What does not chill me makes me stronger (Z.Hera, Baek Ji Young, BoA)

[koganbot]

Z.Hera "Peacock": Dance-pop from a writer who seems to have studied études and preludes, featuring a rookie singer who puts strain in her upper register in a way that's heart-tuggingly passionate, like the best of the '80s. She's got something, as does whoever wrote and produced the song, even if it's getting nowhere on the charts.

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It would help if the visual concept were more than just "I'm young, I'm fresh, and I dance pretty well." In the video she's a caged bird who escapes her garret into a land of balloons and Swiss roofs and soap bubbles. The lyrics (English version here) are about never giving up in the face of adversity or a love object's indifference ("Nobody close, I'm feeling lonely, bitter cold/Only thought it makes me stronger"). Then she steps through her wardrobe into a tinseltown freeze, but she's feeling fire, and her energy never flags.

Live on Mcountdown, she hits both her marks and her notes:

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Can't find definitive info regarding her label, but she seems to be contracted directly to CJ E&M rather than one of their Mnet subsidiaries. I didn't know they had their own singers.

Baek Ji Young "떠올라": Baek Ji Young has been doing well recently with ballads of dripping emotion, no droplet or gusher held back, one of the few ballad singers to reach me consistently. But she has an easy touch on dance tracks, into which she inserts pangs and power, also reaching me.

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She's got a long résumé, and had to overcome vicious and detestable slut-shaming, like what was done to Paris Hilton but in a country where capitalizing on notoriety isn't really an option, at least where she was situated in the biz 13 years ago. In any event, I'm looking forward to exploring the back catalog: according to Wikip she started off with Latin-flavored dance tracks.

BoA: BoA is an astonishingly fluid dancer, my favorite in the world. In comparison, her voice often seems locked-in. But her nasal soundpack is just right for the OST ballad "Between Heaven And Hell": restraint, clear line on the melody, dignified little quavers.

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Comments

Re: Tia-ful creatures of the night emerge fleetingly into daylight

[davidfrazer.livejournal.com]

Here at last is the full MV:



I liked this comment from tbe Popjustice forum:

Melanie delivered on that middle-8 and I can't wait to hear her break another sound system live.

The B-side is called All Night Long. It's a hip-hoppish R&B-ish song with a rap break by a male rapper, and I'm going to stick my neck out and suggest that the brass riffs sound freestyle-ish. :)

Jaeyoon's voice can reputedly be heard on All Night Long, which would mean that it's sat on the shelf for a few years. It would also mean that the "where's Jaeyoon?" and "omg I heard she had cancer!" comments on YouTube videos will never, ever end.

Re: Tia-ful creatures of the night emerge fleetingly into daylight

[koganbot]

Ha. I was seconds away from telling you the same thing. I linked it over on the ILM K-pop 2013 thread, but so far no one's said anything (though some people there were obviously looking forward to it).

Contains little the teasers hadn't prepared us for.

Think I'll go give it its own post, even though as I've yet I've not much to say.

Re: Tia-ful creatures of the night emerge fleetingly into daylight

[davidfrazer.livejournal.com]

This is just wild speculation, but (if Jaeyoon is in it) I wonder if Chocolat recorded All Night Long, and perhaps more songs like it, pre-debut, but the company decided to switch to a more conventional K-Pop sound and gave them Syndrome instead. Certainly it would mean that the R&B and freestyle influences in One More Day didn't appear completely out of nowhere.

Re: Tia-ful creatures of the night emerge fleetingly into daylight

[koganbot]

I actually think "Syndrome" has freestyle touches too — the "fill me up, heal me again" refrain in particular. The only drawback to that song is that the non-Melanies and non-Jaeyoons don't yet have the presence that they'll get by the time of "I Like It" (a song that also makes me think a little of freestyle, at least Melanie's big wail does). A striking thing about "One More Day," where the melody does feel more freestylish, is that the arrangement — most notably the harpsichord-like keyboards — sounds a lot like turn of the millennium tracks by She'kspere, e.g. TLC's "No Scrubs," Destiny's Child's "Bills Bills Bills," Pink's "There You Go."