Flogged Beast Beats Best (Top Singles, First Quarter 2012)
A peculiar thing happened over the last eight months, while 2NE1 was being my official favorite band in the world, which is that T-ara became the group I actually listen to most. That's one effect of T-ara being worked like dogs: they're always doing something - songs being performed to death, new versions of songs that are three weeks old, videos, sequels to videos, and on and on. While 2NE1 are calibrating their impact, T-ara are flooding the market.
2NE1's "I Am The Best" and "Try To Follow Me" are top great songs, and nothing beats a good beat and CL in full exuberance. But T-ara have more day-in-and-day-out good songs.
I fear that T-ara are the idol act that will translate least well to America. There's no adult or even teen audience for bubblegum here. T-ara's brand of strength-in-cuteness and cuteness-in-strength - Hyomin may exemplify this best, 'cause she's not making round eyes and pouting but is really laying into it* - wouldn't even be comprehended as strength, or comprehended at all.** "Bubblegum" isn't even the right word.
From the fan chants, I'm deducing that in Korea young men and teen boys and girls are the core of T-ara's audience, and these are exactly the audiences who wouldn't touch 'em with a ten-foot pole in America. 2NE1, who in Korea seem to be mainly getting girls in their midteens, are no guarantee to hit here either, girl groups not being a dominant American thing. And 2NE1's American launch keeps not happening. But they could hit. They're aggressive in an obvious enough way to cross to American boy fans. And punks'll give 'em a chance, hip-hop'll give 'em a chance, the critics'll love 'em, and will.i.am and Teddy seem to have worked up good material.
Not that I've spent much time on this, pondering how these groups might do in America; aesthetically, they'd probably be better off ignoring the U.S. market. But America provides a thought exercise: contrasting South Korea with the United States could shed light on each of the two countries. If you scroll down my list, you'll find Asian group Blush, whose members are from five different Asian countries. My take is that in Asia they're conceived of as a Pussycat Dolls type group, that is, fashionable and sexy and aimed at young adults. In the U.S. they have two parallel lives, making a splash on Disney (but not even appearing in the video), while getting dance-chart action too, with other, worse singles; so maybe they should be a teenybopper group. But my point is that in Asia they could potentially sound like this for the pop mainstream, and in Europe they could too.
I actually can at least faintly imagine a scenario where T-ara hits here first with a ballad, gets AC and Top 40 play, and, having hit, now has an audience at least tentatively willing to listen and who might give "Lovey-Dovey" and ilk a chance. All this is hypothetical, no K-pop group ever having triumphed here.
TOP SINGLES First Quarter 2012:
1. T-ara "Lovey-Dovey"
2. Trouble Maker "Trouble Maker"
3. ChoColat "I Like It"
4. Cassie "King Of Hearts"
5. Dev "In My Trunk." Note that at 1:07 there's an actual dope in her trunk:
6. Miss A "Touch"
7. After School "Rambling Girls"
8. Sunny Hill "The Grasshopper Song"
9. Davichi & T-ara "We Were In Love"
10. Clazzi ft. Koti & Jubi & MYK "Sexy Doll"
11. The Cataracs ft. Dev "Sunrise"
12. Nicki Minaj "Stupid Hoe"
13. Rihanna ft. Chris Brown "Birthday Cake (Remix)"
14. Tyga ft. Lil Wayne "Faded"
15. 2NE1 "Scream"
16. Jess Mills "Pixelated People." What made you want to look up pixelated? Please tell us where you read or heard it (including the quote, if possible):
17. Teedra Moses ft. Wale "Another LuvR"
18. Melanie Fiona "4 AM"
19. Blush "Up Up & Away"
20. Bella Thorne "TTYLXOX." Disney introduces the old young to the art of texting:
21. Lil Chuckee "Wop"
22. B.o.B ft. André 3000 "Play The Guitar"
23. Kara "Speed Up"
24. Tyga "Rack City"
Btw, eligibility starts December 1, 2011, though if a song is still rising in 2012 I'll count it even if its release date is earlier than Dec. 1.
Three thoughts inspired by my list, hardly new ones, but they need to be elaborated on and challenged.
(1) Musical adventure isn't attaching itself to male vocalists these days.
(2) Popular music doesn't have a viable or credible adulthood.
(3) I don't pretend to understand the concepts "aegyo" and "burikko," though from what I've read (by Trevor and others), the term "cuteness" hardly does those concepts justice: "it's really like a whole world in which what is for Americans a rather trite and shallow concept ('cuteness') takes on a whole new dimension." Question here, though, is how much are aegyo and burikko, like cuteness here, intertwined with women being financially dependent on men? Of course, beauty is too.
Obviously, these "thoughts" are in regard to countries and genres I'm paying attention to. My knowledge goes from little to zilch when it comes to the sociomusical landscapes of, say, Rumania and Turkey and India, not to mention the vast stretches of American and Korean music I know nothing about. And my three generalizations (number three being a question more than a generalization, and so are one and two, really) are crude and questionable as stated. But nonetheless they deserve to be stated, and I think they're fundamentally right. Regarding the first, sure, I can easily come up with arguments against it, in fact did so just the other day; and despite the male dearth atop my list, there'd be plenty of guy vocalists if I were to extend my list to 50. Glad to say that Bieber'd be on it with "Boyfriend," his best single ever (his restraint - fellow never oversings - and Posner's recessiveness combine into an architectural spareness that's almost stunning). EXO's "History" and SHINee's "Sherlock (Clue + Note)" would at least be candidates, and I do hear adventure in those tracks. For example, by framing the "Sherlock" tune in murk, Troelsen and crew created something new that doesn't just reiterate boyband moves of the previous 35 years. And the evidence of "History" live is that the EXO bunch can sing with genuine strength. Maybe my reservation is simply that the tune doesn't grab me. As for "Sherlock," it needs harmonic delirium that the boys can't quite deliver. The thing is, I'm making no claims for any special vocal skill on display in, say, "Touch" and "Rambling Girls" and "The Grasshopper Song" and "We Were In Love" and "Sexy Doll" (tracks 6 through 10 on my best-of). I wouldn't argue that any of those singers are better than the EXO boys. What I'd argue is that the vocals don't need to be any different from what they are in order to be terrific, to be perfect for the songs. So the zeitgeist seems to be helping them along, in a way that it's not helping SHINee.
Obviously this is my list, not yours, not someone else's. But I'm calling this "Top Singles," not just "what I happen to like at the moment" or "what I'm enjoying listening to these days." I'm saying that these songs are good, not just that I like them. That my judgments aren't universal or eternal and may not even last another month (but they likely will last far longer) doesn't mean I think they're mere taste. I think I'm right often enough, and that worlds that make good music are better than worlds that don't, other things being equal ("how good the music is" not being my only criterion for judging a world).
Number two, w(h)ither adulthood? While above I'm trying to make the case that non-America is better than America in at least one respect, which is that adults can listen to bubblegum and it's not specially categorized as bubblegum, just dance. But still, K-pop is veering young just like lots of everywhere is veering young, and I can't say it's wrong to do so. Try this: think of 2NE1's Lee Chae-rin, known as CL, the baddest female Seoul City ever had, my top hero of my musical today. Imagine her twenty years on, at age 41. Is the music she's singing going to have progressed to something better, deeper, richer than it is now? And if it has, does she have an audience for it? Is it grabbing people, seeming to be vital? Is the world's adventure still hers? What precedents or models are there for her, that can bring her to 41?
I realize that the word "adventure" doesn't have a lot of explanatory power.
I've been asking such questions for decades, spinning theories...
*By "lay into it," I mean lays into the sound, which you sometimes can take as fierce rather than cute. And how much she lays into it varies from performance to performance. Most of T-ara lay into it, actually, with no one except Boram going for round eyes and goo; and the one who refuses to lay into vocals, Jiyeon, is also the one who goes nowhere near cute.
**Well, am I myself sufficiently in touch with American culture to say this? The "strength-in-cuteness" thing, which I realize I'm not being very articulate about, might have had American equivalents in screwball turns by Harlow and Lombard and Hepburn (see my Jukebox review of Fat Cat's "My Love Bad Boy"), or in Gracie Allen's total demeanor. Not complacent or compliant. But those aren't really equivalent to K-pop, since they're played as extremes, while T-ara are straight-up normal. In any event, in America, the screwball extremes are a thing of the past.
[[Music Bank K-Chart] 4th week of January & T-ara - Lovey-Dovey (2012.01.26)]
2NE1's "I Am The Best" and "Try To Follow Me" are top great songs, and nothing beats a good beat and CL in full exuberance. But T-ara have more day-in-and-day-out good songs.
I fear that T-ara are the idol act that will translate least well to America. There's no adult or even teen audience for bubblegum here. T-ara's brand of strength-in-cuteness and cuteness-in-strength - Hyomin may exemplify this best, 'cause she's not making round eyes and pouting but is really laying into it* - wouldn't even be comprehended as strength, or comprehended at all.** "Bubblegum" isn't even the right word.
From the fan chants, I'm deducing that in Korea young men and teen boys and girls are the core of T-ara's audience, and these are exactly the audiences who wouldn't touch 'em with a ten-foot pole in America. 2NE1, who in Korea seem to be mainly getting girls in their midteens, are no guarantee to hit here either, girl groups not being a dominant American thing. And 2NE1's American launch keeps not happening. But they could hit. They're aggressive in an obvious enough way to cross to American boy fans. And punks'll give 'em a chance, hip-hop'll give 'em a chance, the critics'll love 'em, and will.i.am and Teddy seem to have worked up good material.
Not that I've spent much time on this, pondering how these groups might do in America; aesthetically, they'd probably be better off ignoring the U.S. market. But America provides a thought exercise: contrasting South Korea with the United States could shed light on each of the two countries. If you scroll down my list, you'll find Asian group Blush, whose members are from five different Asian countries. My take is that in Asia they're conceived of as a Pussycat Dolls type group, that is, fashionable and sexy and aimed at young adults. In the U.S. they have two parallel lives, making a splash on Disney (but not even appearing in the video), while getting dance-chart action too, with other, worse singles; so maybe they should be a teenybopper group. But my point is that in Asia they could potentially sound like this for the pop mainstream, and in Europe they could too.
I actually can at least faintly imagine a scenario where T-ara hits here first with a ballad, gets AC and Top 40 play, and, having hit, now has an audience at least tentatively willing to listen and who might give "Lovey-Dovey" and ilk a chance. All this is hypothetical, no K-pop group ever having triumphed here.
TOP SINGLES First Quarter 2012:
1. T-ara "Lovey-Dovey"
2. Trouble Maker "Trouble Maker"
3. ChoColat "I Like It"
4. Cassie "King Of Hearts"
5. Dev "In My Trunk." Note that at 1:07 there's an actual dope in her trunk:
Click to view6. Miss A "Touch"
7. After School "Rambling Girls"
8. Sunny Hill "The Grasshopper Song"
9. Davichi & T-ara "We Were In Love"
10. Clazzi ft. Koti & Jubi & MYK "Sexy Doll"
11. The Cataracs ft. Dev "Sunrise"
12. Nicki Minaj "Stupid Hoe"
13. Rihanna ft. Chris Brown "Birthday Cake (Remix)"
14. Tyga ft. Lil Wayne "Faded"
15. 2NE1 "Scream"
16. Jess Mills "Pixelated People." What made you want to look up pixelated? Please tell us where you read or heard it (including the quote, if possible):
17. Teedra Moses ft. Wale "Another LuvR"
18. Melanie Fiona "4 AM"
19. Blush "Up Up & Away"
20. Bella Thorne "TTYLXOX." Disney introduces the old young to the art of texting:
21. Lil Chuckee "Wop"
22. B.o.B ft. André 3000 "Play The Guitar"
23. Kara "Speed Up"
24. Tyga "Rack City"
Btw, eligibility starts December 1, 2011, though if a song is still rising in 2012 I'll count it even if its release date is earlier than Dec. 1.
Three thoughts inspired by my list, hardly new ones, but they need to be elaborated on and challenged.
(1) Musical adventure isn't attaching itself to male vocalists these days.
(2) Popular music doesn't have a viable or credible adulthood.
(3) I don't pretend to understand the concepts "aegyo" and "burikko," though from what I've read (by Trevor and others), the term "cuteness" hardly does those concepts justice: "it's really like a whole world in which what is for Americans a rather trite and shallow concept ('cuteness') takes on a whole new dimension." Question here, though, is how much are aegyo and burikko, like cuteness here, intertwined with women being financially dependent on men? Of course, beauty is too.
Obviously, these "thoughts" are in regard to countries and genres I'm paying attention to. My knowledge goes from little to zilch when it comes to the sociomusical landscapes of, say, Rumania and Turkey and India, not to mention the vast stretches of American and Korean music I know nothing about. And my three generalizations (number three being a question more than a generalization, and so are one and two, really) are crude and questionable as stated. But nonetheless they deserve to be stated, and I think they're fundamentally right. Regarding the first, sure, I can easily come up with arguments against it, in fact did so just the other day; and despite the male dearth atop my list, there'd be plenty of guy vocalists if I were to extend my list to 50. Glad to say that Bieber'd be on it with "Boyfriend," his best single ever (his restraint - fellow never oversings - and Posner's recessiveness combine into an architectural spareness that's almost stunning). EXO's "History" and SHINee's "Sherlock (Clue + Note)" would at least be candidates, and I do hear adventure in those tracks. For example, by framing the "Sherlock" tune in murk, Troelsen and crew created something new that doesn't just reiterate boyband moves of the previous 35 years. And the evidence of "History" live is that the EXO bunch can sing with genuine strength. Maybe my reservation is simply that the tune doesn't grab me. As for "Sherlock," it needs harmonic delirium that the boys can't quite deliver. The thing is, I'm making no claims for any special vocal skill on display in, say, "Touch" and "Rambling Girls" and "The Grasshopper Song" and "We Were In Love" and "Sexy Doll" (tracks 6 through 10 on my best-of). I wouldn't argue that any of those singers are better than the EXO boys. What I'd argue is that the vocals don't need to be any different from what they are in order to be terrific, to be perfect for the songs. So the zeitgeist seems to be helping them along, in a way that it's not helping SHINee.
Obviously this is my list, not yours, not someone else's. But I'm calling this "Top Singles," not just "what I happen to like at the moment" or "what I'm enjoying listening to these days." I'm saying that these songs are good, not just that I like them. That my judgments aren't universal or eternal and may not even last another month (but they likely will last far longer) doesn't mean I think they're mere taste. I think I'm right often enough, and that worlds that make good music are better than worlds that don't, other things being equal ("how good the music is" not being my only criterion for judging a world).
Number two, w(h)ither adulthood? While above I'm trying to make the case that non-America is better than America in at least one respect, which is that adults can listen to bubblegum and it's not specially categorized as bubblegum, just dance. But still, K-pop is veering young just like lots of everywhere is veering young, and I can't say it's wrong to do so. Try this: think of 2NE1's Lee Chae-rin, known as CL, the baddest female Seoul City ever had, my top hero of my musical today. Imagine her twenty years on, at age 41. Is the music she's singing going to have progressed to something better, deeper, richer than it is now? And if it has, does she have an audience for it? Is it grabbing people, seeming to be vital? Is the world's adventure still hers? What precedents or models are there for her, that can bring her to 41?
I realize that the word "adventure" doesn't have a lot of explanatory power.
I've been asking such questions for decades, spinning theories...
*By "lay into it," I mean lays into the sound, which you sometimes can take as fierce rather than cute. And how much she lays into it varies from performance to performance. Most of T-ara lay into it, actually, with no one except Boram going for round eyes and goo; and the one who refuses to lay into vocals, Jiyeon, is also the one who goes nowhere near cute.
**Well, am I myself sufficiently in touch with American culture to say this? The "strength-in-cuteness" thing, which I realize I'm not being very articulate about, might have had American equivalents in screwball turns by Harlow and Lombard and Hepburn (see my Jukebox review of Fat Cat's "My Love Bad Boy"), or in Gracie Allen's total demeanor. Not complacent or compliant. But those aren't really equivalent to K-pop, since they're played as extremes, while T-ara are straight-up normal. In any event, in America, the screwball extremes are a thing of the past.
[[Music Bank K-Chart] 4th week of January & T-ara - Lovey-Dovey (2012.01.26)]