Guess who's back? Double S Five Oh One!
My SS501 CDs came in the mail today!!
I was surprised when Mom gave me the package when I got home because I wasn't expecting it yet. (Mom was surprised, too, but that's because I neglected to tell her that I had ordered stuff online. XD; She didn't seem too mad, maybe because I had discussed the possibility of buying the new album a few weeks ago, but I had to explain that I hadn't ordered through a legitimate retailer in Asia, which would've had killer shipping costs, but through an American fan's bulk order and distribution project. Oh, and not just DESTINATION but also SS501's previous mini-album REBIRTH. ^^;) I was jumping for joy! But since we had to leave for dinner, I only got to open the package in the car. It was a very pleasant surprise to find that Mai had included a SS501 postcard and collector's card from their first Japanese album as a bonus! Then I just held the two albums in utter joy for the rest of the drive. ^_^
A few hours later, I finally opened the CDs in my room. The packaging is very unique and sooo prettyyy! I can't stop looking through it all. REBIRTH has a sturdy box (kind of like a pizza box) and includes a CD sleeve, a long but folded mini-poster, and the booklet with the lyrics and their "smokey look" jacket photos of "masculine beauty". DESTINATION has a thick paper cover with the plastic CD holder on the inside right side and the gorgeous "angel and devil" concept mini-photobook (with lyrics) on the left. Love both the "strong and sexy" S&M-inspired black photo set and the" natural and lovely" pure white set. *_*
Even though I already have the songs on my laptop, I played the CDs to make sure they worked (and just to experience the wonder of physically owning them!). The strange thing is, both CDs' album info came up in Chinese in Windows Media Player, and stranger still, DESTINATION was automatically labeled as 1st Solo Album (Taiwan edition) and had that album's cover and tracklist (in Chinese) even though the actual CD face and songs were all right. o_0 My first thought was that these were Chinese bootlegs, but the packaging is definitely the original Korean version and even has these official stamps. So I'm not sure what the heck happened. Is it just Windows Media Player obtaining the wrong album information from the Internet, or were the CDs coded wrong? @_@ Since they both work fine, I probably won't send it back or request another copy, but I will ask around and investigate this further.
Still, I am ridiculously happy right now! :D I love that I could finally, financially support SS501 as an overseas fan, and I just love owning two of my favorite albums! Yes, I'm a hardcore SS501 fangirl, but bias aside, those two mini-albums are brilliant! They're just really great pop music with beautiful and catchy melodies by a genius composer who's won multiple international awards and platinum records; fantastic mixing and production from a team of world-class music producers in Korea, America, and England; and of course SS501's wonderful vocals, smooth, strong, and full of emotion, each unique and together complete. It's rare to love every song on an album, but I love all of REBIRTH and DESTINATION. <3