So it’s actually a duet between her and a Canadian singer named Nikki something (I don’t really know her, sorry) but it’s still very nice. They both sing, alternating verses while IU accompanies throughout on her guitar. She looked very pretty, her hair’s growing out and her outfit was very cute. As a duet, it seemed a bit awkward since the girls didn’t have that much interaction but they both sounded very good. This Nikki girl has a soulful voice and IU’s voice is a lot softer and more delicate so they balanced each other out nicely. The only thing is that IU’s accent is a bit more obvious here as she’s singing after an English speaker but she sounded so lovely, I’d hardly call it an impediment. So without further ado, I leave you with the video – if you liked it, please go to CodeMonMon’s channel and say a word of thanks for posting!

Maki

I’m going to start with f(x) since they’re the rookies here and this is our first opportunity to see them on stage together.

Credit: SmoothyEco1st

So I watched both of their performances, the MuCore one as well as this one and I have to conclude that this is definitely the better one. I guess they relaxed a little because you could see that they enjoyed this one more and their vocals were a lot better here. As far as vocals are concerned, they’re not bad – they seem to have a good foundation and I don’t sense any actually weak singers in the group so that’s a plus. If you watched their first teaser, you probably saw the ‘Asia best pop dance group’ label or whatever at the end of it and I have to say that I can see the focus on dancing here. Their choreography may look easy but it really isn’t, by any means and all of the girls seem to be fairly adept dancers, Luna in particular. Seriously, watch that girl (the one in all black in case you didn’t know) while she’s dancing and you’ll see the concentration and determination on her face – she is a serious dancer, I can see that already.

Yeah, so their dancing is pretty good – I love their choreo for ‘Lachata‘, I really do – it’s just so fun and cool-looking, I really want to learn it and I already told you that I love the song. The girls themselves seem all right on stage – they work well as a group, although you can see that they’re not fully in synch yet but that’s okay considering they’re just starting out and all. Now I know it might seem like I’m being overly critical and maybe I am but it’s just because I’m rather fond of the majority of the talent that SM produces, I think that all of their groups do very well for themselves and I expect these girls to follow suit. I just have high expectations for them, that’s all. So I am being critical but it’s just because I want to see them do well, you know, I want them to come out good and then steadily improve and so far, they’re not doing too badly in that respect.

As for the girls themselves, Luna’s already impressed me with how serious and committed she is while they’re performing and Sulli (the young looking one with the bun-like hairstyle) caught my attention because she’s adorable and she reminds me of all of the previous maknaes that I’ve been fond of. As far as I’m concerned, she’s the maknae in the group because she seems to be acting the part way more than Krystal anyway. Speaking of Krystal (pink and blue shirt), she seems okay so far – her voice is decent and she’s a pretty good dancer so I have faith in her. I was really looking forward to seeing the leader, Victoria (the girl in the dress) but she hasn’t exactly impressed me so far – she seems competent in terms of performing but she isn’t as charismatic as I expected her to be and so the jury’s still out as far as she’s concerned. She did get some cool points after I saw a really cute fancam of the girls leaving their fanmeeting after MuCore where she made a heart for the fans. I was like “aww~ that’s so cute!” so I guess she’s all right. And well, Amber seems okay. I don’t really have an opinion on her yet.

So f(x) seem cool so far, they look like they’ll do well – I’m very interested in hearing the rest of their tracks – is there any word on when their mini album or album or whatever is being released? – and I’m also very interested in hearing more from Luna and seeing what little Sulli’s individual talents are.

Moving on, I’ll get to another rookie group, 4minute with their new song, ‘Muzik‘.

Credit: CodeMonmonSeason3

Let me start by saying that I really like this song, maybe more than ‘Hot Issue’, I’m not sure yet. It’s just really fun and makes me want to get up and dance – and I always appreciate when a song can do that – I definitely see some improvement on their end, I used to find their ‘Hot Issue’ performances tremendously boring but they have a lot more energy here and their choreo is cooler so I’m already liking these performances more. I still don’t think I’ll be watching too many of these performances because two of the members, the leader and the maknae ( I think) – yeah, I’m sorry to say this but their vocals leave a lot to be desired…they don’t sound so bad on the track but they go over a lot worse live. In addition to that, I’m not too fond of Hyuna’s voice in general so that really puts me off but I will say that generally, this performance was good. They sounded okay,  their clothes were decent (I’m loving those boots!) and their dancing wasn’t bad so it was okay, really.

Next up is 2NE1 with their new single, ‘Pretty Boy’.

Credit: CodeMonmonSeason3

Now I really like this song, for much the same reasons that I like 4minute’s new song – it’s very cool and fun to listen to. I actually think that this would have been a better follow-up to ‘Fire’ than ‘I Don’t Care’ because it would have showed a different side to them while still maintaining the momentum created by starting out with a song as upbeat as ‘Fire’ – but I digress….I have to commend them for being able to dance in those ridiculous boots (did you see those things?! Dang! I couldn’t take one step in those!) and well, the dancing is how it always is. Hmm, I think that they had less energy in this performance than they usually do but despite that, it was very solid. They sounded very good, they looked good (in those possibly ‘Heartbreaker‘-inspired outfits?) and well, that’s all that really matters, right? As always, I feel that they kind of went overboard with the dancing – I really don’t need to see anyone writhing around on the floor, thanks – this is particularly in Minzy’s case, I don’t know if maybe the dancing doesn’t seem sexualized to her but it comes across that way in a lot of other people’s minds and I can’t help feeling that she’s just way too young to be doing that kind of thing. Leave that kind of thing to Hyori, Minzy!

Now this right here is the G-Dragon I am used to – totally fierce and cool and in control. It was nice seeing GD not looking so nervous and unsure of himself. I think he did a great job – this was a very good performance. I love the choreo for his song which is a rarity for me when it comes to YG artists, I’m not gonna lie – I love his colour scheme, I just love everything – it’s just really cool and different and innovative and even though I wasn’t all that impressed with his album when I first listened to it, the more I listen to it, the more I like it. It’s very easy on the ears. In addition to that, he won Take 7 this week so good for him. You deserve it, GD – you did well!

Well, I don’t really feel like talking about the other performers but I’ll give Miss Baek JiYoung a shout-out just because I loooooove her song – this would totally be my jam if I lived in Korea and went to clubs – and her performances are always very good – she has such a nice voice~ Also I like to watch them and laugh at how young Taecyeon looks next to her. XD

And in related news, my favourite female duo, Davichi is performing again! Yay! Cheer, you guys, cheer – this is fantastic! Here’s their latest Music Bank performance – they’re only performing their OST song for ‘My Fair Lady’ or ‘Take Care of the Young Lady’ as MySoju is calling it since they already have a Korean series with the same title but I don’t really care because those girls are performing again and that makes me very happy.

Credit: alllllllight (or something to that effect)

The performance was good – they sound fantastic, as usual, although I think Minkyung might have had a little bit of trouble this time around. That’s okay though – they haven’t been performing this song for very long anyway. Honestly I’ve only listened to this song once and I’m not all that fond of it but you should still check out their performances because they are wonderful singers and will never disappoint you by delivering a sub-par performance. So watch it, okay? Good!

And since you’ve made it all the way down to the end of this post – I think this is the longest post I’ve written in awhile, looks like I might be getting back into the swing of blogging, hmm? – I will reward you by sharing a bonus video! It’s the audio of Luna from f(x)’s solo performance from their showcase. She sang ‘And I Am Telling You’ from Dreamgirls and don’t worry – it’s very good quality. I have to say that listening to this, I was even further impressed by this girl – she has a really nice voice and I think she did very well on this song despite the fact that her voice doesn’t have the strength of the original singer’s, I feel like she managed to make it sound really good even with her less powerful vocals. And there’s something to be said about her English pronunciation – it was a lot better than a lot of other people’s and it was nice to be able to listen to someone sing an English song without being distracted by their mis-pronunciation of key words. Really, this kid has a ton of potential and I can’t wait to see more of her.

Well, that’s all for now. Lacha, lacha – ta ta!

Maki

LOL, what a scandalous post title. XD Anyway, I’m excited! Wei shenme, you ask? Well, do you remember when SHINee did that guest appearance on 2PM’s season of Idol Show and for the talent portion, Jonghyun sang a cover of 4men’s song ‘Baby, Baby’? No? Well that’s okay (although you should really check out those episodes because  they were side-splittingly funny). The point is that he finally sang the entire song on ShimShimTapa (I told you I loved there!) the other day and it was buenissimo, claro!

Seriously, this was worth the wait – he sounds so good here and it totally reminded me why I love this boy and his incredible voice. Man, it was so good that randy even provided a download link (one that I will be using, for sure) so if you want it, feel free to take it – just make sure to go tell randy (at her new account) how awesome she is for uploading the video and ripping the audio for us, okay?

The boys were also on Tablo’s Dream(ing?) Radio the other day – I’m sorry, I haven’t been keeping up with their schedule much these days so I just watch things when they pop up – where they sang a full version of ‘Talk To You’ (hence the post title).

credit: randy19973 @ Youtube

I should mention that “Talk To You’ is probably my second favourite song off of their latest mini-album so I was really excited to finally hear a full live version of it. The boys sound really good here, very close to the studio version and you can really hear the improvement in Taemin’s vocals (yay, maknae – I’m so proud!) as well as getting to hear the smoothness of Onew’s lovely voice here – agh, he just sounds so clear and strong. I love his voice. ♥ I really like how MinHo and Key trade off the rapping here – I didn’t pay that much attention to it while listening to the studio version but seeing it here, I’m really impressed – those two make a good rapping duo. All in all, this was a great performance and I totally suggest you check it out whether you like the song or not.

The boys were actually on quite a few radio programs recently – Sukira, ChinChim, SSTP and Tablo’s Dareaming Radio and I haven’t gotten a chance to watch everything yet but if you’re interested (and how could you not be?), then check out this playlist of radio live performances created by randy for easier viewing pleasure. LOL, I sound like a bad advertisement. Anyway, in addition to that, the dance version of the ‘Juliette’ MV was released so if you wanted to learn the dance, here’s your chance. I don’t think I’ll be able to learn that whole thing myself but I might try to learn that ‘dah-da-da-da-dah-da-dah’ part at the end with the hand movements – yeah, that part because I really like it.

Anyway, that’s all for now. Stay healthy! SHINee Fighting!

Maki

Okay so this is just a quick update to say that it’s officially announced that SHINee will be having their ‘Juliette’ comeback performance this Friday, God willing on Music Bank, followed by comeback performances on Music Core and Inkigayo on the following two days. Apparently Onew’s recovered almost completely and he’s been given the okay to perform now. That’s really great news, I think. You know I might have been the only one but I wasn’t too dismayed when I found out that the boys’ comeback was going to be postponed. I mean, of course, I wanted them back on stage but I really felt that this must have happened for a reason and that we should look on the bright side and think of it as allowing them more time to practice and perfect their moves. As such, I have all faith in them and I’m sure that they’ll deliver really good comeback stages this weekend. And in retrospect, it was slightly fortunate that their comeback had to be postponed because there was a lot of postponement of music shows and whatnot recently because of everything that happened and that would probably have thrown the boys off so at least this way, they could maintain their focus.

In addition, it seems that Jonghyun and MinHo filmed an episode of Star Golden Bell (my favourite variety show!) the other day so we have that to look forward to as well. I was a little surprised to see Jong there because he’s only been on that show once or twice before but I’m not complaining – I’m deefinitely glad to see more of him. I’d really like to see Dubu though – I really hope he’s fully recovered by the time they start actively promoting again. Anyway, sadly no one subs full SGB episodes anymore but hopefully SHINeesubs will do the boys’ cuts. Things have been fairly quiet over there recently but I’m sure it’ll pick up with the boys becoming active again.

And as a little heads-up, you may or may not know but SHINee Forums International is working on a Taemin Birthday project right now and I definitely encourage you to participate. Unfortunately the deadline for the booklet’s already passed but you can still donate and whatnot so go check it out!

Hmm, I know I haven’t posted about the mini-album yet but that’s partly because I wanted to do a proper review of it in a little while. I kept quiet actually because like ‘Juliette’, I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it at first – generally, the style is very different and it definitely took some getting used to but after I listened to it again the other day, I found myself being really drawn in by the tracks and hearing the improvement in the boys’ voices. They are experimenting so things are going to be different but I think they did a pretty good job with this mini-album, not resting on their laurels and branching out in that contemporary way they’re always talking about. Also I know some people aren’t really happy with ‘Juliette’ as a promotional single and perhaps it isn’t the strongest track on the album but I find it really fun qnd upbeat and I think it was a really good choice for their single. It’s grown on me a lot over the past few weeks and I find myself singing and dancing along to it whenever it’s on. I still don’t replay it much but not every song’s like that, you know. That said, I just really want to see the boys on stage again – I didn’t realize it until this weekend but I miss their performances so much. They just bring something fresh and lively to the table and few artists’ perormances are able to fully capture my attention the way their’s do so thankfully, we won’t have to wait too long for some new ones.

So SHINee Fighting! And I’ll leave you with some pictures from that SGB filming – credit as tagged and SFI.

Ah, there’s that cheesy smile I love. ^^

Adios,

Maki.

………OK, I’m exaggerating maybe a little bit. I mean, I pop into her Soompi thread fairly regularly so I am aware of her movements and I know that she’s alive and well (thank Goodness) and supposedly in Korea atm, working on a new album. (Please, OMG, please let this be true. SM don’t let me down here, come on, I’m dying for some new stuff from this girl – even though her ‘I Will’ album is still on replay on my iPod, of course.) But anyway, Zhang Li Yin, along with many other prominent artists (including Super Junior) performed together at a concert organized by Jackie Chan at Beijing’s Bird’s Nest stadium on Friday night.

(OMG, doesn’t she look so pretty here? Wow, I love this picture….)

Li Yin performed her song, ‘I Will’ and she sounded, to put it simply, breath-taking. I was pretty shocked because I’d gone Youtube-ing a couple of her old performances and to be honest, they weren’t that great but she has definitely improved. The strength of her voice and her control over it has improved immensely and even though there were one or two rough spots, you could see that she knew her limit and made sure not to overdo anything. So overall, her performance really impressed me. So go watch it now, now, now now! (Please?)

credit: xKLYN @ YT

So yay! I’m really happy about this – it has reignited my appreciation for her ample vocal ability and I’m quite pleased to see that she’s better able at demonstrating it live now than she was before. ^_^ Also, it’s really great that she was able to be a part of this thing – I mean, there were 70, 000 people there – 70, 000 people watched her sing that song and even though it may not have made an impression on all of them, I’m sure that a good few people left that stadium with a new (or rejuvenated or increased) interest in our little LiYin, eh? (LOL, I’m talking like she’s younger than me when really, we’re the same age.) This was wonderful exposure for her, really.

So yay, good job, LiYin – it’s good to see that you’ve been working hard while you’re on hiatus or whatever and I’m sure that it will all pay off in the end. I refuse to believe that SM will let a bright star like her just fade away and I’m sure they’ve got something good up their sleeve for her – and I really hope that we get to hear at least one new song from her jin nian (this year), that is, if her second album is not released in the latter months. I doubt it but I’m still trying to hold out hope. Anyway, she looked hen piaoliang – very pretty – (I’m practicing my PinYin, okay? No tone marks though – dui buqi) and I really love the style of the outfit that they chose for her – it’s very classy and stylish without seeming too formal and it fits her quite well. So overall, I’m glad – this was a very good thing for her.

So picture time! Here she is at the dinner and with Super Junior and Mr. Chan himself.

picture credits: as tagged and Soompi, LJ, bunch of different places….

Doesn’t she look just like a doll? She looks so tiny surrounded by all of those guys in the last picture and so cute standing next to Hannie. I believe they’re close – and it’s understandable, right? – that makes me happy – I’m always glad to know she’s got someone to look out for her and HanGeng’s a pretty reliable guy so it’s very reassuring. Anyways go watch that performance if you haven’t!

Wan an!

Maki

Here’s her new MV for ‘Boo’.

Okay, yes, the concept and the song are very different from ‘Mia’ and probably not what you were expecting from her (I know I wasn’t) but it really isn’t that bad and we shouldn’t think of it as a step down but instead as her trying out a new style. Honestly, ‘Boo’ really is a very cute, catchy enough song and it’s impossible to hide IU’s impressive vocal ability in a song like this – and look on the bright side, it may be on the cutesy side but at least, they didn’t digitalize her voice or use a ton of synthesizer – and for that, we should always be grateful.

So the MV, like the song. is very cute – it’s basically just different scenes of her strutting through a neighbourhood and walking with her video love interest who is alternatively seen standing around and looking bewildered and mildly annoyed at her lateness – it doesn’t really make sense, per se and I don’t think there’s much of a plot so it doesn’t really matter. Hmm, I must say that I love that pink car she’s standing next to in the video – it’s just adorbs! – and even though I liked her long hair, this new style gives her a lovely, childish, fresh look that quite suits her concept and age. What does not suit her age, however, is that ridiculous frou frou piece of tulle mascarading as a skirt that her stylists have her prancing around in – I really don’t know what’s going on with that, it is obscenely short, so short that you can see the red tights that she’s wearing beneath it and she’s even wearing them for performances! This makes me want to cry. Codies, why are you doing this to her? Am I the only one outraged?

What makes me feel better though is listening to her first full length album, Growing Up – listen here; buy here – it is thankfully quite lovely and it follows the style of her mini-album in that it incorporates slower songs that do a better job of showcasing her vocals as well as more upbeat, catchier tunes that show her range and versatility. I’ve only heard it once so far but I’m quite enjoying it so far and I definitely recommend giving it a listen. All of her mini-album songs are on it, including a rock version of ‘You Know’ (Itjanha) that’s extremely entertaining – she actually pulled it off very well, I’m impressed! Hmm, I’ll probably be back with a proper review of the album in a little while – in the meanwhile, give it a try, okay?

I would also recommend checking out one of her new performances – here’s her latest M! Countdown one. I’m happy to report that she has really improved in terms of her performances – her vocals are as strong and consistent as they always were but her actual expression and so on was severely lacking previously and that’s definitely changed now. She’s a lot more lively, expressive and open here, she loosk more comfortable on stage and she really seems to be enjoying herself doing her cute, little choreography so I guess giving her this style to perform was good for something. She still has to work on her actual stage presence a bit – and of course, the skirt HAS to go – but other than that, I’m happy to report that IU seems to be doing quite well for herself. So I hope this image change really works to her advantage by generating a good bit of interest in her and hopefully, this video of a number of other artists including FT Island, Davichi, Bae Seul Ki, K. Will and  Untouchable talking about IU and ‘Boo’ will help her get some more recognition. Goodness knows she deserves it.

IU fighting! DaeBak!

Maki

Okay, it is official – I love Suju’s ‘Sorry, Sorry’ performances. Really. I feel about them the way I felt about SHINee’s LLO performances and DBSK’s ‘Wrong Number’ performances and I just can’t get enough of them. They’re all really, really good! (Ok, well, not all but most of them are.) And today’s was no different – I always say that the best performances happen on Inkigayo. There were so many good points but I’ll just try to list the highlights for you.

1. the red accenting on their outfits – love it! It’s a nice, dull-ish, burgundy colour but it’s a really good accompaniment to the grey colour that dominates the majority of their outfits. It looks good, very good – their stylists are really on a roll these days.

2. Eeteuk’s little smirk at the very beginning of the performance – haha, that was so cute! I usually find Leeteuk cute in a nice-older-guy sort of way but he’s really upping his game in these performances. He’s being very cool and manly, ooh~

3. okay, the entire dance sequence at the beginning with just Hankyung, DongHae, EunHyuk, SungMin and ShinDong looked really good today – I don’t know why but they just looked really in synch today, it was impressive.

4. the usual fantastic Inkigayo camera angles – oh, I could kiss these camera-men, they really know what they’re doing! And although I got a little disoriented because of the really fast zooming in and out that took place sometimes, they managed to capture a lot of the really cool portions of the dance that you sometimes miss in the other show’s broadcasts like the clap, clap, push thing they do at the end of Siwon’s lines and that whole Domino-effect dance sequence that happens during Kangin’s lines and the new EunHae dance portion – wait, wait, getting to that!

5. Eeteuk went in the right direction during the first dandandan part! Not hating but I’ve noticed that sometimes Leeteuk gets confused there and he ends up going in the opposite direction as everyone else (like in yesterday’s MuCore performance) and I personally usually find it really cute and funny but it’s nice to see him getting it right too. ^^

6. More close-ups on DongHae, ShinDong – whoo, more Shindong, ftw! – and EunHyuk while they’re dancing.

7. Hearing the fans singing along during Yesung’s part. Aww. This is a nice change from yesterday’s MuCore performance where they forgot to lower the crowd’s voices so you could actually hear people talking in the background and singing along and you could even see the tops of their heads at the bottom of the screen which was really weird and made it seem like you were watching a fancam or something.

8. HeeChul’s new hairstyle. Now I mean, HeeChul manages to make anything look cool – which is why he’s had like 50 different hairstyles since debut – but I really prefer this one over the previous one. The previous, flat hair made him look like he was about to join a blues band or something and that was just kind of odd – now he looks like a rock star.

9. the new EunHae dance part after the bridge. I was a little sad after watching the MuBank performance and seeing DongHae do the dance part on his own (I mean, I liked it before but after seeing EunHae do it together, it looks much better that way) and then I was relieved when I saw EunHyuk join him once again for the MuCore performance but nothing beat my excitement at today’s because they changed and it’s even cooler now – but I’m not going to tell you what they did so you’re just going to have to watch it to see. Also I kind of like this one more just because I can actually do it unlike the other one, which looks really easy, but isn’t.

10. A close-up on Siwon and then Kyuhyun’s ~Showri~. Really, I don’t why they digitalized his voice at that point of the song (or at all) because when you hear him sing it on stage, it sounds so soulful and lovely and it makes me really sad that I don’t get to hear that when I listen to the track. >.<

Now don’t you want to go watch the performance?

And of course, the best thing about today’s Inkigayo is that Suju won again. Yay! HeeChul is kind of coerced into making a (really, really) fast speech which he ended with a ‘Kibum-ah, saranghanda!’ and ‘kamsahamnida, thank you’, then they pass the mic down to Sungmin who then gives a nice, brief thank you speech (in his super cute voice, oh~) and then Eeteuk moves Ryeowook over so that he’ll give the speech instead of him. Oh, leader-ssi~ Ryeowook thanks some more people, including ELF; there’s screaming, then a messy encore where Eeteuk forces someone (I’m sorry – I really don’t know who he was) to stay on stage and dance with them, DongHae throws the bouquet (like a baseball), HeeChul pretends to throw the trophy into the crowd and SungMin does something with his handkerchief that I don’t quite understand but which I think was a way of thanking the fans. I don’t know – maybe something was written on it. Also Siwon looked really touched when they won and DongHae and Yesung looked sad. Hmm…

Anyway so congratulations to Suju once more. I’m very happy to see them get this and I hope they get a lot more success after this. Super Junior hwaiting!

Maki

P.S: – You think maybe I should make a Suju category? I mean, I have a Big Bang one but I’ve already made more posts about Suju in the last month than I have about BB since I started this blog so I should, right?

Suju won again! Whoo! Yay! The acceptance speeches were a lot less tearful this time around and as usual, Heechul stole everyone’s attention by picking up Hongki and spinning him around in a big bear hug while the rest of his members were having their own group hug. LOL, typical Heechul. I think only Leeteuk cried this time, although Kangin looked a little emotional in the background – good to see that even manly Kangin gets emotional sometimes. ^^

Oh, and the performance was fantastic! It was one of their better ones for sure. Lots of energy, everyone looked and sounded good – although I do wonder if this choreo isn’t a bit much for Kyuhyun, he always seems to be a bit out of breath towards the end – and I’ve even stopped being surprised when Heechul shows up. As usual, the camera angles are very well done, although not as good as the previous Inkigayo performances and there’s a cool switch in the choreo towards the end of the performance that I really loved. It was just very good. I really liked the touch of gold in their outfits as well, although it didn’t work for everyone as well as it did for some. Also I am still confounded by EunHyuk’s pants/socks – really I just don’t even know what to say about those. DongHae looks good though – I always like his outfits the best.

And finally, watch this performance – I demand it! (Please.)

credit: CodeAnalysis

It’s the latest Davichi performance of 8282 (Pali Pali) and I was appalled at how few views it had. These girls are extremely talented and their lives never disappoint – really, I’m always amazed at how good they are – and MinKyung’s even wearing a really cute military style jacket here so I don’t know why people aren’t watching their performances. Really, why are these girls so under-rated? So go do yourself a favour and watch the performance please even if you don’t like the song. It’s really incredible.

Oh, and fortunately the Suju housewarming party was really in last night’s WGM episode so I’m sure it will be up and subbed soon! For the time being, it’s already up on YT, just sans subs. I’ll be awaiting them patiently. Well, that’s it – enjoy the performances!

Maki

P.S:- I started watching Suju’s Adonis Camp show and LOL, I made it through three episodes in one night. Oh, the hilarity – it is ensuing. It’s amazing how one only needs to gather any number of Suju members together – just anyone – and something funny will undoubtedly occur. They are such a riot.

Well, since I’ve been uber-lazy as of late and I haven’t posted a thing – I figure I should do some kind of update so here goes…. first off, please go to this site and help others while you surf the web and improve your vocabulary – it’s Free Rice.com.

Anyways, hmm, I’m very excited about the new YG girl group, 21! I feel like I’ve been waiting forever for Park Bom to officially debut even though it’s only been like a few months (for me anyway) so I’m really happy that all the speculations and the trickle of news is finally over and now her group has a name and official members and a tentative debut date. And they’ve got a song too! Check it out here – it’s 21 and Big Bang’s official song for the LG CYON phones that BB endorses. Hm, it’s not the best thing ever or anything but it’s nice and catchy and it’s good to have something of theirs to listen to. I’m kind of hoping their sound isn’t going to be exactly like this though…

Moving on…so Suju won their first number one with ‘Sorry, Sorry’ yesterday! Yay! I was so happy to come home to that piece of news – I wasn’t even thinking about that actually, I was just like ‘hmm, MuBank today, new Suju performance, SNSD good-bye stage’ and then I popped onto AKP and what do I see? “Suju wins K-Chart” with a picture of Teukkie crying. I was like ‘Yay!’ (well, not for the crying part) but the win is lovely and it was really nice to see Soshi there supporting their sunbaes at the end as well. (Might I add that ShinDong’s trying-not-to-cry face was really funny. Sorry but it really was – to me, anyway.) I was a little disappointed that their encore wasn’t longer but then I found a fancam of it and it was really something. This must mean a lot to them, especially LeeTeuk – I mean, he got down on his knees, dude! I still can’t get over that! Ah, well I’m happy for them anyway and I hope that this is just the first of many. Suju fighting!

Oh, by the way, it was both Soompi and Shinhwa’s 11th anniversaries recently – I’m fairly new to Soompi and don’t know much about Shinhwa – but I know how important and crucial both are to K-pop so congratulations! I wish you many more!

So let’s talk about SHINee, shall we? (Because how could I not?) Hmm, I know I was supposed to do a second part to those Thailand pictures but there were so many and it’s such a chore posting them. I’l try to get the second part up but I’m not making any promises. Anyway so right now the boys are in NEW ZEALAND taking pictures for I’m not quite sure what yet – I’m hearing a photobook and also shots for their new album – but nothing’s been confirmed yet. I’m really hoping it’s for their new album though because it will mean that the album must be set to come out soon. (Ah, I’m so selfish, eh? Suju and Soshi fans had to wait forever for their groups to come back and yet here mine’s only been gone for like a month and a half and I’m complaining. Sorry – I’ll try to be less vocal about it in future.) Anyways, also even though it would be sensational for the boys to have a photobook – those are kind of expensive and I really don’t know if I’d be able to afford it…Also if it’s for their album, I’ll be buying that  anyway so I’ll definitely get the pics but if it’s for a photobook, there are no guarantees. And coincidentally, I was browsing pictures of Suju’s photobooks just Thursday night and thinking that SHINee wouldn’t have one for awhile and then I hear about this. That always happens to me with them! Should I be happy? IDK…

Oh, oh, hey! This is probably late but I have to say that if you haven’t watch the episode of 2pm’s Idol Army with SHINee, go watch it now! Seriously that show was HILARIOUS. I laughed from beginning to end. And honestly I wasn’t keen on watching it at first because I thought there’d be a lot of fan service and you know I’m not keen on that kind of thing but it really wasn’t so bad! Like there was fan service but you could tell that they weren’t taking it seriously and that they were all just goofing off so I could let it go and just crack up as I was meant to. It really was a very entertaining show – I can totally understand why people are so fond of 2PM – they’re quite a cracktastic lot, those guys. Oh, and when they had to show their talents, MinHo did the rap from an MC Mong song (very well, I might add – I was impressed!) and he had Jonghyun help him out with the singing and I was really happy to see that for some reason. I dunno – it just makes me happy to see him asking his hyung to help him out like that. ^^ Also Jonghyun sang this song called ‘Baby Baby’ (of course, K-pop n00b me has never heard it before) and he sounded so nice. Wah~ *_* But I couldn’t really focus on it because of the context he was singing it in, you know, so I really hope that he sings it on another variety show or something where I can fully focus on it (and hopefully get an audio rip ). It was really good! So go watch  the show because if you haven’t, you are missing out.

And finally, I’d really like you to check out this performance. It’s by May Doni and it’s one of her more recent (and more importantly, a subbed) performance of her song, ‘In The Beginning’, the only ballad (and best song, imo) on her debut mini-album. Honestly I was convinced that this girl was talented before but seeing her sing this song so well live just cemented it. I’m very pleased that her company’s allowing her to promote this song because I think it showcases her ample vocal ability much better than Molla-Ing did and because every single performance of this that I’ve watched has been breathtaking. She always manages to sound fantastic and she always hits her notes just right so good for her! I’m also glad that they cut out the rap part because I never really liked it anyway and it allows you to focus much more on the power and beauty of her voice. That said, please do check it out and if you like it, this is an even more recent (and better, although it was difficult to identify) performance of the song. Please and thank you.

And that’s it for now – I’ll just leave you with this cute SJSHINee picture that I came across on Soompi. It’s a cap from a show that Super Junior were recently on – I think it’s called OnlBam or something. I know Suju Happy did it awhile ago because I saw that episode – that’s when I started to notice how cute Sungmin’s speaking voice is. Now I love hearing him speak. Oy, I sound so creepy – I just have a voice thing, sorry.  Anyways, the following picture was posted on DongHae’s notice board with a whole bunch of others of him and his members because apparently he documents everything. Aww~

credit: SHINee 闪耀星球 and seoullights on Soompi

Aww, look at how everyone’s clinging to Dubs – I see DongHae, Heechul, Ryeowook, Sungmin and I think ShinDong? I can’t figure out who that other person is though, might be Kyuhyun but I’m not sure. And it says:

2009.3.8 11:13PM
Together with Onew

Oh, isn’t that just super adorable? You gotta love SMTown. Anyways, enjoy your weekend. Have a good one.

Maki

The title is the name of one of the two few traditional Chinese songs that I know and I chose it because I just came across a video of Super Junior’s Kyuhyun, although here he’s acting as a member of Suju M, singing it on a Chinese tv show and OMG, it’s beautiful. He doesn’t even sing much and he doesn’t know all of the words and cuteness ensues as Han Geng comes up behind him and tries to feed him the words so that he can keep singing (oh, I knew Geng would make a good leader!) but in the end, he just turns the mic over to Han Geng and Siwon to finish up. (Siwon also has a really nice voice, imo) but all of that doesn’t matter because the 40 or so seconds that he sings sounds fantastic. My Gosh, his voice is just so beautiful – I really wish he sang the whole song. OMGee, you don’t know how happy I am to get to hear him sing that song just because I actually know it! And I feel bad now because I didn’t even pay that much attention when we were learning it in class but now I’ll definitely pay close attention when we learn songs because I might get to hear someone I know sing it and sound amazing and because it might help me prepare for my final exam.

video credit: kettch08

And speaking of Suju M and this song, I was going to watch an old interview Han Geng did a few years back and in the little preview at the beginning, I saw that he said that he sang this same song for his SM audition (I think it was that audition anyway) and I got so excited because I figured that he might sing it on the show but this video was even better. I’m still hoping to hear him sing it though, especially because he actually knows all the words and you know, is fluent in Chinese and all.

Hmm, you might know I’m a new Suju fan but did you know I’m a big Suju M fan too? (Of course not, I only became one this week.) I really only checked them out to see who Henry and Zhou Mi were but somehow they pulled me in and I started watching a whole bunch of their interviews and whatnot and listening to their album and now they’re my favourite Suju sub-group. I just really like the vibe that I get from them as a group – so laid back and relaxed and calm – they really seem to get along very well and I think Han Geng makes a really good leader. He’s the steady type, you know. ^^ In addition, some of my favourite Suju guys – Siwon, Hankyung, DongHae – are in the group and it allowed me to see a bit more of Kyuhyun and Ryeowook as well. And of course, Henry and Zhou Mi themselves are awesome (and Henry speaks English, yay!) Hmm, I just really like the group – they fit well together and they have cute interactions (and clothes and hair) so yay for Suju M. Hmm, I know that, as usual, I’m really late to the party, especially since they just finished their promotions and probably won’t be starting them back for awhile but well, I’m here! So I’ll just have to make do with what’s available until they come back with their second album.

Anyways, watch the video – look, it’s up there! – and then check out another version of the song by Kyuhyun played on the clarinet at their Hong Kong concert in December. I really love that Kyu plays the clarinet, btw – I don’t really anyone who does and it just seems so cute and band-geek-y of him. I’ve always liked nerdy boys, although I wouldn’t really call Kyuhyun one.

Later,

Maki