Miss A’s debut

I am LOVING this debut. When I first heard the song, it was alright but I didn’t really dig it, but now I find myself humming to it and I think it’s actually a good song to show off the girls’ vocals. I’m impressed that everyone’s fairly well-rounded, and I love Jia and Fei’s voices. Suzy’s singing and dancing is a little weak — it’s easier to notice that her pops aren’t as strong or that she gets out of breath a lot easier when she’s in a sea of good apples. And Min…well, Min’s debut is long overdue.

Super Junior’s “No Other”

God, what is this embarrassing crap. SuJu’s 4th album in general is lackluster and can’t really compare to their third. “No Other” isn’t bad — I actually quite like the happy pop sound going on — but I refuse to watch anymore live performances of this song. The upside of the slower tempo is that everyone sings their lines perfectly, but the downside is that everything else about this song is crap. I hate cutesy dancing and I pretty much hate cutesy SuJu. They do not tickle my fancy at all. Oh, and massive fail as a repackage album song because this is NOT the “Norago” caliber I was hoping for.

Ah well, you win some, you lose some. Here’s to hoping there will even be a fifth album and that it’ll happen soon before the group disbands / more members sue / everyone goes to the army.

Someone on formspring asked me:

what are a few of your most fav songs?

This list got a little longer than I thought it’d be…

★ Imogen Heap – Just for Now (acapella version)
I love this song so much that when I went to watch Imogen perform a couple of weeks ago, when she started singing this song, I teared. Oh, and, Imogen is AMAZING live.

★ The Postal Service – Such Great Heights

★ Kyuhyun – Smile

★ SHINee – 누난 너무 예뻐 (Replay)
Easily the best Kpop debut song ever. Don’t hate. I know all the lyrics to this one -_- No, but seriously, “Hug”? Terrible. “Twins”? Ear bleed. “Oh Yeah”? Oh no. I’ll be honest, I find SHINee still kind of lifeless and boring outside of performing, but you know what, they are easily the best group live out of all their peers and that’s what they debuted to do anyway.

★ Khalil Fong – Love Song

★ Cinderella’s Sister OST – Minor Waltz

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★ Ibadi – 오후가 흐르는 숲

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These Bonamana performances have been a mess, vocally, without Kyuhyun.

There is a vocal anchor and a dance anchor for every idol group and in SuJu, Kyuhyun is the vocal anchor. His voice is omnipresent in Bonamana. Listen to a MR removed version of their performance, and you’ll know what I mean. He’s in EVERY part of the song. When he’s not singing, the song feels thinner and less full.

This is like when all of SHINee essentially took turns getting swine flu. When Jonghyun was out, I was in fear for all of the RDD performances. You could hear the difference. When Taemin was out, you could see the difference. I’m sure if Eunhyuk were ever sick to the point where he had to skip out on performances, you’d see it too.

So the point is, when Kyuhyun is absent, it is very noticeable, even besides the fact that someone has to cover his solo lines. The performances from the last 5-6 music shows have been terrible. I don’t know why SuJu fans refuse to acknowledge this. I’m not saying this as a fan of Kyuhyun, but everyone has been off steadily throughout, and not only when they’re covering Kyuhyun’s parts.

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Super Junior’s “Bonamana”

When I said that Bonamana’s choreography is “high energy,” I grossly underestimated.

This wasn’t a bad performance, but a lot of members were really out of breath and you could hear it through the mics. At first, I was thinking it’s better idea to use head mics, but those suckers would’ve caught everything and it’s better in retrospect that they didn’t use those.

And I’m wildly impressed by Ryeowook. That guy’s lungs aren’t human. He is solid throughout the entire performance and he always has been for all Suju perfs I’ve ever watched. I have a soft spot for Ryeowook because he’s just so dependable live, despite someone thinking that it was a good idea to give him swishy, waterfall hair that he had to flip out of his face every .5 seconds.

I don’t need to say a lot for Kyuhyun¹, but OMG Kyuhyun. It really just tickles my pickle (yep, I just said that) when I find a performer who can sing well and dance well. Junsu of DBSK was my Kpop jjang because he is master at doing both at the same time, but there is still something about Junsu’s voice that I haven’t grown to love 100% even after three years.

Kyuhyun’s, on the other hand, I could listen to for the rest of my life. I generally find that those in SM who are really good singers in each particular group are not natural movers² — Jaejoong (omg worst dancer ever), Ryewook (well, he tries), Onew (FAIL), Yehsung (please), Tiffany (so bad). And even though I never thought of Kyuhyun as a great dancer, he’s become one, which is really a pleasant surprise and makes me love him even more if that’s at all possible.³

¹ I am a fucking liar.
² Exceptions to this are Jonghyun of SHINee and Luna of f(x).
³ SuJu, please don’t break up before I get to watch Kyuhyun sing live.

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Yes, this is the defining Bonamana screencapture.

I’m going to say straight off the bat that,

1. This song is uninspired.

2. This video is amazingly lazy, even by SM standards.

3. The lyrics are elementary.

4. Yoo Young-jin needs to take a HUGE vacation and step away from SM studios for a while. Come back with a few new beats, and then we’ll talk. In fact, he and Teddy should vacation together.

BUT. The song’s choreography makes up for everything.

I was really, really, realllllly unimpressed by the video — I downright disliked it — but I also know that Super Junior tends to spend a lot of time on crafting choreography for their songs. They have the advantage and disadvantage of having 13 10 members. On the one hand, it still looks like a circus when they perform on stage. On the other hand, they get to incorporate cool stuff into their dances because they can break the 10 membered group into mini-groups during the dances.

This is one of the most high-energy dances I’ve seen in Kpop. I get such a rush of adrenaline after watching them dance to this song. A lot of the moves are “??????” and look wild and flail-y but I DIG. I dig everything. I dig the Egyptian walks, the backward-bent kicks, the LAME harem pants. It’s really 70s feeling for some reason, total disco stuff. There are even moves in there that look like moves you would make if you were completely socially inept and completely body/tone deaf and you wanted to fake like you could dance. But it’s all cool.

You know what else I dig?

I DIG KYUHYUN.

He’s sliding across floors, crotch thrusting, participating in dance breaks. WHAT IS GOING ON.