MuBank and some word vomit
Click to viewI haven't been able to watch a whole live all the way through without stopping at one point, but I rather like the opening 20 seconds, mostly 'cause Hyoyeon's throwing her hips *everywhere* XD However, I hadn't noticed until MuBank this week that she was doing some kind of double body wave?? Has she always been doing this??
Also, *hair: Taeyeon's hair today made me think of Genie way too much, even during the encore (which was amusing in and of itself - note that they go in for a fun, screaming huddle at around 1:35 but then a couple seconds later, Tiffany looks at the crowd - at first, it almost seemed like it was a look that said, "Here's your SNSD9 fanservice, don't think we don't know what you want!" but after a couple more watches, I guess someone just shouted something *conspiracy theory self goes and sulks*). I don't even think it was the same shade of brown, but I think it was the styling of it that made me think of Genie. It's kind of like whenever I see pictures of short-haired Sooyoung, I think of Genie, or short-haired Jessica makes me think of Gee. (People like Yuri is hard to figure out when a picture was taken, which irks my OCD picture labeling tendencies DX) That made me think about how each song has a certain "image," which we've talked about, how SM tries to make their groups out to be trend-setters.
However, with this focus on individual images (not to mention, with the exception of the Japanese album, incohesive albums), is it really possible to measure their "growth" as singers/performers? It rather seems to me that it's simply a measure of their ability to adapt to a new image - how well and how fast they can make a new image their own, particularly as a group. Take for example A Pink. In some of their early performances of "It Girl," it was obvious that they weren't comfortable in it. Compare this to SNSD performing "Ooh La La" or "Kissing You" - even then, they took on these themes and made it their own. (I think doing adlibs helped XD Oooh, that would be an interesting thing to look at, how adlibs can help or hurt a group. I'm thinking of T-Ara in particular, and also, why was SNSD never called out like that, at least not in such a big way? And if they were, did SM just squelch it and/or media not catch the buzz?)
Though the success of an idol is based on their ability to adapt to different images, there has to be a limit to what images they can undertake after a certain point - or is it more that there are certain images that shouldn't be promoted together because they end up undermining each image's credibility? (i.e. Genie and Etude) Or does going to those extremes actually *help* that credibility in a, "Hey, we can still do cutesy stuff! Keep giving us CFs!" This of course links to the Madonna-whore discussion but that was concerned more with the duality of the images. But hm, can we say that there are only two images that are possible? That seems to be the point of view SM is pushing, no?
*I never thought I would actually prefer someone as a blonde, but I think Sunny looked better in the blonde wig. This brunette wig is also cut weird.
[ETA] Apparently SSF posted up this editorial discussing how SNSD can take over the world promote world peace. Discuss xP