KPOP Review: G-Dragon "Crayon"

As I said in my previous review on G-Dragon's "That XX" GD made a new music video for his recent solo album. The song itself isn't the best of the bunch, but I was totally hooked on the chorus. The music video was AMAZING. It had me laughing a lot, I loved everything about it from the ridiculously funny costumes to the colorful backgrounds and sets 

The song has a pop sound that will get you on your feet and dancing. My favorite part of the entire song is the "Why so serious? GET YOUR CRAYON!", That was where I fell for the song. When I heard the song I cringed. Truthfully, I didn't like the rapping. It sounded to stereotypical to the rap sound here in the U.S. As the song went on I got into it, and then I heard the chorus. It raised my hopes for the song and eventually I got passed the fact that I didn't like the rapping. Now I actually enjoy the song as a whole. Except for the word swag. I absolutely loath that word, whoever made that word should be put down. I'm serious. I hear that word everywhere and it gets on my nerves, that and the word YOLO.

The lyrics for the song talk about how GD is so aweosme, according to him. Well at least that is what I understood from the translated lyrics. Honestly I didn't really get the lyrics. They confused me. I read through them a gazillion of times, but all I could get out of it is that GD is boasting about himself. Another thing I was able to understand is that in the chorus GD is telling you to just let loose, or "get your crayon". From what I have heard is that crayon is the words crazy and on combined together. So, basically it means to "get your crazy on" or get  crazy and have fun. That's all I was able to understand, but I may be completely wrong, so don't hesitate to correct me. In fact I want your feedback. I'm dying to know what the lyrics mean.

On to the work of art known as the music video. I LOVED it as I have already said. There was super hero references: Wonder Woman, Batman, and Wolverine. There was also Family Guy's Stewie and Brian on GD's shoes. I also noticed that they put children's tales in there like Pinocchio and Frankenstein. When I first saw GD in the tight black dress I thought it was actually him and wasn't at all surprised that he had a nice feminine body, but then I read that it wasn't him and I was relieved to know that GD doesn't have a better looking body than mine (or I hope so). Anybody else looked at the faces the guys around GD when he was on the couch? They, Were. Hilarious. The party scene was also pretty cool. The video itself was colorful, vibrant, and cheerful, which fits with the song title, "Crayon".

My Ratings

Lyrics: 3 out of 5
MV: 5 out of 5
Song: 3 out of 5
English: 5 out of 5

Overall: 4 out of 5

Here is the music video:

Doesn't G-Dragon look like a teenager in this pic?

He looks adorable in this one.

KPOP Review: U-KISS "Stop Girl"

Finally! I felt like I was going to die from the long wait, but U-KISS has finally made their comeback. I was so anxious to see how this song came out since they are missing AJ at the moment. I wasn't at all disappointed.Although I wasn't completely impressed with this comeback. Honestly, I had to listen to this song for approximately four times before it finally grew into me. 

The song has nothing that is notably special. It did, however, have a more mature tone and feel to it. I loved that R&B sound they had in the song, very mature. When I heard the chorus, my initial expression was that it was too cheesy ("stop girl in the name of love" really?) and I wasn't expecting much. One thing I wish there was more of was the powerful singing Hoon (or should I say, Sailor Hoon) did at the beginning. The song was somewhat repetitive, but that's okay since most songs are like this nowadays. My favorite part in the song by far is when Dongho and Eli rap. I don't know why but I'm just captivated with Dongho's voice, it's something I don't think I will never find a proper explanation. But I was not at all captivated by Dongho's appearance, you know the part where he is wearing the hat and has he long hair to one side of his face. Eli's part was also epic, I loved the emphasis he put every time he said "cheok".

Lyrically the song is about a rocky relationship. They want to be together, but at the same time they get sick of each other. He wants her but then doesn't. They push and pull each other. 

Personally, I was happy to see that the boys weren't going to be in a room again in this music video. I was really getting annoyed by the lack of variety they had on their set. I know it takes so much hard work to put those sets together, but I just don't like it when they don't change set. Take for example Super Junior, sure the boxes they dance in look cool but it's not different and it tends to be boring for me. Gladly that wasn't the case this time for U-KISS. The black and white version of the music video was a good way to boost up the maturity of it. Although, I prefer the color version myself.

Something that I totally loved was the fact that they had females incorporated into their dance. It was like the icing on the cake. The interaction with the opposite sex also helped them add a dance that speaks with the lyrics. As you see Kevin dancing with the woman, much to my dismay(he is mine!!! T-T I'm such a delusional fangirl), they come close but then separate and then come close again only to push themselves away from each other. It was a nice touch. Something I have noticed U-KISS does is their dances correspond with their lyrics. In Tick Tack they had the clock-like movements, in  Forbidden Love they had a slightly sexual dance, and in Believe they did movements that went along with the line "I do believe you". 

The English in the song was perfect. No mispronunciation or weird jumble of English. I liked Soohyun's line when he said "and now my heart is depleted". So, for the English of the song there isn't much to say.

This time around the boys did a wonderful job. Right now my favorite album/ mini album is still The Special to Kiss Me, with Neverland coming in close second. Hopefully when AJ comes back they will have an explosive comeback.

My Ratings

Lyrics: 3.5 out of 5
MV: 3 out of 5
Song: 4 out of 5
English: 5 out of 5
Dance: 4.5 out of 5

Overall: 4 out of 5

Here is the video:

I posted the B&W version since it was uploaded on their official youtube channel first.


P.S. Support these boys by buying their album pwease. You don't want to make adorable Kevin cry, do you?

KPOP Review: FT Island "I Wish"

FT Island or, as my brother thought they were called, Fetus Land (He read it as FTIS Land LOL) has come out with a new song that I really liked. Although I'm not much of a fan of them, this song is one of my favorites at the moment. I totally dig the whole Spanish guitar and trumpet sound they have. I, being Mexican, really appreciate the fact that they are trying to incorporate sounds of other cultures. Now let the reviewing commence!

The song, like I said, is awesome and I really liked it. It maybe be just me, but I think they didn't do a well transition between the Spanish sound to their typical indie-pop sound. The song just abruptly changes. Actually it could have been two totally different songs if you split the parts, but there is just something about it that still makes it sound pleasing to the ears and not a mash of different sounds. Another thing I noticed that I'm pretty sure you guys gave noticed to is that Hongki says something that sounds like queso, meaning cheese in Spanish. There is one line he says that can be misheard as  quiero mucho queso, which means I want a lot of cheese in Spanish. I thought  that was pretty funny and it didn't help that the song had a Spanish sound to it.

The meaning of the song itself is about one of the rarest topics ever in music! It's about... what for it... ROMANCE! *Insert sarcastic tone here* It such a rare subject in music. The song is just telling how a man (or woman just saying) has fallen for a woman, but doesn't understand the feeling. Soon he realizes his love and really wants the woman.

Ok it's now time to talk about the music video. Oh yes, the music video. I didn't get to be honest. Is it FT Island all dating the same girl, or is she flirting with all the members? What confused me more is when Hongki was trying to tell her something but she didn't want to listen. This is what I was able to understand: Hongki loves her and they are all lovet dovey at the beginning but then she gets interested in the other pretty 

boys that are flirting with her. Hongki will not give her up since he loves her deeply. Maybe there is also the possibility that the girl is an alien as Simon and Martina (from eatyourkimchi) had said and she feeds on other people. I have no idea, but what I am sure of is that the video would have been better off with them just playing their instruments and singing in the room.

For the English I give them props for actually pronouncing "love me" correctly and not "lomme". I just have a problem with how they pronounce "lonely". They say "loly" instead of "lonely". That's it though.



My Ratings

Lyrics: 2 out of 5
MV: 3 out of 5
Song: 4 out of 5
English: 4 out of 5

Overall: 3.5 out of 5


Here is the video:

KPOP Review: Orange Caramel "Lipstick"

I'm here with another review, which I have wanted to do for quite a while. As the title says, I'm doing a review on Orange Caramel's "Lipstick". Although I'm not the biggest fan of girl groups there is always a song in each group that I adore. I'm actually surprised at myself for liking this song, because I'm more into the fierce looking girl groups, like 2NE1. Either way this was a good song that managed to bury into the depths of my brain and have me singing it non-stop all day.

The song itself is really addicting. I totally loved the part when they said "Omo omo o-o-o-o omo omo". I sang that until I annoyed the living hell out of my family, and they barely tolerate me plugging my IPod in the car. Anyways, the song is basically about a woman who fell for a man that is hard to get. Yeah the plot of the song is simple, I know. The sound of the song fit perfectly with Orange Caramel's cute aegyo image, and synthesizer in the background was a good addition to the song.

My favorite thing of "Lipstick" is the music video. I laughed throughout the whole video. It's all cutesy and fluffy, but at the same time it's so hilarious. It's so funny from the guys exaggerated movements to the girls' pouty faces.  So the main plot is that Orange Caramel is in love with a ping pong player. Although they are extremely well ping pong players they ask him to coach them. They put on this facade and pretend to not know how to play. Then, when the guy lost a match against someone the girls take it upon themselves to avenge his loss. They successfully win the dude (I think it was unfair since it was three against one) and were on their way to tell him they won when they see him being comforted by his wife. Orange Caramel then challenge the wife. My brother and I had a discussion on whether they had an endless ping pong battle or if Orange Caramel won. I think they won, but my brother says it's an endless battle. What do you guys think?

I would also like to state that I loved Lizzy's face when she turned the corner and saw the coach dude with his wife. Her face was covered with pure disgust, HILARIOUS. I also like that dance move they do when they tilt to the side (I tried to imitate it but failed...HORRIBLY) and sort of push the air beside them. I also loved their outfits except the one that's black and has the big bows. I just hate those gigantic bows, but the black looks sexy.

To conclude, this song was catchy and up-beat. The music video was very enjoyable and had me laughing throughout it. I'm glad Pledis Entertainment made this sub-group, since they are able to portray the overly cute image without changing their main group, After School. Yes, the beauty of subgroups.


My Ratings


Lyrics: 3 out of 5
MV: 5 out of 5
Song: 4 out of 5
Dance: 3 out of 5

Overall: 4 out of 5


Here is the video:

PSY? Pssht I Knew About Him Before He Was Cool...

                                          

PSY as all you Kpopers have noticed has been getting an extreme amount of attention for his song "Gangnam Style". More importantly he managed to garner the attention of a very much targeted audience the the Kpop industry just could not capture, the US audience.  

Although I'm glad for PSY's success I kind of feel irratated when I see people around me talking about him and his song. I'm just there like "Really? Now tell me how long have you been interested in Kpop?". I understand though, his video was funny and the song had a nice addictive sound to it. It had all the qualities it needed to be a good song in the US market. After some thinking though I wondered if PSY really is the one to open the doors to Kpop in the US. The answer to that is absolutely not,

For starters, PSY has a totally different style the groups Kpop has to offer. Sure he has those flashy rooms, the good quality and well thought out MV, and he sings in Korean. One thing that sets him apart from everyone else in the Kpop industry is that he is not afraid to make a fool of himself. Usually when a Kpop artist looks silly or funny they cover it up with being cute or cool, but not PSY. In fact, PSY embraces the silliness. Also, even in Korea PSY was a breathe of fresh air as he so greatly used his used his humor skills to make a kick-ass mucic video. So unless their is an artist like PSY who isn't afraid to ruin their image there isn't going to be another Kpop artist in the US music market anytime soon.

Something that worries me though is that the Americans, that have no knowledge of Kpop whatsoever, will begin to stereotype based on what they see from PSY. Most of my friends that know and like "Gangnam Style" don't even know he is Korean! I just don't want that kind of disaster, but maybe I'm wrong and my fellow Americans aren't so simple-minded.

The attention PSY has gotten is for PSY and PSY alone. I mean more than half, possibly even more than that, of the people that have fallen for the "Gangnam Spell" aren't searching up more on Kpop. All they are interested is the chubby Asian with the funny video. That sort of disappoints me since I crave for the popularity of Kpop here in the US. Then, I won't be labeled as "the one who likes the Asians that look like plastic" by my friends. Not just for that, but for various other reasons. Apart from my disappointment there are also those few people who might have looked up more on Kpop and were surprised to see that there is less of funny middle-aged men dancing and more of groups with an absurd amount of members and sophisticated videos with 360 slow-mo cameras. I would to if I had no idea about Kpop


Well that was my two-cents on the whole PSY thing. Whatever the outcome of this is I hope PSY the best. Maybe I'm wrong and he will manage to make the path for Kpop in the US. What do you think. Is PSY really helping the spread of Korean culture?



Here is the "Gangnam Style" video for you to... who am I kidding you guys have all watched it already, unless you totally dislike PSY and refuse to watch his video. Then again why would you be reading my post on PSY if you didn't like him.


Hmm why don't I send you guys off with a picture of baby giraffes, because I love giraffes... and ostriches.

Aren't they just adorable?

U-KISS Teasers

Ok so I'm so excited that U-KISS is making a comeback. They are my favorite K-pop group and I'm just so happy for these boys *cries*. So I hope you guys are just as excited as I am. I just wish they would give these boys a break. I am seriously surprised they haven't fainted on stage or something, but that just goes to show you how professional they are.Anyway here are the teasers for your eyes to see and your mouth to drool over. Don't forget they will release their MV on September 20, unless some weird thing happens and they can't.

Eli's teaser is nothing too special, but he still looks hot. I was kind of hoping that for this comeback his hair would be dyed a different color.

Kiseop looks good, but I don't think this hair suits him the best, I like the haircut it's just not for him.

Soohyun looks the same. I like how he looks, though, and I also love his shirt.

Oh my buhgeezeus. Kevin's teaser photo ... it's so....I just.... let's just say that my fangirl heart almost had a heart attack. I love his hair style. I hope he keeps it for the most of the MV.

I like this photo and Hoon looks as hot as always. I think that he, like Eli, should dye his hair sometime soon. Maybe black?

Dongho... Dongho Dongho Dongho... one question why? Why did you let them style your hair like this? Personally I think it doesn't suit him at all. I didn't like this type of hair style on Ren from NU'EST nor did I enjoy it on G-Dragon either (although GD is GD), and I'm positive I'm not going to like it on anybody else.

This is the teaser photo of all of them. It was the first released teaser photo.

 And last but not least... The Music Video Teaser!!!!

Did anybody else notice that at the end they misspelled the word coming. The person who made this video spelled it as comming. Lol just thought I would point that out, but you all probably already noticed that.

My First Post Yay!!!

K-pop Review: G-Dragon "That XX"

Ok, so this is my first blog post. Yeah I know it's kind of unprofessional to post that it's my first blog post, but hey might as well state the obvious.My first post would be, as you guessed, a Kpop review on GD's new music video, "That XX". 

I really loved the song and if you really took the time to read through the lyrics it is beautiful and heartwarming. The song starts off with GD saying he saw his friend's, or crush, boyfriend with another woman and that he has told her already multiple times that he is no good. The girl is stubborn and states that her boyfriend can never do a thing like that. Thus, GD is faced with an internal conflict of staying quiet and watching the one he loves suffer just so that she can be happy (sadist much). 

"That XX, what does he have that I don’t
Why can’t I have you
That XX doesn’t love you
How much longer are you going to cry yourself silly?"

I would like to say that the title for this song is GENIUS. Well for me I found it pretty creative, because in the song he says "Geu saekki", which translated in English means "that bastard". So, what they did when naming this song was use the English translation of it, "that bastard", and instead of putting bastard they replaced it with XX, which is meant to represent the censorship used in the song. In my opinion that was really smart.

Next up is the music video. It was a beautiful video with lots of meaning that can be interpreted in different ways. What I was able to interpret of this video was that GD is the friend of the girl with the douchebag boyfriend, who is also played by GD (either YG didn't want to pay for an actor to play the douchebag or GD really likes camera time). So the man with the scruffy blonde hair, GD as he plays the role of the friend, is always looking at the girl from afar. This explains why he is looking out the window, in the hole on the door, and being just plain old stalker-ish. He doesn't go near her because he doesn't want to get her mad since he knows he's going to tell her that she has a "lint licking" boyfriend like always. The girl, like always, will disagree with him and say she has the most perfect guy in the world.

Meanwhile the douchebag is hitting it off with another woman (lol this sounds like my uncle).

"Walking on the street, I bumped into your man (Yeah I saw him)
I didn’t want to believe it, but my hunch turned out right (I told you)
He’s not wearing that ring you gave him, there’s another girl by his side"

In the MV Mr.butthole dumps the ring that his girlfriend, GD's friend, gave him in a cup of water and then averts his attention to a woman. Further into the video you see the girl happily talking to him on the phone (btw that's a pretty big phone), but on the other side of that phone he's with another woman. Way to treat a woman huh.

"Now you’re getting angry with me (Why?)
You say “He’s definitely not that kind of person” (Sure you’re right)"

As I said before the girl will not listen to her friend when he says that she is better off without him. Her friend sees her suffering, as you can tell by her distressed face during some parts of the MV.

"They say love is blind, Oh baby, you’re so blind"

This is probably my favorite line of the song. It basically means that the girl is really blinded by what she thinks is love that she doesn't notice how the douche treats her like crap. It frustrates GD that he can't protect the one he loves and that he can't be the one to be in the heart of his crush, and instead is a good for nothing jerk. GD shows his frustration by throwing things around the room (it's ok GD I'm here for you!).

In the end the girl never opens here eyes and sees the truth. She stays with the jerk, who in the last scene sits arrogantly next to her. As they sit there they don't give off the vibe of a happy couple. The girl looks sad and depressed and Mr.Butthole seems to not really care for her presence.

The English in this song was used in a good way. It was used to express the thoughts the friend wants to say to the girl but doesn't. It was a nice touch. The only problem I had with the English was when GD say "oh baby you so blind" instead of  saying "you're so blind". It's ok though, since GD always talks in a sort of slang when he speaks English.

All in all the song was amazing and the video was pretty. My only complaints is that the bleeping in the song is annoying. They should have also used a different guy to play the role of the mean boyfriend as that might have caused some confusion.

One more thing, a lot of people were complaining that the girl in the music video was to young making GD look like a pedophile. I disagree. She was just used because she's pretty and since she will be debuting soon
(I think) they wanted to make her and the group a little more publicly known. Besides it's not like GD is actually dating her in real life. So calm down whoever it is that is complaining.

My Ratings

Lyrics: 4 out of 5
MV: 4.5 out of 5
Song: 5 out of 5
English: 5 out of 5

Overall: 4.5 out of 5

Here check out the music video.

 Here are the characters GD portrayed.

Bad Boyfriend GD

Good Friend GD

On a similar note be on the look-out as GD will be releasing another MV sometime soon. Hope it's as good as this one. Let's face it's GD so it most likely will be good, but you never know.