F-ve Dolls Far From Toothless

[koganbot]

By now everybody has already made all the salient points there are to make about F-ive Dolls' "Soulmate #1." But, being aware that not everybody who reads this blog reads everybody, I've determined to, as a public service, simply restate the points that everybody has already made.

(1) While the riff may not exactly be the riff from "Funky Town," it's awfully similar. (Like maybe one note different.)

(2) F-ve Dolls were until recently 5Dolls, but now there are six members and the group name was changed to "F-ve Dolls," the logic of which I'm sure I don't have to explain to you (which is a good thing, seeing as I have no idea). The lineup has changed over the years.

Watch on YouTube

I recommend that you listen to this track before reading the rest of this post.
(3) The catchy chorus to this catchy song goes:

꽉 안아줘요 꽉 안아줘요
꽉 안아줘요 갈비뼈가 으스러지도록
키스해줘요 키스해줘요
뽀뽀해줘 앞이빨이 쏙빠지도록

which the good people at pop!gasa translate as:

Hug me tight, hug me tight
Hug me tight till my rib bones break
Kiss me, kiss me
Kiss me so my teeth fall out

which seems rather extreme. When the Hangul text is merely transliterated into romanized text, one gets something like,

Kkwag anajwoyo kkwag anajwoyo kkwag anajwoyo
Galbi ppyeoga euseureoji dorog
Kiseuhae jwoyo kiseuhae jwoyo ppoppo haejwo
Api ppari ssogppaji dorog

I'll add as an aside that the phrase "Kkwag anajwoyo kkwag anajwoyo kkwag," as it reaches my English-language ears, sounds a lot like the English words "Fuck, I'm enjoy a fuck, I'm enjoy a fuck."* I'd say this was probably just me, except it's not just me, even if it turns out to be a coincidence.

(4) I was going to call this post "F-ve Dolls Seek Amy" but I chickened out.

(5) Back in the day, before splitting off as the subunit 5Dolls, they were combined with their labelmates Speed in a group called "Co-Ed School," who were once featured here at koganbot (as were labelmates T-ara) in our special series on Problematic Korean Videos. If Core Contents Media would like to change the label name to "Problematic Contents Media," they will not meet an objection from me.

(6) The song is good — is more effectively cheerful than most of the summer cheer we've been drenched with recently.

(7) This isn't a point, just a question, not related to the song: I had the impression from what label-boss Kim Kwang-soo said in an interview that he'd have let Hyoyoung out of her contract if she'd wanted to go. I didn't stick with this little side issue in the Hwayoung story. (F-ve Dolls member Hyoyoung is Hwayoung's twin sister.) Anybody have any definite information (if there is such a thing)?

*On the remix they follow this joyous sentiment with — in English — "Kiss me loverboy, kiss me loverboy."

Comments

[koganbot]

The video seems deliberately anachronistic, in that the F-ve Dolls are consistently dressed in the bright flashy flat fashions that flourished briefly in London's Swinging Mid Sixties, while the video walks the Dolls through sequences and sets from a bunch of different times: the gangster-mafia 1940s to the Keystone Cops of the '10s to the early-talkie late '20s to the Busby Berkeley–staircase '30s to the disco-dj '70s. And of course the track itself has a neo-'70s neo-disco beat — though people are making way too much of its supposed resemblance to T-ara's "Roly-Poly": yes, like "Roly-Poly" (and "Lovey-Dovey," and Nine Muses' "Figaro") "Soulmate #1" has prominent disco signifiers, but the fundamental vocal attack of "KKWAG anajwoyo KKWAG anajwoyo KKWAG" is far more aggressive than the inviting, rolling cadences of "Roly-poly roly-roly-poly nan mireo naedo nan dashi negero daga ga seo."

[christophe andersen (from livejournal.com)]

Being one of the people that doesn't read a lot of the other blogs and not very often when I do, thank you for posting!

I read your post on the bus this morning, listened to the track on YouTube, immediately downloaded from iTunes (oddly called "1st Soulmate" in iTunes with the single/ep being called "Since 1971") and then listened throughout the day. Great stuff! It is effortlessly fun and I immediately started comparing to "Roly-Poly" and "Lovey-Dovey" before even reading your comment above. The only k-pop songs this year that feels as effortless to me is a couple of the Girls Day songs, especially "Oh Great!" but this has more of a disco feel that really draws me in. I'm a total sucker for this sound.