All the extra video links are supplementary videos that I enjoy. The full stage "camcorders" are room sound quality (poor), but they capture the full choreography and the audience noise, and are the closest facsimile of what it might be like to actually be there. I started linking the unofficial stage mixes by a user whose editing skills are amazing in 2016 and continue here (they also serve as a terrific review of fashions and variations girl groups go through in the course of a promotion). And then other various and sundry videos that I like.
(updated 1/15/2019)
2017 mix CD, part one (zip download):
1. Girl Front (Odd Eye Circle (LOOΠΔ)) (music video)
2. Baby Face (Cosmic Girls (WJSN)) (official audio)
3. Rookie (Red Velvet) (full stage camcorder, stage mix)
4. I Don't Like Your Girlfriend (Weki Meki) (live version, full stage camcorder, funny relay version)
5. Excuse Me (AOA) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
6. Irony (Park Bo Ram) (audio only)
7. Bippity Boppity Boo (Berry Good) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
8. Yes I Am (Mamamoo) (full stage camcorder, ad-lib compilation stage mix (captions recommended), unofficial stage mix)
9. No Thanxxx (Epic High) (lyric video) (audio only)
10. The Weatherforecastors (All Day Sunny) (Grace) (audio only)
11. Aloha (Pristin)
12. Signal (Twice) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
13. Gashina (Sunmi) (dancers gender reversed version)
14. Love Me (Lee Hyori) (audio only)
15. Jealousy (Baek Ah Yeon)
16. Night Rather Than Day (EXID) (full stage camcorder, live version)
17. Love Cherry Motion (Choerry (LOOΠΔ))
18. Some (Bolbbalgan4)
19. Listen to This Song (DIA) (official audio)
20. I Think I Love U (Sonamoo) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
21. Nalari (S.E.T) (full stage camcorder)
22. Only U (Laboum) (full stage camcorder)
23. Roopretelcham (Elris)
2017 mix CD, part two:
1. WoW! (Lovelyz) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
2. Happy (Cosmic Girls (WJSN)) (unofficial stage mix, full stage camcorder)
3. Heart Attack (Chuu (LOOΠΔ))
4. Bing Bing (AOA) (full stage camcorder)
5. Wee Woo (Pristin) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
6. Will You Go Out With Me? (DIA) (full stage camcorder, live stage, Eunchae focus cam because super cute, unofficial stage mix)
7. Red Flavor (Red Velvet) (full stage camcorder, Seulgi focus cam, unofficial stage mix)
8. Dlwlma (IU)
9. Stars (Rothy)
10. In the Rain (Kisum)
11. Pow Pow (Elris) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
12. Would You Like? (Tymee) (lyric video) (audio only)
13. Rolly (Good Day)
14. DDD (EXID) (full stage camcorder, funny parts switch version, even funnier parts switch audio over live version)
15. Last Carnival (Juniel)
16. Pastry (Nine Muses) (audio only)
17. Kiss on the Lips (Melody Day)
18. Love is Sudden (MIXX)
19. Everyday I Love You (feat. Haseul) (Vivi (LOOΠΔ))
20. Glass Shoes (fromis_9)
21. Twinkle (Lovelyz) (unofficial stage mix, full stage camcorder)
22. Hz (Hashtag) (audio only)
23. Heart Shaker (Twice) (live version, full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
24. Hwi Hwi (Laboum) (full stage camcorder, unofficial stage mix)
2016 mix CDs
Red Velvet and Twice were probably the big acts in 2017 with multiple releases and promotions. Both groups I had to resist not including three tracks, despite both deserving it. Twice because of how many pop gems they promoted. Red Velvet because their vocal prowess perhaps deserves further showcase beyond what they promoted.
There are some conventions I have for K-pop – things I try to avoid – that went out the window. Some actually already have. I take issue with intentional abuse of the English language. Granted, there's a lot of bad English in any and all foreign pop and a lot of it just has to be overlooked as the price of empire. By "intentional abuse", I mean when there's a mistake that someone along the line must have pointed out, but was steamrolled over by the powers that be. Possibly in defiance of empire or imitation of it.
Prevalent among such abuse is in regard to pronunciation. Twice's "Cheer Up" was a big hit in 2016, very catchy, but wouldn't make it onto a mix on principle because they clearly weren't saying "cheer up". It was infuriating despite being a pop gem. It was a pop gem despite being infuriating. Such conflicted feelings. To me it sounded like "chortle", but comments seemed to favor "churro", with a vocal minority preferring "shut up".
On this mix, Red Velvet's "Rookie" being mispronounced as "looky" initially disqualified it, but in the end it's just too good of a track. Member Wendy is a native English speaker and has acknowledged as much that they were mispronouncing it.
Another is terrible group names. I try to avoid getting into groups that have terrible names, but it's a minor point. Even Jimmy Page noted that names don't matter if the music stands up. He was, of course, responding to criticisms about "Led Zeppelin", and in their case, history might suggest that the strength of the music can make a band name that was initially questionable into one of the most iconic names ever. In no way am I suggesting that K-pop stands at any similar artistic stature as Led Zeppelin (perhaps ironically there's a recent song entitled "Zeppelin" where singer Anda sounds like she's mispronouncing it "jet plane").
"Berry Good" was a major face-palm. "Weki Meki" was confounding. Both and more became acceptable releasing tracks that I couldn't deny. As soon as you like a group, you forget how much you initially hated their name.
But the group I would geek out about for 2017 is LOONA. I mentioned LOONA's concept before that starting in October 2016, the agency would be introducing 12 members one-by-one before the full group debut. Three members were introduced in 2016 and all three songs made the 2016 mixes.
Through 2017 and into 2018, they expanded the one-by-one introduction concept and started mixing and matching members in songs and videos and created two pre-debut sub-units: LOONA 1/3 and Odd Eye Circle. LOONA 1/3 consisted of 4 of the first 5 members introduced, and Odd Eye Circle was made up of members six to eight. There was even international buzz as Dazed magazine did an article on Odd Eye Circle as they were showing up on Billboard's international charts.
I think it was about when Odd Eye Circle launched in the late summer that things started going crazy on the internet and the Loonaverse started to be consolidated as a thing. I'm not sure how much of it was purely fan driven or if the agency had planned it all out, or whether it was a synergy between what fans were saying and the agency sprinkling out hints and ideas partly influenced by the fans.
There is a plethora of fan videos detailing theories, symbolism and analyses of what's going on. These fans must have watched each video dozens of times at slow speed and done internet searches on everything they noticed. It's fascinating stuff and many have left me amazed. Just for example of the level of detail, here are two by the same super-fan of songs included on my mixes: Girl Front and Heart Attack.
Then on a mundane level, even the roll-out of members is its own epic and jaw-dropping story since they traveled so many places to shoot, all of it chronicled in near-daily 1 minute clips of LOONA TV on their YouTube channel. Heejin in Paris, Hyunjin in Japan, Haseul in Iceland, Yeojin in Taiwan, Vivi in Hong Kong (Vivi's from Hong Kong, the only international member), LOONA 1/3 in New Zealand, Hong Kong and Prague! Odd Eye Circle shot in Los Angeles.
To date, all 12 members have been introduced individually and one last pre-debut sub-unit consisting of the final four members is preparing something ahead of the full group debut.
*sigh* I'm really too old to be into this shit, but I'd say that's more indication that it's about future life resonance and does not reflect my former love and pride in music in this lifetime, which I can let go of anyhow in the name of mindfulness practice. Nothing whatsoever should be clung to. K-pop is still pop. It's manufactured and recyclable. It trends and fades, it comes and goes. It's nothing to cling to, as if that weren't the most obvious thing in the world.
If my fandom is more an indication pointing to a future lifetime in Korea, K-pop, or music even, has nothing to do with anything. It resonates in this life because of music, but if it comes to pass that I'm re-born in Korea, I might not be musical at all. Music may have no resonance, as indicated by my giving up music in this lifetime and recognizing it as insubstantial and ethereal. K-pop is just a mix of this life and a future life.
This music is for the kids. I shouldn't be responding to this music. Me being a fan is just really creepy. So maybe the actuality of my response is tapping into a youth side of me in a future life. It's telling me to go, go, go across, go totally across to the other shore to my next life. Gate, gate, paragate, parasamgate, bodhi svaha! Leave with no regrets, if not no remainder.
Friday Night (Sonamoo) (unofficial stage mix)
What's My Name? (T-ara)
Palette (IU)
Hallelujah (Jimin (AoA))
Darling My Sugar (DIA (L.U.B))
Likey (Twice) (unofficial stage mix)
Knock Knock (Twice) (unofficial stage mix)
I'll Be Yours (Girl's Day)
Memory Clock (Hur Young Ji (ex-Kara))
Sobok Sobok (Kim So Hee)
A Person Who Gives Happiness (Solar (Mamamoo))
Peek-a-Boo (Red Velvet) (unofficial stage mix)
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