My Pazz & Jop Ballot, 2011
COMMENTS:
How to get Maura Johnston interested in K-pop if she isn't already: Freestyle! The ’80s dance music, that is. In Korea freestyle's not nostalgia or a separate genre but a living part of the musical language, a go-to set of tropes that can be applied all over. Don't know how many people in Korea say to themselves, when they hear a K-pop track that's freestylish, "This is freestyle," since K-pop was just getting going in the early ’90s when freestyle was winding down. But there's the same combination of the mournful and the upbeat, with extended riff piling upon extended riff. Some recent examples: Kara's bright and light (but fierce) "Jumping," 4minute's Cover Girl-like "Hot Issue," and, from the bleeding-mascara precinct, Leader'S's "Hope" (group called "Leader'S" with an apostrophe and a capital S) - all three by different songwriters and producers.
Rapper SOOLj is freestyle in both senses of the word: improvises raps (he and Huckleberry P go at it on SOOLj's mic swagger site) and also wallows in riffs that could have come out of Miami, NYC, Jersey, and Philly in the ’80s (no vid for the example I'm looking for, but here's one that's sort of got it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykUKoEyG16g).
Other stuff:
Britney in 2007 was splashing the waves merrily and thrashing around desperately, to do one being to do both. In 2011 the sea's a lot quieter, but Britney's still in there with her childlike or infantile "Oops!" voice, never quite socialized. Pursuit of pleasure sounds like pursuit of sorrow and vice versa. Workaday dance pop, all good. "Hold It Against Me," that baby voice… Does she imagine this is seductive? Funny? (My mom, b. 1923, insists the joke - in the Bellamy version: "If I said you had a beautiful body would you hold it against me?" - was old when she was a little girl. Probably pre-dates WWI, possibly the War Of Jenkin's Ear.) An insistent reach for anything, however low, and meanwhile a massive pang of beauty.
All meanings at once.
"Criminal" is supposedly meant to reassure a mom, daughter Britney saying to her that though the boyfriend’s a criminal, I'll be all right. Yet the words flatly accept his viciousness. And her singing voice won't acknowledge any of this anyway; seems not to know what words it's singing. Instead, her sound is the fear and sadness of the helpless mom, or it's the sorrow of Britney reaching out to the mom, and Mom proves immune to reassurance.
IU, "The Story Only I Didn't Know." I don't have a good explanation for why a particular ballad hits me, since most go in one ear and out the other, leaving only torpor to mark their passage. Here, IU creates a space of intense agony, the music standing stark still. Her small voice sounds almost matter-of-fact. Like adding up deadly accounts. (So, torpor bad but stillness good?) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAQ0d3LAtZ0 [click CC if you're not seeing English captions])
Galaxy Dream ft. Turbotronic, "Ready 4 Romance." Take any room, from shack to bar to ballroom, dim the lights, add breaths and echo effects, and voila! A dark, erotic, cavernous space. The cavemen figured this out early, using shadows and torches.
HyunA, the Bubble Pop! EP: on reality TV HyunA plays herself as a goofball and brat (search YouTube for "HyunA screams at chicken"), yet this does nothing to undo her sexual aura. On live performances of "Just Follow" she moves slow, her face expressionless, the expressionlessness expressing force and haughtiness, and an inner stillness - the stillness totally sexualized. I wonder what she thinks of it. Does the force field of sexiness that emanates from her have anything to do with her, or is it just a thing that she ("she") can use? Is it just her gorgeous, slightly blank face and her way of barely moving, restraint in her gestures, onto which we project the force field? She and Zico had performed "Just Follow" seven consecutive times [EDIT: over ten days, that is]; at the end of the eighth they deliberately break character and smile, "See, we're normal warm people after all"; and HyunA winks. But this is a controlled warmth, "See, I've been here all along," her revealing herself in her own time, doling out the warmth but only when she wants to. So besides warmth what's revealed is mastery, the ability to control the revelation, the smile demonstrating more control since it says "I can turn my roles on and off." The fear and hysteria she puts on when she wants to go girlie-girlie is a role too - even if the various roles all happen to be the truth. [EDIT: This P&J para, written Dec. 22, 2011 or thereabouts, was my first attempt to get at the awe-and-aura-not-requiring-distance point I next made a week later on my lj and a few days after that on Tumblr.]
For reference, these were my votes, plus a few more links.
SINGLES:
1. Britney Spears "Hold It Against Me" (Jive)
2. 2NE1 "I Am The Best" (YG Entertainment) here it is live in Singapore, fancam, CL possibly the most effervescent being in human history
3. Fat Cat "My Love Bad Boy" (Yoori Entertainment) live on M! Countdown, ticking her tush like a clock.
4. GD&TOP "High High" (YG Entertainment)
5. Jeremih "Down On Me" (Def Jam)
6. IU "The Story Only I Didn't Know" (LOEN Entertainment)
7. Bobby Brackins ft. Dev "A1" (Universal Republic)
8. Galaxy Dream ft. Turbotronic "Ready 4 Romance" (Planeta Mix)
9. Big Bang "Tonight" (YG Entertainment) live on SBS Inkigayo
10. Dia Frampton "Heartless" live on The Voice [webrip]
ALBUMS:
1. SNSD Girls' Generation (1st Japan Album) (Nayutawave/Universal Music Japan) 15 points
2. Britney Spears Femme Fatale (Jive) 14 points
3. Dev The Night The Sun Came Up (Universal Republic/Island) 13 points
4. Miranda Lambert Four The Record (RCA Nashville) 12 points
5. LPG The Special (Windmill Media) 10 points
6. Rainbow SO 女 [EP] (DSP Media) 9 points
7. SOOLj Electro SOOLj [EP] (CNH) 9 points
8. Various Artists Mr.Collipark Presents Can I Have The Club Back Please (colliparkmusic.com) 8 points
9. T-ara Temptastic [EP] (Core Contents Media) 5 points
10. HyunA Bubble Pop! [EP] (Cube Entertainment) 5 points
Nomenclature and such, i.e., the silly part of this ballot:
--Why I call SNSD "SNSD" rather than "Girls' Generation": More people online seem to call them "SNSD."
--Why I call SNSD's first Japanese album "Girls' Generation (1st Japan Album)" rather than just "Girls' Generation," which is what it's called in Japan: Their first Korean album, back in 2007, was also called "Girls' Generation," and it has no songs in common with this one. And the SM Entertainment YouTube site calls this "The 1st Japan Album."
--So, by voting for the 1st Japan album am I indicating that the Japanese-language versions of "Genie," "Gee," "Run Devil Run," and "Hoot" are as good as the Korean-language versions? Really?: No, actually they're not, but they're still good, and this is the only place you get all four of them on the same album. And the filler is far better than the filler that's normally on their albums, even if it's more Europop than K-pop. And this album's way better than The Boys.
--Why I just called a song "Genie" rather than its real title, "Tell Me Your Wish": Because most people seem to call it "Genie."
--Here's the link to the segment of Invincible Youth where Sunny demonstrates tractor etiquette, and Shinyoung says that you have to drive farm machinery with a bright heart: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PBRa8TxXh8
--Why I call Fat Cat's "내사랑 싸가지" "My Love Bad Boy" rather than "My Love Bitch," which is what we called it on the Singles Jukebox: The first translation I saw said "My Love Bitch," and that's what I went with, mainly so that I could quote the YouTube commenter who said, very sensibly, "i prefer the name of the star be 'love bitch' and the song be 'fat cat' (she is not fat AT ALL)." But "My Love Bad Boy" gets far more Google hits, and it seems to be correct - though I surmise that "Bad Boy" has bitchier, or at least more disreputable, connotations in Korean than in English. I'm sorry for any inconvenience this has caused. The wusses at allkpop.com call the song "Indifferent Love," for what it's worth. No one else does.
--Why I go with the spelling "HyunA" rather than "Hyuna" or "Hyun-a" or "Hyunah" or "Hyun-ah" or "Hyeon-a" or…: Romanization of Korean is in chaos, as the South Korean government wants a transfer to Revised Romanization, but everyone seems to be ignoring this, except on official documents. Anyway, her Facebook page says "HyunA," and it's my policy to go with what the artist wants.
--Why I make "Big Bang" two words, even though Big Bang's YouTube site spells it "BIGBANG": [Throws up hands.] Most people make it two words.
--Why I don't capitalize the "m" in "4minute": The 4minuteofficial YouTube site keeps the "m" lower case. (I'm disregarding the spelling of "4MinuteVEVO" or that it's "4Minute" on the Cube Entertainment site and as the title of the 4Minute Facebook page. Right under the Facebook title we see, "Community Page about 4minute" and on the 4Minute Facebook basic information page it says "About: 4minute." But it also says "Hyun-Ah." "Hobbies: Cooking, Watching a movie.") Anyway, this is the habit I've gotten into. I also tend to go with "K-pop" rather than "K-Pop," don't ask me why.
- Frank Kogan
How to get Maura Johnston interested in K-pop if she isn't already: Freestyle! The ’80s dance music, that is. In Korea freestyle's not nostalgia or a separate genre but a living part of the musical language, a go-to set of tropes that can be applied all over. Don't know how many people in Korea say to themselves, when they hear a K-pop track that's freestylish, "This is freestyle," since K-pop was just getting going in the early ’90s when freestyle was winding down. But there's the same combination of the mournful and the upbeat, with extended riff piling upon extended riff. Some recent examples: Kara's bright and light (but fierce) "Jumping," 4minute's Cover Girl-like "Hot Issue," and, from the bleeding-mascara precinct, Leader'S's "Hope" (group called "Leader'S" with an apostrophe and a capital S) - all three by different songwriters and producers.
Rapper SOOLj is freestyle in both senses of the word: improvises raps (he and Huckleberry P go at it on SOOLj's mic swagger site) and also wallows in riffs that could have come out of Miami, NYC, Jersey, and Philly in the ’80s (no vid for the example I'm looking for, but here's one that's sort of got it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykUKoEyG16g).
Other stuff:
Britney in 2007 was splashing the waves merrily and thrashing around desperately, to do one being to do both. In 2011 the sea's a lot quieter, but Britney's still in there with her childlike or infantile "Oops!" voice, never quite socialized. Pursuit of pleasure sounds like pursuit of sorrow and vice versa. Workaday dance pop, all good. "Hold It Against Me," that baby voice… Does she imagine this is seductive? Funny? (My mom, b. 1923, insists the joke - in the Bellamy version: "If I said you had a beautiful body would you hold it against me?" - was old when she was a little girl. Probably pre-dates WWI, possibly the War Of Jenkin's Ear.) An insistent reach for anything, however low, and meanwhile a massive pang of beauty.
All meanings at once.
"Criminal" is supposedly meant to reassure a mom, daughter Britney saying to her that though the boyfriend’s a criminal, I'll be all right. Yet the words flatly accept his viciousness. And her singing voice won't acknowledge any of this anyway; seems not to know what words it's singing. Instead, her sound is the fear and sadness of the helpless mom, or it's the sorrow of Britney reaching out to the mom, and Mom proves immune to reassurance.
IU, "The Story Only I Didn't Know." I don't have a good explanation for why a particular ballad hits me, since most go in one ear and out the other, leaving only torpor to mark their passage. Here, IU creates a space of intense agony, the music standing stark still. Her small voice sounds almost matter-of-fact. Like adding up deadly accounts. (So, torpor bad but stillness good?) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAQ0d3LAtZ0 [click CC if you're not seeing English captions])
Galaxy Dream ft. Turbotronic, "Ready 4 Romance." Take any room, from shack to bar to ballroom, dim the lights, add breaths and echo effects, and voila! A dark, erotic, cavernous space. The cavemen figured this out early, using shadows and torches.
HyunA, the Bubble Pop! EP: on reality TV HyunA plays herself as a goofball and brat (search YouTube for "HyunA screams at chicken"), yet this does nothing to undo her sexual aura. On live performances of "Just Follow" she moves slow, her face expressionless, the expressionlessness expressing force and haughtiness, and an inner stillness - the stillness totally sexualized. I wonder what she thinks of it. Does the force field of sexiness that emanates from her have anything to do with her, or is it just a thing that she ("she") can use? Is it just her gorgeous, slightly blank face and her way of barely moving, restraint in her gestures, onto which we project the force field? She and Zico had performed "Just Follow" seven consecutive times [EDIT: over ten days, that is]; at the end of the eighth they deliberately break character and smile, "See, we're normal warm people after all"; and HyunA winks. But this is a controlled warmth, "See, I've been here all along," her revealing herself in her own time, doling out the warmth but only when she wants to. So besides warmth what's revealed is mastery, the ability to control the revelation, the smile demonstrating more control since it says "I can turn my roles on and off." The fear and hysteria she puts on when she wants to go girlie-girlie is a role too - even if the various roles all happen to be the truth. [EDIT: This P&J para, written Dec. 22, 2011 or thereabouts, was my first attempt to get at the awe-and-aura-not-requiring-distance point I next made a week later on my lj and a few days after that on Tumblr.]
For reference, these were my votes, plus a few more links.
SINGLES:
1. Britney Spears "Hold It Against Me" (Jive)
2. 2NE1 "I Am The Best" (YG Entertainment) here it is live in Singapore, fancam, CL possibly the most effervescent being in human history
3. Fat Cat "My Love Bad Boy" (Yoori Entertainment) live on M! Countdown, ticking her tush like a clock.
4. GD&TOP "High High" (YG Entertainment)
5. Jeremih "Down On Me" (Def Jam)
6. IU "The Story Only I Didn't Know" (LOEN Entertainment)
7. Bobby Brackins ft. Dev "A1" (Universal Republic)
8. Galaxy Dream ft. Turbotronic "Ready 4 Romance" (Planeta Mix)
9. Big Bang "Tonight" (YG Entertainment) live on SBS Inkigayo
10. Dia Frampton "Heartless" live on The Voice [webrip]
ALBUMS:
1. SNSD Girls' Generation (1st Japan Album) (Nayutawave/Universal Music Japan) 15 points
2. Britney Spears Femme Fatale (Jive) 14 points
3. Dev The Night The Sun Came Up (Universal Republic/Island) 13 points
4. Miranda Lambert Four The Record (RCA Nashville) 12 points
5. LPG The Special (Windmill Media) 10 points
6. Rainbow SO 女 [EP] (DSP Media) 9 points
7. SOOLj Electro SOOLj [EP] (CNH) 9 points
8. Various Artists Mr.Collipark Presents Can I Have The Club Back Please (colliparkmusic.com) 8 points
9. T-ara Temptastic [EP] (Core Contents Media) 5 points
10. HyunA Bubble Pop! [EP] (Cube Entertainment) 5 points
Nomenclature and such, i.e., the silly part of this ballot:
--Why I call SNSD "SNSD" rather than "Girls' Generation": More people online seem to call them "SNSD."
--Why I call SNSD's first Japanese album "Girls' Generation (1st Japan Album)" rather than just "Girls' Generation," which is what it's called in Japan: Their first Korean album, back in 2007, was also called "Girls' Generation," and it has no songs in common with this one. And the SM Entertainment YouTube site calls this "The 1st Japan Album."
--So, by voting for the 1st Japan album am I indicating that the Japanese-language versions of "Genie," "Gee," "Run Devil Run," and "Hoot" are as good as the Korean-language versions? Really?: No, actually they're not, but they're still good, and this is the only place you get all four of them on the same album. And the filler is far better than the filler that's normally on their albums, even if it's more Europop than K-pop. And this album's way better than The Boys.
--Why I just called a song "Genie" rather than its real title, "Tell Me Your Wish": Because most people seem to call it "Genie."
--Here's the link to the segment of Invincible Youth where Sunny demonstrates tractor etiquette, and Shinyoung says that you have to drive farm machinery with a bright heart: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PBRa8TxXh8
--Why I call Fat Cat's "내사랑 싸가지" "My Love Bad Boy" rather than "My Love Bitch," which is what we called it on the Singles Jukebox: The first translation I saw said "My Love Bitch," and that's what I went with, mainly so that I could quote the YouTube commenter who said, very sensibly, "i prefer the name of the star be 'love bitch' and the song be 'fat cat' (she is not fat AT ALL)." But "My Love Bad Boy" gets far more Google hits, and it seems to be correct - though I surmise that "Bad Boy" has bitchier, or at least more disreputable, connotations in Korean than in English. I'm sorry for any inconvenience this has caused. The wusses at allkpop.com call the song "Indifferent Love," for what it's worth. No one else does.
--Why I go with the spelling "HyunA" rather than "Hyuna" or "Hyun-a" or "Hyunah" or "Hyun-ah" or "Hyeon-a" or…: Romanization of Korean is in chaos, as the South Korean government wants a transfer to Revised Romanization, but everyone seems to be ignoring this, except on official documents. Anyway, her Facebook page says "HyunA," and it's my policy to go with what the artist wants.
--Why I make "Big Bang" two words, even though Big Bang's YouTube site spells it "BIGBANG": [Throws up hands.] Most people make it two words.
--Why I don't capitalize the "m" in "4minute": The 4minuteofficial YouTube site keeps the "m" lower case. (I'm disregarding the spelling of "4MinuteVEVO" or that it's "4Minute" on the Cube Entertainment site and as the title of the 4Minute Facebook page. Right under the Facebook title we see, "Community Page about 4minute" and on the 4Minute Facebook basic information page it says "About: 4minute." But it also says "Hyun-Ah." "Hobbies: Cooking, Watching a movie.") Anyway, this is the habit I've gotten into. I also tend to go with "K-pop" rather than "K-Pop," don't ask me why.
- Frank Kogan