You know nothing, for God's sake

"Jeon Won Diary" is pretty damn catchy, but it doesn't feel at all like a T-ara song. I'm just puzzled that in sub-unit N4, where we've got three of the four T-aras who anyone really cares about (Hyomin, Jiyeon, and Eunjung, with Soyeon off in the other sub-unit*), the dance throb gets to overpower the stars' identity and to muzzle their charisma, at least sonically. Soyeon and Hyomin are the ones who've defined the T-ara high pitch most, Soyeon the reliable workhorse with Hyomin bringing the pitch even higher in a way that was simultaneously more tenuous and more emphatic, her adventure being the tension between waver and force. Meanwhile, Jiyeon was a gorgeous negative presence — clear, pale, breathy, uninflected — and Eunjung was called in whenever there was need for emotional pangs and highlights. She's been underutilized the last couple of years, and with Hwayoung gone I'd hoped Eunjung would get back to rapping. Instead guest guy Taewoon from labelmate Speed does a strong but not at all T-ara-esque rap, making me miss Hwayoung. Areum is new, young, full-voiced, and wholesome, but like the other three her distinctiveness gets flattened by the surrounding pounding dance.

None of this is necessarily a knock on the song. But when "Bo Peep Bo Peep" played in its insinuatingly provocative way at the start of the video drama version, I felt a pang for all that's missing here. Now should have been the time for T-ara to be making a T-ARA impact.

Instead, the accordion and the screeching-brake synths kinda get to be the main protagonists, with the sax as their playful shape-shifting sidekick: is stereotypically smooth and sensitive leading into the chorus, then turns all squawky and dissonant in the ga-ring-ga-ring-ga part (unless that squawker is some "ethnic" or "traditional" instrument impersonating a sax). Next to it, the accordion chugs along as if it owns the roadway.

( Moot )

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( Pratfalls )