Background becomes foreground

[koganbot]

Wonder Girls to tour U.S. with Jonas Brothers this summer (says UPI):

"[M/V] Wonder Girls - Nobody from [The Wonder Years - Trilogy]" (Watch on YouTube)

Seem like a variation on NY-Miami 1988, which I think is a good thing.

"Wonder Girls "Tell me" M/V" (Watch on YouTube)

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Just being curious, now that you are talking about K-Pop, what do you think about “Gee” by SNSD?



And totally unrelated, but also would love to know your opinion about this couple of tracks…

[koganbot]

I quite like all three. From the sound I'd say that SNSD don't have a lot to do with The Wonder Girls other than their both being girl groups, but maybe that's a huge connection. In 1999 I wouldn't have thought of much similarity between, say, *NSync and Destiny's Child but by 2000 the *NSync audience had embraced Destiny's Child and *NSync were staying in business by crossing back to r&b with stuff like "Gone." "Gee" makes me think of Hi-NRG Stock-Aitken-Waterman perhaps as reimagined by various Swedes aiming at the North American market, but that's just a first impression that obviously has nothing to do with the group in its own context (or maybe it does).

As for Jerkin', I know nothing about it that I didn't find by Googling in the last ten minutes; my first impulse from the sound alone was to think maybe it's L.A.'s answer to Juke, but that's probably as ignorant as my other comments. And from the looks of the vids it looks like there's a hip-hop skater crossover in, like, the visual symbolism. Yeah, and maybe some hyphy in there as well. (And maybe there's poppin' and lockin' in its distant ancestry.)

[(Anonymous)]

By no means I’m an expert in K-Pop (and maybe some of my prejudices come from listening to J-Pop, but not all of them), but seems like this groups are like omnipresent in the media so the public kind of make factions, still not sure about this, but the mechanics that one appreciates in forums and blogs is that people are very obsessive and gossipy (usually to such a high degree that pisses you off) about the groups they love (also boy bands, but usually I don’t listen to them so I can’t talk about that) and kind of work as haters for the rest (or at least of the ones that can work as competence). About the music I think is great when is great and usually (at least in my case) is when it works in a “superficial” mode, this naïve (but very charming) vision of relationships that also works in the consumerist mode of love/hate reactions, and not so much when they are set in a “sentimental” mood. But also, I think, I see what you said about the groups searching for spaces to express themselves in the musical styles available at the moment, with SNSD working inside a pop/rock framework (their song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH4KV8zrL_8) for an anti-suicide campaign is also good) and Wonder Girls working in pop/R&B one (also a new group with just one single 2NE1 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qu5Ld_KnMWA) seems to go in a more aggressive style of R&B, but all of them still functioning in the same frequency, but maybe is just a thing with the niches that pursues the agencies behind every group). Anyway, if one should believe what one reads (http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/31881198.html) in the net, what the Wonder Girls have made is nothing short of impressive, but I’m not so sure about if is going to be productive or counterproductive for their interests.

(I also don’t know much about jerkin but liked both songs).

[koganbot]

From Wiki:

Controversy

During the Dream Concert held on June 7, 2008 in South Korea, a silent protest was held against Girls' Generation by various other fan groups, notably E.L.F, Cassiopeia, and Triple S.

["Girls' Generation" is, I guess, the best English translation of their name, but the group are known as SNSD internationally, SNSD being the initials of their Korean name: So Nyeo Shi Dae/So Nyuh Shi Dae. This according to Wiki, anyway.]

Do you know if there's a demographic or social difference between the audience for Wonder Girls and the audience for SNSD? In my previous comment, where I was comparing Destiny's Child and *NSync, the former in 1999 were getting played on the "rhythmic" ("hip-hop and r&b") stations and the "urban" stations with some Top 40 play while the latter were mainly Top 40 with (mainly white) teenybopper girls as their primary audience though would cross a bit to "rhythmic" (and they had r&b sources too, I'd say Bell Biv Devoe and Boyz II Men being more crucial models than New Kids were). Despite Destiny's Child still being teens themselves, they were getting more the general young men and women market, including teens and maybe some tweens but not preponderantly so - leaning black but of course plenty of whites, Hispanics, etc. also listened to hip-hop and r&b, and TLC had crossed huge to teenpop already, which DC did in the following year. I have no idea how the Korean market divides itself. I'd expect there to be some class and gender divisions among the audiences for pop and rock and hip-hop/r&b, though I have no idea how those divisions would compare to North American.

[(Anonymous)]

Not really sure about the demographics and much less about the class divisions. Here is an article (http://snsdkorean.wordpress.com/2008/06/09/two-articles-regarding-dream-concert) in a fansite with a couple of news about a concert where 14 people get injuried running to the front line or fighting with other fan clubs for the seats. There are also videos of the “boycott” on YouTube (1 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLxu37c1Tmk), 2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1gPDd26aPk)). So probably, in this case, females between 12-16. But I suppose this is a kind of behaviour that is accepted by society and that loses its meaning when you grow. But probably the public is more a mixed bag, with the girls acting on TV series, having radio shows, appearing on ads or getting spreads on fashion magazines, so there should be more mix between boys and girls on their teens, kids that love the looks, young people that still have care or like the fashion style or with whom they are dating, mothers and fathers, and probably being cute as a pop star works in the same way as in Japan, as a safe form of being different without getting in trouble with the community (and also the “adult” pop I remember hearing on TV channels via satellite were so heartfelt, dull and boring that this groups seems kinda “edgy” (also I don’t remember seeing nothing that I will call disturbing but maybe that depends in the available offer)). But probably the same audience for both groups.

Gender wars?

[koganbot]

The dispute began when DBSK's fanclub Casseopia, SS501's fanclub Triple S and SuJu's fanclub ELF (CaTriEl) demonstrated a 10 minutes of silence during the performance of SNSD as a retaliation against the mostly male based SNSD fanclub.

It was also found that a male-based fanclub of Wonder Girls (Wonderful) indirectly supported the demonstration which lead to a battle between the fanclub cultures. Also, using the variation of "otaku", SNSD fans are being referred as "SoTaku" and Wonder Girls fans as "WonTaku" by its rival fanclubs.

Re: Gender wars?

[(Anonymous)]

As I said, not very sure about the demographics…
: )

Re: Gender wars?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

K-pop has the most insane and deeply frightening fanclub culture ever, and I say this as someone with a full-blown otaku background. It's as much crazy hate of "rivals" as crazy love of the idols in question, said rivalries seem as random in provenance (from an outside perspective at least) as hip-hop beefs, and are sometimes as damaging - people have poisoned the water bottles of and thrown acid at pop stars they dislike.

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

Confession: I had to look up "otaku" on Wiki. (I also have little knowledge of anime, though my local library has a surprisingly large collection. Was your "otaku" anime related? Music related?)(Of course, "fan" is derived from "fanatic.")

Do you know if there's a class component or an ethnic component to the Korean fanclubs? Would the Korean equivalent of a preppy girl join one (if the social map in Korea even contains equivalents to "preps" and "skaters" and the like)? (Actually, I don't even know the current high-school terminology in North America.)

Re: Gender wars?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

(wrote a response earlier but browser died)

Anime/manga fandom, which has a musical component Western counterparts (Marvel comics, Star Trek etc.) don't have - soundtracks, "in character" albums by voice actresses, J-pop/J-rock tie-ins. Fair amount of overlap with Asian pop fandom in general. IME kids heavily into the scene listen to little else.

Korea's pretty homogeneous ethnically. There's class consciousness but I don't know how it plays out w/r/t youth culture, other than the assumption that "good kids" ought to be studying or playing classical violin or whatever. It's also a highly wired society. A lot of K-popstars are diaspora, so Korean forays into hip-hop/R&B have been (from a North American taste perspective) more convincing for longer than similar efforts by Japan/Taiwan/China; there was a lag of maybe five years where Korean bboys could rap, Japanese couldn't, and it hadn't even occurred to Chinese to try.

I don't know much about NAmerican hip-hop culture either. XD; I think most K-pop feuds don't (intentionally, anyway) start at the artist level - they start at the fan level, or given the wacko incestuousness of the Asian music industry, at the label level.

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

My Drunken Tiger review was an exercise in how to review Korean diaspora hip-hop when one doesn't know anything about Korean diaspora hip-hop.

Re: Gender wars?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I have just learnt from Wiki that main dude from Drunken Tiger is married to T and writes songs for her! Feels like it should've been obvious. XD;



(Since I don't speak a word of Korean we're pretty much on the same footing methinks.)

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

Re-linking my Drunken Tiger review (the Village Voice annoyingly changed their URLs at some point, destroying all my links to it).

Re: Gender wars?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Caveat that I haven't followed K-pop for a while; my best period is circa Shinhwa, Baby V.O.X. (one of my favorite girlbands of all time despite them not being able to sing), Lee Jung Hyun, and of course BoA.

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

Aw, I'm not going to be able to listen to these for a week. I have to get up at 4 AM and head for the airport. But many thanks for posting them.

Re: Gender wars?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

No prob - is "have fun where you're going" appropriate? XD

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

Yes. Connecticut, my father's 90th birthday, will see my parents and my brother and sister-in-law and my two nephews and assorted friends and relations.

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

Here are links for three of the four petronia embeds:

Shinhwa "Wild Eyes"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Sx05Lf1p9Y

Lee Jung Hyun "Michyeo"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHSdRbY9_mA

BoA "Amazing Kiss"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUDWn7HCMkQ

Re: Gender wars?

[koganbot]

Also I don't know a whole lot about North American hip-hop culture(s). Did hip-hop beefs make it down to the fan level? That is, Biggie and 2Pac had their feud, but did fans of Biggie and 2Pac also feud? I can imagine (or not even imagine, one can read it) fans of "conscious rap" hating on fans of snap, but I don't hear about fans of, say, Flo Rida hating on fans of Soulja Boy Tell 'Em (though perhaps they do). And also I have no idea if gang conflicts filter through to rappers, though this may well be the case. The only thing I know about it is Snoop Dogg spelling out C.R.I.P. in the "P.I.M.P." remix.

[koganbot]

Here's a working link for "HaHaHa," the SNSD song for the Samsung antisuicide campaign; though I can't imagine how the lyrics could possibly do any good. Steven Tyler once said telling a junkie to just say no is like telling a manic-depressive to cheer up. Well, assuming this song really is aimed at the suicidal, its lyrics are telling the suicidally depressed to cheer up, to laugh it off.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UEZRkSyLbg

[koganbot]

Here are links for the three embeds by anhh (Anonymous):

Girls' Generation "Gee"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7mPqycQ0tQ

The Bangz "Boys With Tattoos (We Jerkin)"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkFW2ZJoIx4

New Boyz "You're A Jerk"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv9VKKXwVxU

[petronia.livejournal.com]

NB toilet paper dude in the vid is a famous K-pop singer turned songwriter-producer for other acts.