~another future~
Hello! I’m back with a new Mash-up Corner. This time is Dirty Dream (Miryo vs. Katy Perry). This mash-up was pretty obvious since Dirty sounds like a rap version of Teenage Dream.
I made this mash-up some weeks ago but forgot to post here. I hope you like it!
By the way, I enabled the download for both Sunday Morning Girl and this mashup as well, so if you like it, you can download.
Thank you!
Hello! I know a long time has passed since the last post but I was busy! Sorry! I promised to post more often!
Well, in the end of 2010, I published a post abut some forgotten jewels a.k.a. amazing album tracks that not everyone was aware about, and here I’m once again to present some good songs that sometimes people don’t always notice.
From2010 to now I’ve been listening to a lot of new sounds, so I’ll try to be more diversified this time! Le’s go:
BENI – Signal
Signal is the b-side of the famous single “Kiss Kiss Kiss” by BENI. In this amazing track, BENI brings back the good’n'old RnB mixed with some dance. The repeated “Oh Oh Oh Oh” in the entire song sounds very interesting and it gives rhythm to the song. It’s impossible to not dance along with this song. In a nutshell, Signal could easily have been the a-side of the single.
Brown Eyed Girls – Addiction
Addiction lives up to its name! It’s quite amazing how well the song was made and the clever use of autotune just in certain parts that gave an awesome feeling! The vocals in this song are just superb and Miryo’s performance is one of her best in their entire discography. You really should check this song out! I do believe that this song could be the main title of Sound G or of a mini-album.
Tohoshinki – Back to Tomorrow
After the sort of disbandment of Tohoshinki, I was very skeptical of how good HoMin could continue with the activities under the “Tohoshinki” name. Their korean comeback wasn’t that good, and the lyrics of ” (Why?) Keep Your Head Down” were clearly about JYJ showing how much SM can be malicious. But I was surprised with their new japanese album, “TONE”. The album has really good tunes and Back To Tomorrow is a wonderful song and I love especially the “love love love” parts ’cause they made you go into the song and feel everything it expresses even if you don’t know japanese.
Crystal Kay – Deaeta Kiseki
It’s such a shame that many asian music fans don’t pay attention to Crystal Kay even though she really deserves some. I’ve to admit that I didn’t pay attention to her either but when It was announced that BoA would collaborate with her in a song for CKay’s new single I started wanting to know new things about her! That’s when I downloaded the single where Deaeta Kiseki is. The whole single is amazing and it makes you wonder why CKay isn’t that famous in the a-music world you know, because she’s really talented! Deaeta Kiseki is a sweet mid-tempo that is really pleasant to listen to. With very breezy vocals, Crystal conduces the song beautifuly and the backvocals are just gorgeous, blending well with the whole vibe.
Epik High – Pieces of You feat. Jisun from Loveholic
I’m a big fan of Epik High so It was very hard to chose a single song to include here but I think I made a good choice. Pieces of You is beyond gourgeous and a example of how good orchestrated songs can blend really well with melodious vocals and powerful rapping. Jisun steals the spotlight with the amazing chorus! The lyrics are so emotional and Jisun handles it pretty well singing in a vulnarable way that makes you fall in love immediately. Tablo and Mithra are awesome as always! The instrumental is another highlight of the song, especially the whole last part. The violins are pure love! Definitely a must listen!
I hope you guys liked the whole selection! I had a hard time choosing this songs but I hope I did a good job! If you have suggestions please tell me! I will be very happy to receive them! Thank you!
Here we are with the first “Taking a Deeper Look” post. I’l try to make this section something regular on the blog but I can’t promise anything! To start, I chose Rainbow’s “To Me” music video! My objetive in this kind of post is to analyse carefully music videos, so everyone can enjoy masterpieces like this one, that not everybody appreciate in a first look. So Let’s start!
The music video starts with a car entering a garage, and we feel relieved ’cause we thought the music video would feature only the girls dancing in an empty room.
After a while, we found out that there was a couple in the car, and things start to get interesting once one of the Rainbow girls is seem spying them! In this point we feel that this music video won’t be dull!
Ok, the ostentation arrived! Apparently the ostentation trend was just a caracteristic of YG but no, DSP Media wanted to “innovate” by getting a fancy car and a bunch of Iphones.
Kpop wouldn’t be Kpop if there weren’t an empty room to the girls dance isn’t? The empty room showed up along with the Monochromatic Future Award winner hook.
Sorry for the crappy cut on the SNSD girls
It’s no surprise for anybody that Girls’ Generation is one of the biggest girlgroups out there, and aiming to be even more popular their company, SM Entertainment seems to be pushing too hard to achieve the objetive. Many Kpop groups are migrating to Japan, so it was very natural that Girls’ Generation were doing the same but recently (not really recently) the girls were criticized for their poor japanese.
I found that really embarassing considering that they are promoting in Japan for over an year and the only member who has good japanese skills is Sooyoung. Last couple days, the girls were promoting in America the recent release of The Boys in USA. In the live presentation in the Late Show with David Letterman they did a very good job, singing live, something they don’t do that often anymore, but since they were just musical guests there was no interview, but in Live! with Kelly they “talked”. I said “talked” because the only one speaking was Tiffany while the others (even Jessica for my dissapointment) were with that “let’s-pretend–we-are-understading-the-conversation” face. They did a lot of that face back in the time they were promoting their japanese debut in Japan.
I just think that SM Entertainment is too eager to earn money that they’re not even worrying about simple things as teaching english to the girls if they are going to release english material. By the way, they have this problem with all their artists, treating them as products (SNSD was promoting a water purifier brand, I mean, what the hell does water purifier have to do with music?) and caring less and less about the music, which in theory is the main priority of a musical group.
Another group that is worrying me is T-ara. They said that they would go to an event through the subway if they were to win the first place on Inkigayo. They won and they did what they promised. Well, that’s ok for me, but after that, T-ara announced that they would do charity work if they win the triple crown on Inkigayo.
I found that very disrespectful to their fans and to music itself! What are they doing? They need to beg now? Isn’t their music enough to win so they need to blackmail their fans?
Even though I really like Yayaya, Roly Poly and Lovey Dovey, I’m not sure if the direction that their music is going is right and all those “promises” they are making sounds like desperation to me.
The korean musical scene is very plastic and superficial, at least apparently, but I’m really concerned with what the recording labels are transforming “Kpop” into.
Hello!
I’ve been doing mashups since a long time ago, but I don’t have time anymore to promote them and such, so I sort of gave up releasing things under my “AhtkaChan” pseudonym, but I love to do it, so I decided that sometimes I’ll post here some mashups that eventually cross my mind.
This time it’s Sunday Morning Girl (Koda Kumi vs. The Bolshoi)! The idea of this mash-up came when I heard the similarity between the beats of both songs. Since there is no official instrumental of Sunday Morning available I focused in Kumi’s adlibbing.
I hope everyone likes it!
Hello! I came here to present to you guys the 1st (and I hope not the last) Monochromatic Future Awards! Bringing the best (and worse) of 2011 of Kpop! Since many blogs out there did this kind of post I wanted to present some new… categories. Well, I hope you have fun with it as much as I had when I was choosing the winners! Let’s begin! Continue reading ‘Monochromatic Future Awards 2011: Best of Korean Music’
While I was browsing through the net I came across this interesting review about the music video of Roly Poly. A sentence that caught my attention was this one:
The best thing about Roly Poly is that it’s not pretentious at all.
I think that is a really accurate description of what Roly Poly is/was. In my opinion, Roly Poly didn’t have a depper meaning nor were tryin’ to be the next definition of what should be the next Kpop trend (even though many girlgroups are following this concept) the only message was “have fun!” and they managed to do it very well!
As said in the review cited above, the most important part in Kpop is, without a doubt, the dancing. Unfortunately, the music is seem to be the last thing that the companies care about, even the big star Rain said that the most important thing in his performances was the part where he took his shirt off (and he said it for real), but (fortunately) for everyone else in Kpop, the dancing is quite important and Roly Poly got plenty of it.
Kpop has many iconic dances like Brown Eyed Girls’ Abracadabra, Wonder Girls’ Nobody, Girls’ Generation’s Gee and (being that a coincidence or not) all these songs were smashing hits! And Roly Poly appeared as the next “big-hit-with-cool-coreography”. Other factor that contributed to the popularity of Roly Poly was the music video! The music video was very simple regarding it’s concept and it was full of clichés (something that who’ve been following Kpop for some time is used to) and I mean, they even had those “oh! oh!” that John Travolta used to do back in the day! I agree that the music video could have been better but since it’s Kpop, we should be happy that they’re not under SM Entertainment releasing creepy-360 degrees music videos.
Concluding, Roly Poly was a step ahead for the girls after Yayaya. I like Yayaya but anyone who’s not dumb can sing a song like that. I still miss the time when they used to sing I Go Crazy Because of You.
BoA – VALENTI
Release Date: January 29, 2003
Very Best: Kiseki
Best Track(s): B.I.O., Sekai no Katasumi De, WINDING ROAD feat. Dabo, Moon & Sunrise, Discovery
Worst Track: Feel the Same
BoA’s second album “VALENTI” was her highest selling album and It’s easy to know why. Her debut album “LISTEN TO MY HEART” was a very good debut album and the following had to be a solid release which is what BoA provided us. I’ve to say that Kiseki is my favorite song of all time from BoA’s whole discography. The song is quite good, BoA’s vocals are so delightful, her vocalization is pure love and the 90s vibe flows of it. But, choosing Kiseki as the Very Best track off the album was a very personal choice ’cause any of the “Best Tracks” could be the “Very Best”! B.I.O. brings the best in terms of dance music since it’s a blast of power and fierceness. Sekai no Katasumi de, along with Moon & Sunrise are two relaxing/feel-good tracks. The guitars are very soothing and the great highlight of both songs are the backvocals that were amazingly done! WINDING ROAD feat. Dabo isn’t as amazing as the other tracks, in fact, the verses are quite dull but the chorus is so powerful! I’d say it’s one of the most powerful and emotional chorus that BoA has sang until today! Discovery is my favorite song of the album after Kiseki. The instrumental part is very well done and the verses are so good! I think even though Kiseki is my favorite song by her, I listen to Discovery more often than I listen Kiseki. Feel The Same is very lacksluster and completely forgetable. She should have put the japanese version of Realize (stay with me) in the album instead of Feel The Sane.
Overall Rating: Great / Very Good / Good / Regular / crap.
Orange Caramel – Funny Hunny
Release Date: December 15, 2011
Very Best: Funny Hunny
Best Track(s): –
Worst Track: –
Funny Hunny is (apologize for that) funny, so in the end, the name of the song is self-explanatory. You know, ever since Orange Caramel made their debut I’ve never been too fond of their sound, even though I loved their first teaser of the first album, but I’m really glad that I decided to give this single a try. Funny Hunny is extremely… funny (I promise I’ll try to stop using this word) and very cute as well! The vibe os the song is just great and Lizzy’s rap is adorable and fits the song adorably! I came up with the theory that After School is better when they are separated! Jung Ah and Kahi released recently an awesome track for the OST of the drama “Light and Shadow” and now Orange Caramel presents this funky song! In love with them! ♥
Overall Rating: Great / Very Good / Good / Regular / crap.
