=-

Once you reach the safety of home, you quickly have a shower, inspect the slight bruising the guards left on your arms, wind down and think about the night’s events.  The whole day is too much for you to process.  Why was Jihyun angry?  What went wrong?  Was Hyuna really stressed, maybe she was dehydrating?  Did CE:154-D mean anything really?  What started the fight?  You don’t know the answers to any of these questions, and a news report on TV covering the incident doesn’t shed any light on it at all – they don’t seem to know what started the fight either.  You start to think that maybe it’s time to give up on Hyuna and follow other k-pop groups besides 4Minute.  After all, there’s plenty of fappable fish in the sea.

-=-

You spend a few months trying your hardest to forget about 4Minute completely and focus on other groups in k-pop.  While none of them have a presence in them as iconic as Hyuna, you manage to enjoy watching some AOA videos for a while.  Then something unprecedented and horrifying happens to drag you right back into the world of 4Minute.

4Minute release a collaboration with Skrillex!  This was what Hyuna warned you about, it means that there’s trouble!  However, do you have the heart to go back to the CUBE building after what happened last time?  You think about it long and hard.  Yes, it’s risky to go back there, but you don’t have the pass any more and that was what everyone wanted, so you might be safe.  Also, while you couldn’t keep your promise to Hyuna to hold onto the keycard, at least perhaps you can honour this other promise for her, that you would go back to the CUBE building and help her, somehow.  Who knows what trouble she’s in, or even if it’s something you can do anything about, but you have to go.

Since you have no idea what type of trouble to expect or what you might be required to do, you try to make yourself as prepared as possible.  You put together a small backpack which contains:

• A large bottle of water
• A flashlight
• Some sandwiches and biscuits
• A small pocket knife
• A mobile phone
• Enough money to get a taxi ride home if needed
• An MP3 player full of 4Minute and Hyuna’s entire discography
• A Hyuna photocard (for good luck)

It’s not enough to be good – you have to be ready.

-=-

Your bus arrives at the CUBE building in the late afternoon.  You get off at the stop and look towards the entrance.

The building is much more deserted than the last few times you’ve visited, you figure that it’s because there’s no fanmeets on right now.  You walk up to the glass doors and head inside.  The foyer is completely empty, there isn’t even a receptionist at the front desk.  Far from the mess and chaos the last time you were here, everything is pristine, sparkling and empty.  You walk around for a while, and come to the double-doors that lead to the auditorium.  You push against them and they open easily.

The auditorium is empty with only a few lights on, and the stage is hidden behind a red curtain.  You wander around the chairs when you start to notice a noise, there’s something moving behind the curtain.  You walk up to the curtain and peek behind it.

There’s a lady here, mopping the stage floor.

“Excuse me?” you ask.

The lady stops mopping and looks at you.  “Hi!  Who are you?  Are you lost?” she asks.

You think quickly.  “Yes!  I’m looking for… CE:154-D.”

“Oh.  Down the stairs behind the stage.  Just follow the signs!”  The girl smiles at you and resumes cleaning.

“Thank you!” you say.

“Just watch out for the parts I’ve cleaned, they’re still slippery” she says as she works the mop back and forth.

You nod to the girl and move across the stage floor to the stairs at the rear.  You go down one flight of stairs to a door marked “CA”.  Opening this door leads into a set of extremely long corridors, marked A through to E.  Every corridor has dozens and dozens of metal doors on one side, marked with numbers.  You read the numbers on each metal door.  CA:001-A, CA:002-A, CA:003-A… all the metal doors have barred windows.  You look through the bars, every room is the same inside – a bed, a toilet, a bench, a TV set.  They’re all empty and as pristine as everything else.

You go back to the main door to the stairwell, and descend another flight to a door marked “CB”.  The cleaner lady was right – this is easy.  You descend three more flights and you’re at the “CE” door.  You open the door to another huge set of long corridors, with many metal doors lined up along each one.  As you find corridor D, you notice something… it smells in here.  You move down the corridor.  Each metal cell is not empty, but contains a person.  CE:001-D, CE:002-D, CE:003-D…  Some of them are female, some are male, all are young, all are dressed in tracksuits and sneakers, nobody looks to be above 29 but the large majority are in their teens.  As the people in their metal cells hear the sound of footsteps and realise that someone is walking down the corridor, they turn to face the barred windows, and start pleading:

“When is my debut?  Please debut me!”

“I didn’t know that wasn’t my sweet potato!  I’m so sorry!”

“Let me out of here!  I’m wasting my life!”

“The money from my parents will clear soon, they promised me!”

“If you let me go I swear to come back after my jawshave!”

“I’ll count calories more accurately next time!”

You keep walking.  As you move forward, through CE:124-D, CE:125-D, CE:126-D… something starts changing in the demographics of the cell occupants.  The ones in this section of the corridor are all female, and they all look more or less like Hyuna.  Not exactly like her, slight differences in jawline, nose, eyes, etc… but similar.  They all have a similar voice too.  The pleas also change, from cries to be let out to statements about Hyuna and 4Minute:

“Thanks for supporting 4Minute through the years!”

“The song Hate with Skrillex just came out!  Please support it!”

“I love my 4Minute girls, we’re all so close, we’re like sisters!”

This is creeping you out.  You start running until you get to CE:154-D.  You look into the cell.  It’s Hyuna – the real Hyuna.  She looks exactly the same as she did in 2013.  You would be lovestruck if you weren’t also completely shitting yourself with fear.

“Took your SWEET FUCKING TIME getting here!  I’ve been stuck down here for over a year!” she shouts at you.

“Shall I just leave?” you ask.

Hyuna starts panicking.  “No, no!  Okay, I’m sorry!  I’m so happy you’re here!  I’m just really upset and emotional!  Look, just let me out, okay?”

You look around.  “Okay… but, with what?”

Hyuna shrugs.  “Dude I don’t fucking know, isn’t there a key or something?”

“I didn’t see any on the way down here.”

“Oh GREAT.”  Hyuna slumps onto the bed in her cell.  “Well, you’d better do something quickly.  You’ve awoken the hive mind.”

You take off your backpack and pull out the pocket knife, extend the blade and start poking into the lock.  It rattles around a bit but nothing happens.

“You don’t know how to pick locks, do you?” Hyuna asks.

“No idea at all” you reply.

“A few of the locks on doors have rusted out since I got put in here.  Maybe you can rust out the lock somehow.” she suggests.

You start thinking.  What’s so corrosive, disgusting and harsh that it could disintegrate the metal of a lock?  The answer hits you straight away.  You pull out your MP3 player with 4Minute’s discography on it, dial up “Hate“, and place one of the earpieces inside the lock cavity.   You only have to wait a minute – the lock metal falls apart halfway through the first chorus.  You swing the door open and Hyuna embraces you.  “My saviour!” she says, hugging you tightly.

“HOW’S THIS?” yells a loud voice behind you.  You and Hyuna turn around… it’s Hyuna.

Hyuna is holding a metal pipe.  She swings it straight at your face.  You’re able to duck just in time – Hyuna however is not so lucky and catches the full force of the swing to her jaw, knocking her to the floor, unconscious.  “DO YOU LIKE 4MINUTE’S COLLABORATION WITH SKRILLEX?  PLEASE SUPPORT IT!” Hyuna continues as she straddles Hyuna, now laying on the floor, and repeatedly bashes her in the face with the end of the metal pipe.  You reach down and try to pull Hyuna off Hyuna but it’s no use, she’s far too strong.  “WE NEED TO DO WELL ON THIS COMEBACK OR WE’LL DISBAND.  I DON’T LIKE TO TALK ABOUT DISBANDMENT, IT’S SO UPSETTING!” says Hyuna, slamming the pipe again and again against Hyuna’s skull.  You try to dislodge the metal pipe from Hyuna’s grip, but she effortlessly shoves you aside, sending you flying across the cell and out into the corridor.  Hyuna slams the pipe into Hyuna’s skull a few more times.  “THANK YOU FOR SUPPORTING 4MINUTE!” she screams as the sound of Hyuna’s skull cracking makes you wince.  Hyuna stands up, and turns to you, brandishing the pipe.  The other Hyuna is motionless.

“DO YOU LIKE “HATE”?” screams Hyuna at you.

You quickly grab your backpack, and pull out the photocard.  “I’m your biggest fan!” you say.

Hyuna stares at the photocard and pauses.  She then repeats “The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!” in a chirpy voice.  Hyuna smiles at you, cute but uncanny.

You slowly get up and start backing away.  You look briefly at the other Hyuna, her brains and skull fragments smeared all over the cell floor.  Hyuna repeats: “The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!”.

Suddenly all the other Hyunas in the cell blocks start repeating, in perfect unison:

“The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!”

Hyuna drops the metal pipe.  You start running.

“The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!”

You keep running.

“The photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!”

You keep running, not looking back.

-=-

It’s time once again for Kpopalypse roundup!  Let’s check out this week’s new releases!

WJSN (Cosmic Girls)

Nine Muses A – Lip 2 Lip

Ultra-lite ska-pop, fun times.

Up10tion – Tonight

They actually sing “shoobedoobop” here, but it’s not a doo-wop song so they’re wasting their time, and yours.

Monsta X – Stuck

From what I can tell from its usage in k-pop MV channels “special clip” means “this song has been out for a while but we only got around to doing a video for it now because we didn’t think you gave a fuck”.  Definitely one of their better songs so I guess it’s by popular demand or something.

B.A.P – That’s My Jam

Like all those crappy recent SM songs that we all hate but half of us are in denial about how shit they are.

INX – Alright

Accurate song title #1 – this is alright.

Basick ft. G2, Hwasa – Nice

Accurate song title #2 – this is too fucking nice for its own good, like 99% of hip-hop these days.

Y Teen (Monsta X + WJSN (Cosmic Girls)) – Do Better

Accurate song title #3 -they could do better, surely.

Suran – Paradise Go

Another woman who has that Lim Kim “garling jizz and trying to sing at the same time” kind of voice doing some mediocre bollocks.

Unpretty Rapstar 3 – She’s Coming

Isn’t it cute how the narrative of the Unpretty Rapstar TV show is that it’s a “competition”, yet they all have to co-operate together for a whole day doing a video shoot?  Kind of gives it away as the sham it is, don’t you think?

Brand New Music – Respect The Name

This one goes along nicely until they completely get rid of the beat at 3:50 and replace it with a bunch of firetruck noises for the rest of the song.  Listen to the very end – San E even knows how awful he sounds.

GUEST REVIEW BY ASIAN JUNKIE

J-Mezz ft. The Quiett – Memento

The fuck is this?

OTHER BULLSHIT SONGS THAT DIDN’T MAKE THE CUT

Dusky80 – I’m Not Worried

The reason why in the 1930s Gypsy Jazz was always played fast is because if you played it slow, it sounded like this.

Jannabi – Summer

There’s actual kissing in this video which makes it pretty much porn by Korean standards.  That’s the only reason why it’s here, really.

Code Kunst ft. BewhY, YDG, Suran – Beside Me

They look like they’re being tortured by their own crappy music.

Green Face – Do Re Mi Fa Sol Wind

Just when you think Korean ballads couldn’t get any more shit, here comes Jethro Tull.

Koh Nayoung – Bucket List

The term “bucket list” being derived from the expression “kick the bucket” a.k.a. “you’re fucking dead” rubs against this song’s bright feel in a way which is uncannily hilarious and surely unintentional.

In & Choo – Vacation

In & Choo have come a long way since their Nugu Alert feature… oh wait no they haven’t.  Never mind.

Sugardonut – So What

It would be cool if the inclusion of bass, drums and guitar actually synchronised with the guys sitting on the benches, but I guess they decided in the end that it was too hard bothering with something like that for such a shitty song nobody will listen to anyway.

Pia ft. Nucksal, Deepflow – Kick Flip

Crappy groove-metal isn’t just for racist Americans with heroin addictions.

Jin Won & Lee Ji Ae – Play Hot And Cold

I love the YouTube commenter who asks “does anyone know any more songs similar to this style?” – answer – yeah, about 50% of all new k-pop songs by anyone lately.

K.shin – Overmind

…and the other 50% sound like this.

Benji ft. Heyne – Duet

…sorry, I meant like this.  Yes, “Duet” is actually the name of the song, talk about running out of ideas (as if the music alone wasn’t proof enough of that).

Girls’ Generation – Sailing (0805)

… or maybe like this.  So many flavours and they all taste like grey.  You know a song from an A-list group is total shit when it doesn’t even make the playlist even despite the fact that I know you’re all interested in it.

Two girls from Lovelyz do some bullshit song

When people start talking about how they like a song and the only reason that they can give for liking it is the singer’s voice and talent, then that says a lot to me.  It tells me straight away that the song must be fucking crap, because if the technique of the singer stands out to the point where it doesn’t occur to you to say anything at all about why you like the song itself (other than that you like it because of the singer, which is circular logic), then the song must not have been very engaging to become so easily overshadowed.  The whole point of the singer is to strengthen the song to the best of his ability, not to create a bunch of stupid fawning over his/her own voice.  It’s like buying a dress because the workmanship on the cross-stitching is really good and not even caring if the dress actually fits or looks any good on you when you put it on.  But then there are actually people out there who buy toys and leave them in boxes and never open those boxes ever and there’s a big business in selling shit to those people so I guess if stupid people can be robbed and the money can be used for something useful it could be said that they do contribute to the greater good.  Notice that I’ve left any specific reference to the singer or the song itself out of this write-up, that way I can just copy and paste it the next time some bullshit song exactly like this comes up for review, which will probably be pretty soon given that about 25 songs are released exactly like this each week in Korea.

That’s it for this week’s Kpopalypse roundup!

With the emergence of YG’s new girl group Blackpink who in true YG fashion have debuted a cool, casual 32 months behind schedule, curious caonimas now wish to know what I think of their fandom.

However, I wasn’t sure that answering this question was a good idea.  Kpopalypse blog has always been about teaching k-pop fans to think for themselves rather just go along what what’s trendy or accept what some dickhead on the Internet spoonfeeds them, even if that dickhead is me.  So rather than just answer these questions simply, I thought – why not give readers the tools to determine by themselves exactly how insane any given k-pop fandom is?  Enter the Kpopalypse Fandom Insanity Scale!

Step 1: I’ve devised a series of sixteen questions, that will determine exactly how insane your fandom of choice is!  Please do your best to answer them honestly and candidly!

1. COLOURS

Does your fandom have a colour?

• A – Yes
• B – Yes, and other groups should try to pick a different colour
• C – Yes and other groups should try to pick a different colour or we will send toilet paper

2. LIGHTSTICKS

Does your fandom have a special lightstick?

• A – Yes
• B – Yes, isn’t it pretty, you’d better appreciate it asshole
• C – Yes and IF YOU PLAGIARISE IT I WILL STAB YOU

3. FANCHANTS

What does your fandom chant sound like?

• A – Rhythmic chanting
• B – Extremely fucking loud rhythmic chanting
• C – The territorial screaming of long-extinct creatures

4. FANDOM NAME

What is your fandom name?

• A – Something really stupid
• B – Something really good, stfu haters
• C – OMG WHY DON’T WE HAVE A FANDOM NAME YET WHY ARE YOU NEGLECTING US ISN’T IT ENOUGH THAT YOU HAVE OUR MONEY WHY DO YOU ALSO HAVE TO BREAK OUR HEARTS

5. FANMEETS

How does your fandom behave at fanmeets?

• A – polite and respectful
• B – slavering and Zerglike
• C – attention-whoring nutcases with daddy issues

6. FANDOM RELATIONS

How does your fandom feel about other k-pop fandoms?

• A – we love them because we’re united by k-pop
• B – we’re obviously better than them but it’s okay, we stay out of each others’ way
• C – LETS GO GET EM, TEAM

7. SONG QUALITY

What is your fandom’s opinion about their chosen idol’s songs?

• A – the good stuff is great but there’s also some meh songs that I don’t care for
• B – I like everything my idol does
• C – clearly my idol’s songs are superior to all others and if you don’t care about them all you are objectively wrong

8. VOICE QUALITY

What is your fandom’s general opinion about their chosen idol’s vocals?

• A – honestly I couldn’t pick my idol in a blind listening test, and besides, don’t they all use Autotune anyway?
• B – my faves are obviously the most vocally talented
• C – I’m going to start my own vocal pedagogy ranking/thread/forum/website/shrine to prove to you all that MY bias is best (no links provided because let’s not encourage this cancer)

9. AGENCY MATTERS

How does your fandom feel about their idols’ agency?

• A – who cares what company they’re with, I just hope the idols get to make money and have a sleep-in occasionally
• B – my idols are with the BEST agency and if you don’t like them you are a dirty hater
• C – I love my idols but their agency needs to listen to the fans more because us fans know more about how to run an agency than managers who have years of experience in artist management and nuanced knowledge of the inside business world that is completely hidden to us, WHY WON’T THEY LISTEN TO US

10. INTERNET CONDUCT

How does your fandom’s community leaders behave on the Internet?

• A – pleasant and nice
• B – psychotic and controlling – to their community
• C – psychotic and controlling – to their idols

11. SUSPECTED DATING

Your idol is seen with another idol of the opposite gender, could there be dating happening?

• A – who the fuck cares
• B – I’m sure something is going on but it’s not like I can stop it
• C – I’m sure something is going on and it’s not like I can stop it but GODDAMN I WILL TRY MY HARDEST FOR OPPA

12. ACTUAL DATING

How does your fandom respond to news of their idol dating?

• A – I’m happy for them
• B – I guess I’m a little heartbroken but tomorrow is another day
• C – I’m going to translate eight different sets of article comments about this breaking non-news so all the English speaking fans can see how that slut should have stayed away from oppa

13. GROUP TENSION

How does your fandom respond to news of inter-group tensions?

• A – slight disappointment but hey, shit happens
• B – denial followed by deep depression
• C – pick a side in the dispute and throw stones at the other side, despite having no insider knowledge of what really happened

14. JELLY SNACKS

Your idol is caught in a drug scandal!  How does your fandom respond?

• A – oh well, it’s the music business *shrugs*
• B – my idol seemed so pure, I’m devastated
• C – drugs are harmless and besides he never did it before it was just this one time the press release said so and you can trust those

15. CLASSY-SEXINESS

Your idol is caught emulating the men in Gain’s music videos – in real life!  How does your fandom respond?

• A – Gosh that’s a bit messed up, I hope he didn’t do it
• B – I really believe he’s innocent, after all the court let him off and courts in Korea aren’t sexist or culturally biased in any way
• C – KEEP THE FAITH, ALWAYS

16. OH&S COMPLIANCE

Mysterious bruises start appearing on your idol’s significant other!  What could be the most likely explanation?

• A – obviously, he beats the crap out of her
• B – they just train dance together really hard
• C – those bruises are clearly makeup, she’s after his moneyz!

Step 2: Count up all the answers that you gave, using the following system:

• for each answer A – allocate 1 point to your fandom
• for each answer B – allocate 2 points to your fandom
• for each answer C – allocate 3 points to your fandom

Step 3: Use the following guide to find out how batshit crazy your fandom is!

16 points

You’re such a sad, desperate psychotic fan that you’re willing to lie about your fandom’s virtues on a stupid Kpopalypse test just to feel better about yourself.  Please answer the questions again, this time honestly.

17-20 points

Congratulations, your fandom is probably reasonably normal.  If I were the supreme dictator of the planet, I may consider allowing your fandom to exist on some kind of limited basis with strict curfews.

21-25 points

Your fandom is potentially wasting oxygen that others could breathe.  Consider leaving this group of crazies before you get sucked as deep down the rabbit-hole as they are.

26-30 points

How do you sleep at night, knowing that your fandom is this insane?  Only with a body pillow of your idol, obviously.  Seek professional medical attention.

31-35 points

Humanity didn’t crawl out of the caves just for you to be part of a contingent of dickheads like this.  How must your parents feel?  You haven’t stabbed them in a ritual sacrifice to oppa, have you?

36-40 points

How are you still even reading this far?  Don’t you have people to stalk?

41-48 points

There is no hope for you, your fandom or humanity in general.  It doesn’t matter what any of us say or do because we are all doomed.  Might as well vote Trump 2016, fuck it.

Now you know exactly how crazy your fandom is!  Sweet dreams and stay safe until next post!

It’s time for another Kpopalypse roundup!  Let’s take a look at this week’s new releases!

FTIsland

This week’s roundup actually doesn’t have anything to do with the radio show itself, which was guest-programmed (see the playlist post for the tracks played), but I know that you guys still want a roundup so here’s the new releases anyway.

Blackpink – Whistle

Weirdly sparse yet annoyingly busy at the same time, the decent melodic bridge section doesn’t make up for all the other awful shit going on everywhere else.

Blackpink – Boombayah

Blackpink’s other debut song is better but it still sounds like something that wouldn’t have made the cut for a 2NE1 album.

VIXX – Fantasy

The thing about sampling classical music is that it’s all in the public domain so there’s no royalties to pay.  A pity there wasn’t more of that kind of subtlety throughout, this song has one of the most sonically crowded choruses in k-pop.

I.O.I – Whatta Man (Good Man)

This isn’t quite a remake of Salt N Pepa’s “Whatta Man“, although even if it was that probably wouldn’t have saved it because that song’s crap too.  The good Salt N Pepa was the iconic “Push It” era, not the pissweak hip-hop/R&B lite they did a decade later.

Stellar – Love Spell

Nondescript but pleasant enough, the real joy of this is watching Stellar wearing all that pure white clothing and pretending that they don’t know you’re fapping.

Jun. K – Think About You

It’s certainly JunK alright.

BeatBurger – Vagabond

Everyone acts like only YG can do trendy bullshit but weak crappy music is for everybody.

Onew & Lee Jin Ah – Starry Night

After SNSD’s shitty song last week SM Station have clearly just given up.

Henry & GenNeo – 1030

Korea’s Rick Astley returns with his “Cry For Help“.  Oh dear.

24K – Still 24K

Average song, but what an insane video.  Any MV featuring this kind of set design and gunplay is costing a ton of money so I hope these guys are making some decent returns for their own sake.

Lundi Blues – Long Beach

This week’s Fender Rhodes shitball is just as bad as any other.

Very Very Good Life – Dance

An unusually listenable stab at the kind of dreamy guitar-pop Korean bands usually execute with terrifying blandness.  It even has Fender Rhodes and doesn’t suck, it’s some kind of magic trick I swear.

Chi Young Tae – Scope

Like this, for example.  What fucking shit, someone grab that guitar off him and bash him with it until he fucks off.

Aquibird – Lookalike

Babies are fucking disgusting ugly resource-sponges that drain your time and energy and give nothing back, and so is this song.

A-Daily – Chu

A rocking upbeat tune that we don’t get enough of in k-pop these days, here’s hoping these Nugu Alert friendly girls get to do at least one more song before the axe inevitably falls on their careers.

IMGL – Hey You

Anyone with a 6-string bass is just bitter that they’re not the guitarist.  Face facts – you’re a bass player and nobody wants to hear you doing scales in the middle of the song, dickhead.

IMGL – My World

More annoyingly present bass playing.  You’re not special, stop that.

Right Life – The Way You See

See that kid staring through the bars?  That’s how you’ll also feel about a minute into this.

Jaeney – Tell Me Why

Check out the amazing muscle-tone on this woman, I guess this only got released because people saw those pecs and were afraid to tell her that her song sucked.

Luizy ft. Hyun Sik – Baby Ride

You could play a drinking game with this song where you try to find objects that weren’t rented.

That’s it for this week’s Kpopalypse roundup!  More next week!

I have no fucking idea why so many people care about my biases in k-pop, but it seems that plenty of you do because I get asked questions about this shit all the time even though my bias lists are publicly available to all.  Nevertheless, I’ll freely admit that the landscape of hot women in k-pop has changed somewhat since my last bias list post 18 months ago, and therefore a revisit of this important topic may be relevant, so that means it’s time for an update!  Who is on the Kpopalypse bias list for 2016?

While my bias list has changed a little, it hasn’t changed all that much.  I especially don’t feel the need to update it every time a new girl group emerges… new groups tend to take a few years for me to find someone in them who actually makes an impression, generally because a lot of the debuting girls don’t have much character to their faces at such a young age, so don’t expect any inclusions from recently-debuted groups here.  The “your mum” jokes that I drop here and there in blogs and my ask.fm are something that I do because they have a grain of truth to them – if you’re about the same age as most of the debuting idols, I’m far more likely to bias your mother than the average girl in a k-pop group.

Of course that doesn’t mean that I don’t have biases, so let’s get right down to it and list them for your entertainment!  Unlike previous bias lists, this one will be completely video-centric, and restricted to videos from live performances, TV and fancams, rather than official MVs (where it’s easier to fake certain elements).  Note that only current k-pop idols are listed here – people who cease to work in the field of k-pop are no longer eligible for inclusion.  Let’s take it away with:

THE KPOPALYPSE 2016 BIAS LIST

1. Raina (After School/Orange Caramel)

Raina’s #1 position in this list has never really been under any serious threat, and the only thing that could bump her off the list is if she stopped participating in k-pop.  Not much fear of that yet however – sure, Orange Caramel and After School have both been about as active as Qri’s mole-removing cream over the last 18 months, however Raina herself has still been busy, collaborating with every shitty Korean rapper in sight doing incredibly pathetic soft-ass hip-hop ballads.

Just as well for me because crappy music usually means less sudden movements on stage and therefore makes perving at Raina a lot easier.  Several caonimas have observed that I tend to like “chipmunk” faces in k-pop idols, and this is certainly true of Raina.  Another advantage that Raina possesses for bias-list purposes is that in 2016 she still looks like Raina, something that definitely can’t be said of many stars in the ever-transforming world of female k-pop idols.

2. Eunjung (T-ara)

Eunjung continues to look ridiculously attractive.  The long hair she’s been rocking over the last 18 months definitely doesn’t suit her, but that’s the sort of shit that can be easily overlooked in the face of some sexy pirate cosplay, a recurring Eunjung theme.

Eunjung’s general cuteness and wider frame compared to most Korean idols (compare her shoulder span to anyone else on stage here) are what keeps her high on the Kpopalypse bias list, she seems like an idol that I could fuck without having to stop every 30 seconds to ask if I had broken a pelvic bone.

3. Hong Jin Young

Trot singer Hong Jin Young comes in at #3 and marks the first list-shuffing for 2016.  Delight are hotly rumoured to have imploded, signalling previous #3 bias Jaewon’s probable departure from k-pop, and the Three Caonimas are no more – both f(x)’s Sulli and Berry Good’s Subin have left k-pop completely, whereas Minx’s Ji-u is still active but somehow doesn’t look very Sulli-ish anymore.  This leaves room for advancement as Hong Jin Young moves up two places on this list.

Hong Jin Young’s facial features scream out plastic surgery louder than just about any k-pop idol I’ve ever seen, but unlike a lot of other examples in the k-pop realm, the surgeon definitely did a good job here.  Plastic surgery detractors always say “it doesn’t matter how nipped and tucked you are, your kids will still look ugly”, but I was going to pull out and do a Seungri anyway.

4. Puer Kim

Puer Kim gets to move up in this list as well, and it’s not difficult to gauge the enduring appeal of k-pop’s Tura Santana who even has the below interviewer speculating on her “femme fatale” nature (watch below from 11:03).

The interview also has about 57 different euphemisms for Puer’s amazing rack:

• “first impressions” = tits
• “blessing from god” = tits
• “it’s a characteristic that makes me, me” = tits
• “my mother said I was sexy ever since I was young” = she grew tits before everyone else

Puer Kim has been quiet on the k-pop scene lately, maybe it’s just because she’s sick of talking about the twins in every interview.

5. Qri (T-ara)

F-ve Dolls’/DIA’s Seunghee has now exited the realm of k-pop and is therefore ineligible, meanwhile Sunny has been demoted and Qri moves up.  Why is it so?  The answer is better technology.

As the video says “we do not approach Qri from the basis of tools, we approach Qri from the basis of engineering principles”.

“You cannot achieve anything, in any business, in the absence of high-caliber people (like Qri)”.  Qri’s 2.0 manufacturing meets required standards.

6. Sunny (Girls’ Generation)

Sunny’s 2.0 upgrade however hasn’t been as effective, as it mainly focused on her face which really didn’t need any improvement and thus the result is a small retrograde step.

Not that the rest of her needs much improvement either however.  Even trashy Korean media thickears Dispatch were still able to determine the “best moment” in the above video.

7. Park Jimin (15&)

I went searching for a bunch of hot videos of Park Jimin but all I found that was any good was this “shipping” compilation where she’s paired off with some guy from GOT7.

Oh and this other one where the whole of BTS are low-key drooling over her.  As they should.  But yeah, she’s not big on the fanservice as usual, life remains tough for Park Jimin appreciators.  I would pay her good money to see her donning the outfits in the second half of Pocket Girls’ “Bbang Bbang“, but it’ll probably never happen unless a variety show makes her do it as an ironic joke (make it happen, Saturday Night Live).

8. Minkyung (Davichi)

Crayon Pop’s Way has been removed from the bias list completely for health and safety reasons, whereas After School/Orange Caramel’s Lizzy has physically wasted away to the point where her bias position has suffered.  Maybe she really is “naturally skinny” or whatever, but it’s interfering with my fap.  This means that Davichi’s Minkyung moves up.

Some quick “research” of Minkyung revealed that she doesn’t even sing much anymore but just appears in endorsement after endorsement.  Everyone was happy that Davichi left MBK but what the fuck have they even done since?  CJE&M just seem to be sitting on their hands and collecting the cosmetic company money, at least MBK made them put out a song occasionally.  Mind you as long as I still get my Davichi POV porn I don’t think I care whether they put out another song or not.

9. IU

IU hates you and would probably kill all of you if it were legal.  She might have gotten a little of the angst out of her system with “chat-shire” but IU still has to be a performing seal for nerds, witness her bringing the baby-doll aegyo for a bunch of hard and sweaty FPS players in the below video.

The poor woman.  She’s in hell.

10. Hyoeun (Stellar)

For my money, Stellar is “Hyoeun and the three other girls”.  That’s because I actually went out with Hyoeun for a while.

Okay, so it wasn’t really Hyoeun, but damn she certainly looked like her, imagine a slightly shorter Hyoeun with bigger boobs.  We met over the counter many years ago when I was working a government job.  She started very obviously flirting with me (i.e so obvious that even my relatively inexperienced self at the time could tell) so I asked her out and she said “well, you know where I live, my address is right on your computer screen, why not come over?”.  So after work I turned up at her doorstep, which gave her quite a shock.  I asked her why she seemed surprised – she said “I know I invited you but I didn’t actually expect you to come”, and I was like “well, it would have seemed a bit rude not to have”.  She let me in anyway.  We talked for a long time, she wasn’t just attractive but had a great sense of humour as dark as my own, and it didn’t take long for the relationship to progress.

On one of our first meetings, she confessed to me that she was a prostitute and a heroin addict.  I said “okay”.  She said “I hope you don’t hate me”.  I didn’t, I gave her a hug instead, while she cried on my shoulder.  Having already been active in the music business for a few years at this point, I’d met plenty of both before, so this news didn’t really concern me that much.  I was more upset about the Leonard Cohen CD that she had on repeat which nearly had me reaching for the drugs myself, despite the fact that I didn’t take them (and still don’t).

She was a nice girl but her addiction was always in the background, making things weird.  One time after an enjoyable bedroom session, she said “I’m going to do something now, which involves this teaspoon – you can watch if you like, but if you don’t want to see it, I understand”.  I declined the opportunity to be a spectator, but in retrospect I should have said yes – I hadn’t seen many drug casualties at that point in my life and didn’t know how important it was to not let people shoot up alone.  Another time I left her house and accidentally left $150 on her bed just because it fell out of my pocket.  When I remembered the money, I raced back to get it, thinking to myself that as a prostitute by trade she’s going to take it the wrong way, thinking that I left the cash there deliberately and that I was dropping the hint that I’m just another one of her clients to her.  I went back to her house, picked up the money and she wasn’t offended at all but said “that’s a shame, I would have happily spent that”.

One time I was at her place and her ex-boyfriend rang up.  I’m not sure what he was saying to her but it was an argument of some kind and she was in tears.  After about five minutes of her sobbing while he yelled at her I decided that I’d had enough of listening to him tear strips off her self-esteem and I hung up the phone on him.  It probably wasn’t the right thing to do, but her mood improved straight away.  The week after, we broke up – she told me that she was getting back together with her ex.  I was bummed out but we mutually agreed that it was fun while it lasted and perhaps we’d see each other again one day.

A couple of months later, the phone rings – it’s her.  She’s crying and says that she’ll be moving to Queensland with her ex to start a new life.  She says that she hopes to kick drugs completely over there, but that she’s still addicted for now, and so is he, but that they plan to make a fresh start.  I told her that this sounds great and why is she crying?  She told me that she just wanted me to know.  I never saw her again… until Stellar debuted.  I’m glad she’s doing well health-wise, although she probably makes less money now.

HONOURABLE MENTIONS BECAUSE PEOPLE WANTED ME TO EXPAND THIS LIST TO 20 GIRLS

11. Lizzy (After School/Orange Caramel)

Despite looking like a cancer patient these days her cute face still gets her over the line.

12. Gain (Brown Eyed Girls)

I can watch JAV all day and I’m like “just fantasy, meh” but when I watch Gain’s videos I slowly feel like I’m being brainwashed into becoming a rapist.

13. Yooa (Oh My Girl)

Depending on the styling, makeup and lights, she can look like a fairy from the boob kingdom, or E.T – but I’d still phone home all over her face.

14. Chanmi (AOA)

I’ll take Chanmi’s “would give you a quick handjob behind the bike shed” vibe over the rest of AOA’s perfect, primped supermodels any day.

15. KittiB

The girl rapped about her own tits.  That’s got to be worth something.

16. Choa (AOA)

Impressive weight gain has advanced Choa to the upper echelons of AOA fap.  If she’s been padding it’s with hamburgers and chocolate cake – the right way.

17. Hyomin (T-ara)

One day as a teenager my mum asked me “have you met a nice girl yet?” and I replied “why would I want a nice girl?”  She laughed – she thought I was joking.  It wasn’t until a decade later when I dated ten Hyomins in a row that she understood.

18. Yezi (Fiestar)

Check her out in the “Apple Pie” video where all the other girls grin wide-eyed but Yezi refuses to do more than a slight smirk because she doesn’t want to blow her newfound “fierce” image.  Any girl who hates aegyo is probably on my level.

19. Jiyeon (T-ara)

The hypnotising power of the cyclopoean eyebeams compels me to reserve a position here for Jiyeon.

20. Rainook (Bloomy)

Yes I know her real name is Jiyun but “Rainook” is more accurate – a perfect cross between AS/OC’s Raina and Rainbow’s Jisook.  Spam her over at Asian Junkie to confuse IATFB’s penis.

That’s it for the Kpopalypse bias list!  I’ll leave you with this clip of Rainook so you can observe her some more.  Until next time, caonimas!

Ohmigosh, hi everybody it’s Tiffany here!  I’m so happy to be here!  Kpopalypse always gets questions about Korean culture but he doesn’t live in Korea, so he asked me to write something about my favourite country in the world for you who are thinking of coming to Korea!  This is absolutely unexpected and exciting and humbling all at the same time!  Let’s learn all about Korea!

GEOGRAPHY

Korea is a nice country full of wonderful people.  It’s located on the eastern coast of the Asian continent.

It’s the peninsula thing a little to the left of the green island.  Aren’t green islands pretty?

Korea is divided into North and South.  North Korea is a dictatorship where people have no freedom, and little food, so they can’t eat what they want at any time.  South Korea is a democracy where people do have lots of freedom, and lots of food, so people can eat what they want at any time, unless it’s against SM’s dieting rules.

HISTORY

I don’t know much about Korean history because I’m busy being a k-pop star so I asked the girls from AOA but they didn’t know either.  They said that our president is busy rewriting the history books so they didn’t want to comment on history and get it wrong and upset their sensitive fanbase, but once the books are all rewritten they’re going to learn what’s in them and let you know all about it.

WORKING LIFE

Koreans work longer hours than anybody else in the developed world!  However don’t be fooled – Korean workers actually have the lowest productivity of all OECD countries, and it’s probably because they’re so busy building up their own businesses on the side.

Smart office attire could mean a worker cares about her presentation in the workplace, but it could also mean she’s practicing clothes-making so she can start her own business and leave you in the lurch. Don’t be too trusting of co-workers!

TRAVEL

It’s fun to travel in Korea to see important sights that will fill you with Korean pride, however the roads are very dangerous, public transport is safer!  When using public transport, it’s best to travel light!

Stylish!

A small travel bag like the one shown above will ensure that you cause a minimum of inconvenience to other travellers!

LEISURE

When it’s party time, Koreans definitely like to have a drink, and the favourite alcoholic drink of choice in Korea is soju, depicted below.

The soju is somewhere on this shelf, I think – sorry I was a bit tipsy when I took this photo.

Soju is about 20% alcohol by volume so be careful and drink responsibly!

The other common Korean leisure pastime is prostitution, which is unfortunately very popular and makes up 4% of Korea’s GDP.

Prostitutes can be identified by a general lack of clothing, low moral values and a tendency to abscond with other people’s money to feather their own nest.  Avoid!

To make your time in Korea enjoyable, don’t associate with prostitutes or you may end up with diseases, broken friendships or strained business partnerships.

PATRIOTISM

It’s important for Koreans to love their country but people who post about it on the Internet are probably just showing off.

Say it, don’t spray it.

Love your country on the inside instead, where it matters the most.

Go go Korea!  Can you feel the Korean patriotism emanating from this picture?

ENTERTAINMENT

Don’t forget to listen to Girls’ Generation (少女時代) while you’re in Korea!  Here are our albums that you should listen to!

Girls’ Generation – Girls’ Generation

Girls’ Generation – Girls & Peace

Girls’ Generation – Love & Peace

Thank you for reading this guide!  Please watch over us fondly!

This post has self-destructed as the show is now over.  Thank you to all of those who subscribed!

It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup – let’s check out this week’s new releases!

I.O.I (well, most of them)

This week’s radio show was the 2016 Radiothon fundraising edition.  I didn’t play any new releases this week, instead I played tracks from the CDs that I gave away on-air to entice listeners to subscribe to the radio station.  A list of the tracks actually played is at the playlist post.  In the meantime, here’s all the new stuff!

EXO – Lotto

“Wah wah wah Autotune”, I thought any k-pop fan anywhere would be well and truly used to Autotune by now.  Don’t kid yourself – the song is the problem, not the effects on the vocals.

Yuri & Seohyun – Secret

The best iteration of the “4 walls” style monotonous electrofart sound yet but that doesn’t mean it’s actually good.

CL – Lifted

Please, nobody tell CL or her fans what “shorty” actually means.  It’s funnier if they don’t know.  Look at Method Man’s grin, he’s loving this and he’s not going to tell anyone either.

I.B.I – Molae Molae

Apink by numbers, basically.

Hyuna – Morning Glory

Remember folks: the photocards in 4Minute albums are so you can have a souvenir and feel extra-special thoughts for your favourite member!  You can keep them, sell them, or trade them with your friends!

Hanhae – Eyescream

I scream, you scream, we all scream for better songwriting in k-pop.

WJSN (Cosmic Girls) – Secret

Meh.  Sorry to all those who waited a week with baited breath to find out what I thought about this, that’s all I got.

Badkiz – Hothae

They didn’t pitch-correct or even synthesise the saxophone loops.  It really makes the sax stick out actually.

Tymee – Cinderella

And here’s exactly the same thing but more boring.  I get that she’s over the whole “pick-up-chu” thing but Tymee lowering her voice to suit her new “tough” persona or whatever just sounds fucking weird.

Romeo – Treasure

Their song’s a bit messy and all over the place, but I like their truck that folds out into a stage.

Agust D – Give It To Me

They’re not even trying to make proper beats anymore.

Agust D – Agust D

This one’s slightly better but damn the ancient art of beat creation is getting lost a little more every day, isn’t it.

J-Min – Ready For Your Love

Someone asked me to review this because I missed it last week, but sorry to disappoint because it’s so boring I have even less to say about it than the new WJSN song.

Bambino – Moonlight Shower

Hey that nutter who posts about Bambino on Anti Kpop-Fangirl constantly was right, this is the new revolution in k-pop sound and style that we’ve all been waiting for.  Okay, not really, but it’s actually not a steaming great pile of dogshit like “Oppa Oppa” was so it’s already in the top 10% for this week.

Nell – Dream Catcher

Oh look it’s Nell.  Hahahaha.

MASC – Strange

Just ordinary boy-band stuff.

Sleepy – So What

Oh shit, Sleepy’s seen “Windowlicker“.

Jisun – Heart 2 Heart

Speaking of Sleepy, here’s a boring Korean ballad exactly like every other boring Korean ballad ever.

Nu.D – Ballionaire

How did a Korean think up that song title first?  Anyway this is as bad as you think it is.

Jay Park & Kirin – City Breeze

Trust Jay Park to do an early 90s retro song and copy awful p-funk and new jack swing instead of the stuff from back then that was actually good.  Proof that he’s musical cancer.

Lady Jane – Just 2 Days

A cool Europop style chorus saves this one from Rhodes shitball land.

That’s it for roundup this week – more next week!

It’s well known that Kpopalypse doesn’t like k-pop ballads, but why?  What is it about ballads that makes them suck so much?  Are there any good ballads?  If so, what makes a good ballad good, and a bad ballad bad?  Can ballads be bad meaning good?  Read on as Kpopalypse explores the trufax about k-pop ballads!

Remember that time called the Golden Age of k-pop, when international fans (including me) flocked to the style in droves?  Remember that time when songs like “Sorry Sorry“, “Lucifer“, “Roly Poly“, “Gee” and “Oh!” rode the charts high?  What did all those songs have in common, besides that they were great?  Well they weren’t ballads for a start.  Somewhere along the line between then and now, k-pop performed the ultimate bait-and-switch, capturing the hearts of a global audience with fantastic songs and then cruelly flipping the musical focus from upbeat rocking dance-pop to soppy turgid kindergarden-grade slop for sentimental emotionally stunted fuckheads and parents of pre-teens with ADHD.  K-pop was so good back in 2011 that fans believed there was a realistic chance that it may have escalated to become the dominant pop music form around the globe, but in 2016 even the most naive optimist can see that any hope of k-pop penetrating beyond Asian communities in a meaningful way is now completely dead in the water, and it’s entirely the fault of the music quality.  The ballad trend in k-pop is strangling everything that’s good about the genre and it needs to die, or k-pop itself will die, slithering back into the Asian restaurant background music void from whence it came.

But – what’s wrong with k-pop ballads?  How can they be done better?  Let’s take a look at some examples of k-pop ballads, both good and bad, to see what we can learn.

BALLAD PROBLEM #1 – EXCESSIVE SOFT LAYERING

When I go out and buy toilet paper (because sadly I don’t get sent it for free by haters, but I’m working on that), I always buy the cheapest stuff by volume that I can find, so I’m always bringing home different brands depending on what’s on special.  The other day, I brought home some ‘luxury’ brand that was 4-ply thinking that it would be ultra-soft, but it actually was a bit like wiping my ass with cardboard.  The problem with it was the same as the problem with a lot of k-pop ballads – too many layers absorbs plenty of shit, but isn’t very pleasant to experience.

Below is an example of a generic, shitty, boring k-pop ballad.  I could have picked one of thousands of other songs almost identical to it in k-pop that get released yearly, but I chose this one just because it sprang to mind, and because it’s by a huge k-pop company and features some big names, thereby illustrating that not even the very best talent either on the stage or behind the scenes can save a bad song from itself.

The song actually starts off acceptable, but when that backing kicks in at 0:53, we know straight away that we’ve waded deep into in restaurant music territory and we’re not getting out for the rest of the song’s running time.  The obvious problem with it is that there’s just too many soft layers.  Here’s all the musical layers in this song and when they are introduced.

• Piano (0:00)
• String pads behind the piano (0:00)
• Main vocal + effects including reverb and Autotune/synthesised vibrato (0:16)
• Drums (0:53)
• Bass guitar (0:53)
• More prominent strings (0:53)
• Plucked acoustic guitar (0:53 but only really noticeable from 1:20)
• Harmony vocals (1:26)
• More prominent acoustic guitar (1:26)
• Harmonica (1:31)
• More strings (2:00)
• Counterpoint string melody (2:04)
• Strummed acoustic guitar (2:04)
• Harmony backing vocal pads and call/response parts (2:17)
• Overdubbed money note (3:00)

That’s 15 layers of crap, and that’s just what I noticed in a quick first listen, there’s probably even more in there if you want to go deep with headphone listening.  You could be forgiven for not even noticing at least half of it, it’s all introduced gradually in a very subtle way, even the big money note sort of fades in smoothly rather than suddenly appearing.  However, while lots of layers brought in gently might be appropriate for restaurant or elevator background music that nobody really listens to anyway, it just adds to the boredom factor for anyone who likes a bit of focused listening for any reason other than sleep.  Nothing sticks out or is interesting, or engaging, or exciting, or even particularly relaxing, because to be relaxed you have to have some kind of tension there first for the relaxation factor to actually mean anything.  In this way, the song actually punishes you for paying attention to it, so it’s best not to even focus on it.  It’s music designed specifically to be ignored.  That’s why so many ballad songs come with drama-themed music videos, so you can focus your primary attention on the story.

Here’s a much better ballad.  The main reason for this one working well at least as far as the arrangement is concerned, is that the layering is sparser, even though they’re working with a simulated mini-orchestra so there’s probably an equal amount of individual instruments at play.  Also each layer has places where it cuts through, and all the different instruments take turns at being in the forefront and donating their individual character to the song’s backings.  It doesn’t all blend into one boring background mush, and at certain times the lead instrument competes directly with the vocals for volume (examples: 0:46, 1:27).  Even though this song is just as slow, the overall effect is more interesting to the ear, and I can even stay awake through it if I really try.

BALLAD PROBLEM #2 – BORING INSTRUMENTAL CHOICES

Shitty ballads can come from anywhere, from any label, from any artist, even from any songwriter (because songwriters are often commissioned to write pieces in certain formats), and the average k-pop album is full of garbage like the above song from Fly To The Sky.  The commitment to soft inoffensive multi-layered boredom is just as prevalent in the above song, but that’s not the only aspect making it suck – the choices of instrument textures are also deliberately dull.  Notice how something other than a snare drum is marking beats two and four, that’s because a snare drum might actually jump you out of your semi-slumber and excite you a bit, and we can’t have that.  Only the blandest, most generic and uninteresting backing instrument choices will do for the bulk of Korea’s shitty ballads.  Imagine how this song would sound if they distorted the bass guitar a little bit, someone might have a fucking heart attack unless they buried it in the mix super-low.

Puer Kim’s ballad isn’t the greatest thing ever in the world of ballads, but the daring production choices do lift it above the rack.  The electro-backings commonly associated with dubstep are utilised in a way that is pretty much forbidden in that style – in other words, there’s lots of ambience here.  Big large bouncy noises all come with a few seconds of room echo, and there’s all that small stuff churning away in the background as well that you might not even notice on first listen because of the dominance of the song’s larger assets.  This song has more in common with Einstürzende Neubauten than SM The Ballad, and if there’s one thing that Einstürzende Neubauten were very good at, it was changing up their instrument selection into something different at every opportunity.  The result is a song that really sticks out and is easily noticed, just like Puer Kim’s amazing talents.

BALLAD PROBLEM #3 – VOCALFAGGOTRY

The only thing that’s ever allowed to stick out in your average shitful k-pop ballad on the other hand is the vocals, which are usually mixed nauseatingly present with tons of added effects and of course everything and I mean everything is Autotuned and electronically adjusted to sound “perfect”, whether you can hear the software working or not.  Vocal pitch-correction is so prevalent and the tech works so well now that it can be done on the fly and completely seamlessly with a simple stomp-box, you’ve got about as much chance of finding a k-pop song without pitch corrected vocals as you have of finding k-pop album art that hasn’t been Photoshopped.  This correction is only more prevalent in ballads where the songwriters know that vocalfags are hanging on every note, and all you people vocalfagging and comparing vocalist A and B and writing up stuff in your forums and threads look pretty silly in the eyes of anyone actually involved in music production on any meaningful level.  In commercial pop music in 2016, only the most absolute lowest-rung Z-grade desperate nugus too poor to afford to rent proper studio gear would record without pitch-correction.  If your favourite idols can afford a music video at all, they can afford Autotune.

Ignoring the fact that everything is fake (and I really do stress that everything is fake, yes really), the big drawcard for k-pop vocalfaggots is the “money note”, that big extended note that all k-pop ballads just have to have so they can show you how great the singer is (in the above song at 2:25 if you want to skip straight there and start masturbating furiously).  Because that’s the point of most of these shitty ballad songs of course – to showcase the singer rather than provide the listener with a song that’s actually any good.  That’s why the songs are so shitty – the people writing them don’t care – it’s purely there a basic template to showcase the singer and nothing more.  Money in k-pop doesn’t come from music sales, it comes from brand power, brand power comes from star power and star power comes from you falling in love with the properties of your favourite star, such as “ohmigosh he held that note for such a long time and did perfect vibrato, what a dreamboat, he can dissect my uterus”.  A good song isn’t a requirement for this to happen.  Sure, if a good song happens anyway by chance, great – but it’s not actually the primary objective, and it’s a lot harder to write a really good song than it is to just write a shitty generic ballad backing track and say to the girl in the studio “okay – here’s your lyrics, here’s your notes, just do what you normally do over the top, don’t forget the money note and we’ll fix it all in the mix later, don’t worry you’ll sound great”.

The above song is one of my favourite k-pop ballads and it’s partly because Bom isn’t a good enough singer to wreck the song with any showing off.  It’s a well-known fact amongst k-pop’s armies of vocalfaggots but not so much among most regular k-pop fans – despite being the “primary vocal” of 2NE1, Bom really can’t sing that well at all.  I won’t go into the reasons why because I don’t care and neither should you, but Bom was probably picked as 2NE1’s “vocal” because of her unique vocal sound rather than her ability to actually apply that sound.  The result of Bom’s very “untrained” vocals is that engineers have to use a different approach to normal to get any results at all – pitch-correction can make a good singer sound better and a bad singer sound good but it can’t make Flavor Flav sound like opera.  Bom can’t just read off a chartsheet and get it right or even anywhere close, she needs people to coach and write songs specifically around her limitations.  Watch the following video, which I’ve used in blogs before:

G-Dragon and T.O.P want Bom’s voice on their track, and why not – she has the extreme rarity of sounding unique in the world of k-pop where all singers are schooled to sound pretty much identical.  They concede at 2:50 that it’s hard to get results out of Bom, but when they do get them, it makes the track sound great.  They struggle on all night trying to get that “perfect Bom take” where she actually sings the fucking thing that she’s supposed to, but they eventually give up – in the end it’s just too hard.  How do you teach someone to sing something new when they don’t have the musical language to conceptualise and understand exactly what it is that you want them to do?  Bom’s weakness is also her greatest strength – she sounds unique and interesting even on ballad material precisely because she’s just not capable of doing it right.

BALLAD PROBLEM #4 – INSIPID MUSICAL MESSAGES

As if the music itself being crap isn’t enough reason to hate k-pop ballads, here’s a bonus reason.  K-pop’s turgid ballads really have to go to the next level and make sure that they are not interesting or engaging in any way by not just having garbage music but by filling the lyrical content with the most idiotic, vacuous words and visual messages imaginable.

Getting together and/or breaking up with your boyfriend or girlfriend might seem like a big fucking deal when you’re 11 years old and you’ve never really had much experience with matters of the heart, but after a while you realise that breakups are just part of life’s rodeo, and that it takes a few rides on the merry-go-round of dickheads before you meet that special someone who you can share your mutual ambivalence with for the rest of your life.  However many people don’t ever make that step into emotional maturity, and go through their entire life believing in tooth fairies, Santa Claus, organised religion and the extreme emotional vanity that k-pop ballads encourage by playing up every single relationship issue for maximum drama points like it’s some big fucking deal.  Who gives a fuck if Jonghyun hung up on Taeyeon, I’d hang up on that bitch sooner if she started singing this shit down the phone.

It’s just about the only topic k-pop ballads ever cover, and it makes me grateful that I don’t understand Korean language because I’m sure I would cringe even harder than I already do at garbage music like this.  If you’re a girl and you ever hear any guy say to you any of the shit in the above song, make sure you’ve got one hand on that mace can.

Sunny Hill have a better stab at breakup lyrics, that comes across a lot more sincere and realistic than your average k-pop ballad.  Cleverly, the song’s words are paired with a music video which highlights the hidden layer of meaning in the lyrics.  The core message here throughout both the words and visuals is that belief in an idealised perfect love, like belief in an orthodox religion, requires a disconnect between what happens inside the heads of the true believer and the often completely contradictory situations that are actually happening in the real world, and that’s why the behaviour of people who are very devoted or devout is often completely opposed to their own stated moral values.  The song is very much the opposite of the SM The Ballad songs, because rather than idealising romance in an insipid, corny way, it’s putting romance into a greater context, the type of context that would probably be too much for the average k-pop fan with a bedroom wall full of idol group posters.

Of course, this is all just the way I look at it.  If you are able to extract some tiny semblance of enjoyment out of the bulk of k-pop’s awful disgusting ballads, more power to you, and never let it be said that you’re not well catered-for in this genre.  Also, you’re banned from touching the MP3 player settings or any acoustic guitars at my next housewarming party.

It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup – let’s check out this week’s new releases!

Cross Gene

Playing catch-up this week after two weeks in a row of not playing any new stuff, so not many of this week’s new releases actually made it into the show.  As always, tracks actually played are at the playlist post.  Here’s this week’s new stuff:

LaBoum – Shooting Love

Like a combination of Red Velvet’s “Dumb Dumb” and Twice’s “Like Ooh Ahh“, and with the negative qualities of both.

NCT Dream – Chewing Gum

Healthy porn for women.

Puer Kim – Pearls

Everything I needed to say about this one is over at my ballad post.

Park Jimin – Try

Notice how it’s called “Try” rather than “Succeed”.

Ailee – If You

Not only musically hideous but she’s not even in the video.  Where’s Johnny Noh with a camcorder in the bushes to provide the raunchy Ailee imagery when you need him.

VX – What Are You!

The fact that this song is better than just about everything else this week should embarrass all of us.

Spica – Secret Time

I’m not really into it, but it’s their best song in a while, I reckon both of Spica’s fans should like this one.

Five Run Strike – Round & Round

Wooram doesn’t rock as hard as her sister but this is officially “not shit” and for any Korean rock group that’s quite an achievement.

Geeks – Divin’

Well this definitely “is shit”.  How come everything from Korea with the word “Geeks” in the song, band or artist name is terrible?

Dorothy – Purple Lips

Like a super-budget version of miss A’s “Touch” or Sistar’s “Alone”, that’s a compliment by the way.

Hyoyeon, Min, Jo Kwon, JYP – Born To Be Wild

Unfortunately not the Steppenwolf song, which is a major missed opportunity to wreck something that probably really needs wrecking.

ELO – Rose

Just a bit too vocally overcooked to be any good, which is a shame as that backing track would work good with an actual song.

Two X – Over

I waited three years for this?

Tymee – Fuck Pretty Rapstar

This should have obviously been the feature track instead of “Cinderella”, but Tymee’s shitty company didn’t have the balls to release this diss track against Unpretty Rapstar 3, so Tymee just put it up on her own YouTube anyway for the lulz.  Subtitles are here if you need them as this one is best appreciated if you know the words.

Chancellor ft. B-Free – Palm Tree

The sort of music that fuckheads listen to when they pull up next to you at the stoplights.

Urban Zakapa – Thursday Night

Urban Zakapa are one of Korea’s consistently most terrible groups and I really don’t pour enough scorn onto them.  I’ll try to rectify this shortfall in my writing for the future.

Skawakers – Tiger Spirit Arises

This is pretty funny but ska-pop has been done a lot better than this.  There’s a really cool Japanese punk girl group that did a ska song like this maybe about ten years ago but way better, they had a full brass section and one of the girls was oustandingly biasable.  I forget their name though, I should probably hit up Tiffany and see if she remembers who they are.

EDIT: she does!  Thanks Tiffany!

That’s it for this week’s Kpopalypse roundup – more new songs next week!

So it’s no secret that I get a fuckton of questions on my ask.fm about all sorts of shit.  Questions that I receive tend to fall into the following categories:

1. Shit that isn’t really a question but more of an FYI, I sometimes answer these but usually store for “later use” instead
2. Shit that I don’t want to answer, usually because it might spoiler upcoming content I’m working on/planning
3. Basic questions that I can answer easily in less than 30 seconds, I’ll answer it or delete it if the question is too boring
4. Tricky interesting questions that would make a good blog post, I usually make note of the question and use it for blog material later

However, sometimes I get questions that fall into a fifth “this is a great question and I can’t answer this really quickly or easily, but I don’t think I could stretch out the answer to fill up an entire blog either” category.  I do definitely want to encourage these better, higher-quality questions, so I think they deserve their own special series!  Enter the new Kpopalypse series, QRIMOLE!

Read on as Kpopalypse answers some ask.fm questions that don’t completely suck!

The following questions all came from the same asker.  You know who you are, cheers for inspiring this new series!

If the music industry is a dead horse that is not profitable, why are record companies still investing in making groups/soloists, releasing music and holding concerts?

Whether it’s as a performer or behind the scenes, people generally get into the music business because they’re really passionate about music.  I know that was certainly the case for me – a strong feeling of “well, I really like music and I really don’t know what the fuck else to do with my life”.  While it’s true that it’s extremely hard to make ends meet for the vast majority (especially these days what with all you kids stealing everything or paying 0.1% of a cent on Spotify), people still consider it a worthwhile pursuit because they’re passionate about it, and it’s every musician’s dream to be able to make a living just from music-related stuff and not have to work in the “straight world”.  How much compromise musicians are willing to accept to achieve their goal and under what terms varies with the individual, but ask anyone in a band “would you like to do nothing except rock out for a living if you could” and the answer is always “yes”.

Over the last decade the music business in Korea has also gotten better at riding the coat-tails of other, more profitable businesses, positioning its products as a one-size-fits-all “business card” that can be used to market other commercial ventures.  Through this capacity, the star-making potential of the music business is able to still turn a chunky profit for agencies that know how to pick their idols, music and image correctly.   In this sense, the music industry is still viable in Korea, but to be honest in k-pop it’s not the “music” industry anymore, it’s the “music idol” industry, where the music itself is secondary to the creating and marketing of idols – a commodity with a much higher resale value than the songs themselves.

If being a pop star (idol in particular) is economically akin to slavery why are there idols/stars who are actually financially independent, own several buildings, various cars, designer goods etc. and generally display more than above average level of wealth?

Firstly, how much wealth an idol displays isn’t always a true indicator of how much wealth an idol actually has.  Not every idol who owns flashy cars is financially in the black – some are overspending.  In Korea’s “ohmigosh I care so much what everyone else thinks of me” culture, you can bet that there’s quite a few idols who have gone into debt taking out irresponsible loans and buying expensive items so they can give an appearance of wealth that matches their agency’s glossy $500k music videos.  If you’ve ever wondered why pop stars with mansions and sports cars routinely declare bankruptcy, now you know one of the main reasons.

Of course, a tiny handful of k-pop stars are genuinely rich (at least by Korean standards).  These are the ones who have made the aforementioned transition from “music idol” to “business card”.  The contracts that idols have to sign with agencies are universally terrible, and even if they have a few hit songs the label will still fuck them in the ass to the point where they’re very unlikely to see any real money.  However once they make that transition to a product, then they can be sold all over the place, and a idol with no hit songs out but who is doing a few endorsements a month is making way more than someone with a number one single.

What do you think is the actual ratio of stars who are economically shafted by their labels vs those that earn money?

Those two things aren’t mutually exclusive.  You can earn a ton of money and still be shafted by your label through contracts and agreements that guarantee that you see nothing of what you earn.  Plenty of k-pop stars earn a lot of money but see none of it because it all goes into keeping the company afloat and they get the scraps left over.  However if this question is really “What do you think is the actual ratio of stars who are economically shafted by their labels vs those that earn money and get to keep a substantial portion of it?” then the answer is “almost none”.

One of the interesting quirks of a lot of k-pop contracts is that the artists get paid a lot more for overseas work than work at home, I know that this is true of SM as well as MBK but I’m not sure why, so I’m going to assume it might be similar for other labels?  I don’t really know though, and of course not every k-pop agency has the ability to send their artists overseas.  Japan used to be quite lucrative for k-pop artists until recently when being an ultra-nationalist dickhead became trendier (in both Korea and Japan) and that pool of income dried up somewhat.

If you want to know who is earning good income in k-pop, here are the things to look for:

• Commercial film work for high-profile well-known brands
• Music videos with extremely obvious product placement
• Endorsement deals
• Buying real estate that isn’t extravagant (i.e a sensible financial decision was made, rather than showing off with a flashy mansion and about to go bankrupt from stupidity)

These things make some income, but not anywhere near as much as you might think:

• K-drama appearances
• Sold-out live concerts
• Lots of YouTube traffic

And here’s the things which can safely be disregarded when factoring in how rich/poor your idol is:

• Winning award shows
• #1 on the charts
• Variety show appearances
• Makestar, crowdfunding, etc

Are those stars/idols that decide to work in the industry aware of the possibility of getting paid poorly? If so, why become a star/idol at all? Is it for the ego boost they get from the from the mindless obsessive adulation of strangers? Or is it the access to copious amounts of sex they’d get from strangers in exchange for money and/or bragging rights? Or is it some other reason?

Well, it’s not the sex, at least not for k-pop idols – most idols barely have time to have sex, and when they do, they don’t tend to do it with strangers but generally others within the industry.  When you’re famous or even semi-famous, it becomes very difficult to trust random strangers, and singers who fuck their fans (while they do exist) are actually much rarer than you would think (sorry folks).

The music industry is a “glamour industry”, just like acting, modelling, photography, TV presenting, professional athlete, pro gaming, etc. –  what this means is it’s a profession that has a high amount of people wanting to be in it because they like the idea of the job’s (apparent) lifestyle.  On the other hand, people who want to be doctors or accountants aren’t dreaming of the long hours examining warts on your mum’s labia or counting numbers in a spreadsheet, they don’t care about the lifestyle of the job and may even sometimes despise it, but are pursuing that career because they know that once they are established it delivers a consistent reliable income.  Glamour industries always have far more people wanting to be involved in them than there are positions to fill, and no tertiary education in a glamour industry guarantees a steady job once you’ve attained the qualification.  However the 1% at the very top of the tree in any glamour industry is always a very attractive place to be (or at least seems like this to an outsider), so people who find the idea of a regular reliable job to be soul-crushingly suicide-inducing would often rather roll the dice on the slim odds of success in their “dream”.  Ego boosting is also a factor to some folks – you’d be amazed how many well-known rock singers are introverts – but you can also get ego-boosted just by applying makeup correctly and leaving your house, so it’s not the wisest reason to get involved.  People who pursue glamour industries for the ego trip tend to crash and burn the heaviest, when they either don’t succeed, or do gain some success and then experience firsthand how much hatred and envy fame creates instead of the adulation that they wished for.

If becoming successful in the music industry has nothing to do with talent, what are the formulas that make some groups successful as opposed to others?

In k-pop the agency’s weight to give what they’re doing the right marketing push obviously has a lot to do with it – for instance it’s pretty safe to say that anything coming out of SM and YG is going to do pretty well at least within Korea, they’ve obviously hit on a consistent formula that works for that particular market and they just need to keep repeating it with minor variations.  However that same formula doesn’t work so well for other markets, witness SM and YG’s consistent failed attempts to make any sort of dent overseas, the only time that they got it right (Psy) it was just blind luck rather than by design or good management.

I don’t think anyone knows the true answer to this question though, it can’t be that simple or we’d all be overnight rock stars, right?  Even if there is a specific “formula that works”, if everybody starts doing that same formula, well, they can’t all be successful because there’s just not enough room in the marketplace for 2000 k-pop groups to all be on the A-list, so there has to be some kind of differentiating factor but it’s impossible to really know what that should be as it would change depending on context and what else is going on at that moment.  For instance, nobody picked Nirvana to become successful when they did, however if a new band that sounded exactly like Nirvana started today, nobody would care.  People who become successful within music owe a lot to luck, circumstance and just being in the right place making the right music at the right time, to fill an unknown demand for a particular type of musical statement.  That’s why it’s so hard to just “make a hit group”, unless you already have a huge advantage (like a big agency that can push you).

You mentioned that most personalities of idols are taught/not truly their own, and that it is obvious if you know where to look. Where must one look? Are you perhaps just talented at reading people? I only recall an article where you linked a 9Muses dance tutorial video and commented on the excessive smiling/nodding of the members. I didn’t notice anything amiss. But then I watched their documentary (you recommended it in a different post) and realized that most members did not get along, were thinking of solo careers before even debuting as a group, and one of the members said that after their debut there was nothing humane left between them. In short, please consider a series where you can teach naive simpletons like me how to read in between the lines and see the real behind the bull. With examples and explanations, of course.

I don’t think you need to be overly talented at reading people to be able to spot the bullshit in k-pop.  Just watch the video materials and think to yourself “do people really fucking act like that?” and more often than not you’ll get your answer.

The above video isn’t the one that you’re referring to, but it doesn’t matter – all of these videos are very similar and follow the same principle.  Koreans really seem to love forced, hammy overacting (just watch any k-drama), and this video really pushes it to the limit with lots of scripted dialogue between the members which is very obviously planned and not spontaneous in any way.  Then they’ve even gone to the next level and added stupid captions and sound effects to complete the “oh so zany” vibe they’re going for.

Part of the reason why idol TV appearances are this way is because Koreans actually seem to like this type of bullshit forced dumbed-down humour for some reason.  However there’s another reason that’s more important – agencies can’t really trust their idols to be spontaneous, because the chance that they’ll say or do something that will upset viewers is huge.  Just look at how many controversies arise from the few shows where idols do get a chance to go off-script.  The fantasy of idol life that is pushed by Korean media brings up a huge amount of jealous, envious feelings in the general public (even though being an idol is actually a pretty shit experience for many in reality), and as a result every idol is one innocent mistake away from being ostracised from the country.  It’s a lot safer to give the girls strict instructions than to have the whole thing ride on their actual personalities, the girls simply following instruction is certainly something located more within their comfort zone given that that’s just about all idols ever do once they become trainees.  However once you start bringing the actual thoughts and feelings of the girls into it, you’re dealing with a potential powder-keg situation, because those thoughts often don’t match the smooth positive image that the agencies are going for.  Add on top of that the fact that you’re dealing with often very young people who don’t have a fully-rounded experience of life and culture (mainly due to being cooped up in the practice room and gym for 18 hours a day every day for a few years in a row) and therefore may be prone to saying a lot of dumb immature shit, and you can see why companies just go for the safe scripted formats most of the time.  The only difference between the dumb crap idols get hated on for and the dumb shit that I did when I was their age is that a camera wasn’t watching my every fuckup.

If just one person can come up with half a dozen decent questions in one sitting, what’s wrong with the rest of you?  Head on over to my ask.fm and ask some decent quality questions and you too could be featured in the next episode of QRIMOLE!

It’s that time of week again – Kpopalypse roundup time!  Let’s take a look at this week’s new releases!

The Starz

This week the radio show and the roundup are more or less back in sync.  This means that “bonus songs” have returned, i.e the songs are separated into ones that made the cut for the show and ones that did not.  Unfortunately it was also a quieter week than usual.  Here’s what was new!

Nu’est – Love Paint

The male version of Hyomin’s “Sketch“, both thematically and musically – but faster.  Oddly, some things don’t work that well at twice the speed.

Sunny Hill – On The Way Home

I think the “Midnight Circus” quality era has left them for good but this is still alright, the kind of thing Davichi might do on the right drugs.

Brave Girls – Yoo Hoo

Just like E-Tribe kept doing with Dal Shabet, Bravesound tend to strike out a lot with their “home team” for some reason.  Maybe it’s the lack of performance pressure that comes from working with an outside name that makes songwriters get sloppy.

Hitchhiker – $10

This will either annoy you to shit, or you’ll love it and it’ll annoy everybody else around you to shit.  Either way, someone is being annoyed, so Kpopalypse wins.

Mamamoo – Dabdab

An uncharacteristically reasonable song from a group that churns out constant duds, it’s probably because the two who usually get all the vocal wank lines are absent.

Jay Park – Aquaman

It’s not great, but I much prefer Jay Park ripping off Marvin Gaye’s “Sexual Healing” than R.Kelly or T-Pain or whatever the fuck it is he usually does.  Don’t tell the Gaye family that Jay Park is one of the few k-poppers with money or they’ll chase him and tackle him in a corner with open wallets!

Microdot – My Lemonade

I wonder what “my lemonade” is all about – do you think he likes water sports?

Kei & Myundo ft. Bumzu – Y

Y indeed.

BONUS SONGS

IREN – Butt

It not only looks like ass but also sounds like ass.

Homme – Dilemma

Boring Korean piano ballad that sounds like every other boring piano ballad ever #59873

Swings – Your Soul

Listening to Swings telling me to take care of my soul is like listening to Donald Trump telling me to take care of my scalp.

Mamamoo – Angel

Mamamoo’s twin song to “Dabdab” for the vocalfaggot crowd is just as bad as I was expecting it to be.

Yang Da Il & Hyorin – And Then

And then there’s this piece of shit which is even worse.

Lou.de – 1:00 AM (Tonight Without You)

Sometimes when I miss a song for the weekly roundup and someone alerts me to the fact on ask.fm, it’s a great pleasure to discover a hidden jewel of quality music that nearly slipped me by.  Right now is not one of those times.

Biuret – The End Of The World

I really did a double-take over this one because I thought it was Hitomi Tanaka on the bass there for a second.

KCM – Hedgehog Love

This bizarre pseudo-country thing nearly made the cut for my show but I decided at the last minute that I couldn’t do that to my listeners.

That’s it for this week’s roundup – more next week!

Some important featurettes have been updated on Kpopalypse blog!  Read on to find out what they are!

Featurette #1: As the total amount of money given to Kpopalypse via PayPal donation and Patreon subscription has now exceeded the cost required to remove advertising from the site, all advertising has now been completely and permanently removed!  This pleases me greatly as I’m very much against Internet advertising in general so it’s a great pleasure for me to offer you all completely ad-free access (even though I’m sure many of you use adblockers anyway).  A very special thank you to the generous caonimas who have made this possible, you know who you are!  I’ll keep you anonymous but you have my permission to gloat in the comments section below if you so choose!

Featurette #2: Kpopalypse blog has also had a sexy domain change and can now be accessed from http://www.kpopalypse.com or even just kpopalypse.com.  This won’t affect any existing readers, it just makes the site that little bit less cumbersome and annoying for new readers to access.  The content of the site should annoy, but not the accessibility!  You can still continue accessing to this site from kpopalypse.wordpress.com if you wish.  Any existing links or bookmarks that you currently have to Kpopalypse content will remain intact and unbroken.

Thanks to all those who have given to Kpopalypse, or who will give in the future, and also those who will never ever give a cent even if Way’s Girls abduct all your relatives and hold them ransom but just like to come here occasionally and read my utter bullshit postings, you are all appreciated!  Kpopalypse will continue to provide content for your entertainment (or bemusement, or annoyance)!

Kpopalypse is back to explore unknown Korean artists in another episode of the most unpopular eclectic series in k-pop blogging history, Kpopalypse Nugu Alert!

Read on and be entertained as Kpopalypse explores the depths of YouTube to find more music that you’ve probably never heard of!

This episode of Nugu Alert is all about film noir.  What’s film noir?  Well, you could look it up on Wikipedia if you wanted, but Kpopalypse is a lot slightly cooler than Wikipedia, so why not keep reading this blog as I condescendingly write about it for all you knuckleheads?  Film noir (literally “black film”) is a cinematic style that hit its stride in the 1940s (but was arguably in existence much earlier) where film directors would explore darker themes than the norm for the time – and this thematic darkness was accompanied by a similar darkness in the visual palette.  A lot of the early film noirs look a bit fucking pussified by today’s high-tech standards, but the modern “lots of darkness and menace, everywhere, all the time” look that is standard for today’s Hollywood action blockbusters, science-fiction and horror films is very noir-inspired.

Film noir style is often used in music videos.  Lots of faces cast in shadow, strong use of silhouettes, and light often used as a physical entity to obscure the action just as much as to illuminate it are all visual trademarks of the noir style.

That’s fine if you’re History or T-ara, two groups with agencies that have money in the bank, but not everyone in k-pop is so fortunate.  Proper film noir effects aren’t cheap – you either need very good lighting technicians, very good cinematographic tricks, or ideally both, but what happens when you don’t have either?  Let’s look at some Korean nugus and how their music video directors solved (or didn’t solve) the “film noir on a budget” problem.

The usual rules for Kpopalypse Nugu Alert apply here:

• No music videos with over 20,000 views
• Maybe Korea cares, but the average western k-pop blog reader sure doesn’t (yet)
• Kpopalypse thinks you should check this shit out, just because

Staz of Man – Staz Coming Now

Film noir is of course very appealing to Korean rappers who always want to look as badass as possible, except when they need to make ballads for cash.  However, it’s hard to get film noir style right – the wrong type of lighting, contrast or post-processing means that rather than getting a cool “dark look”, everything instead just “looks too dark”.  Hip-hop posse Staz Of Man try within their various limitations for a film noir look to complement their actually quite rocking debut song, with varying degrees of success.  The scenes of the guys rapping here look quite good with some effective rear spotlighting shining off the hair and leather jackets and there’s even a bit of CGI which works in context and isn’t too over-the-top, but things get a lot muddier for the interior drama scenes.  The contrast is so maladjusted that the brightly glowing computer screens where Staz Of Man plan their mysterious operation to save hip-hop from Raina’s cardigans are dimmer than their surrounding furniture, and proceedings get so murky that at one stage a bright white cat walks across the frame and is barely even visible at all.  Still, most of this video’s few English watchers probably didn’t notice details like this, as they would have been too busy laughing at the hilarious melodramatic narration that occurs before each verse as a female computer operator pep-talks each rapper with sexy catchphrases like “go pyro on their asses”.

YouTube views at time of writing: 1715

Notable attribute: nobody could work out how to turn the angle grinder on safely at 1:38 so they CGI’ed in fake sparks despite having all the equipment right there to create sparks in real life

Nugu Alert Rating: extreme

Jaywon Jung – Again

Jaywon Jung isn’t really all that nugu in the grand scheme, he’s a session guitar player and singer who does a lot of backing track recordings for other artists (if you’re interested check out his Sketchbook appearance where his extensive resume is discussed) but he’s probably still fairly nugu to most k-pop fans.  He’s here in this episode to show that film noir isn’t just for rappers, and Jaywon Jung’s cruisy and somewhat dull Carpenters-esque song is a lot lighter and breezier than the standard hip-hop fare.  However the video sure isn’t much lighter, with the ultra high-contrast figures of the street dance performers placed against the almost complete pitch-blackness of everything else.  Every now and then the performers are allowed to fade into the blackness a bit and this is used to cheat a little and give the impression of a “one-shot” video as well as add some of the usual trademark scuzzy obscuring film-noir effects, like double-image blur and massive amounts of bloom on everything.  This is good because it’s nice to get some contrast going, as the interpretive dancing or whatever the fuck it’s meant to be that’s going on here is pretty boring and certainly benefits from the visual help.

YouTube views at time of writing: 14545

Notable attribute: Kangin’s wobbly camera rig deftly turns at the last minute to avoid a pole at 1:49

Nugu Alert Rating: high

Sims – 24/7

Ever since my interview with ex-MBK rapper Naino from Nutaz (previously featured on Nugu Alert), I’ve been watching his hip-hop crew Crimp closely.  I’m not sure when Sims entered into the Crimp fold but he doesn’t disappoint, rapping over a rocking beat which is probably one of the best hip-hop tracks this year, not that that’s saying much.  (EDIT: figured out the connection, it’s producer Clams who is part of Crimp.)  The video also displays some nice budget-noir effects, with are mainly just cinematographic – careful street-light and zoom positioning compensates for the fact that these guys don’t really have much going on in the way of light kits.  There are a few static VCR-style effects to break up the visual proceedings however, but I guess that’s as far as the budget went on this one.  Sims hasn’t taken Korea or the rest of the world by storm yet (perhaps it’s his completely unwebsearchable name that’s giving him issues) but clearly, these folks could use our help.  Everyone do your part as nugu fans and make sure to share and spread this one, I want this guy to get fame and an offer of a place on a future season of Show Me The Money just so he can brag in an interview with me later about how he turned it down.

YouTube views at time of writing: 61

Notable attribute: synchronisation of the middle finger, the word “fuck” and the higher than usual bassnote at 0:44 probably the greatest moment in Korean hip-hop to date

Nugu Alert Rating: off the chart

That’s it for another episode of Kpopalypse Nugu Alert!  Kpopalyspe will return at an undisclosed time in the future with more nugus!

It’s that time again – time for the bi-yearly big Kpopalypse survey!

Get ready to be giving all your opinions about stuff and things!