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Merry Christmas


Fancam Appreciation #14 - A Pink's Hayoung

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This week's submission comes from jewel. No, jewel is not an alias of HYSF, though I'm sure the two would fanboy/fangirl over Hayoung together.

Are there fancams that you want to nominate? Email them to antikpopfangirl@yahoo.com or tweet them to @antikpopfangirl.

Kpopalypse's review of 2015's cunt-gargling Christmas k-pop trash

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Christmas is here, and your Christmas present from Kpopalypse has arrived!  It's time to round up all of the shitty k-pop Christmas songs that were released this year!

christmaslovelyz1



A few rules before we start, because I know you guys love rules:
  • Songs will be presented in chronological order of release date of the video.
  • Only 2015 Christmas songs with MVs are considered for this list, songs without MVs are spared out of mercy.
  • Must be original Korean songs or at least non-original songs that I'm not familiar with enough to recognise, covers of popular western Christmas songs and carols are not eligible, unless I decide to include them anyway just to be a cunt.
  • "Winter comebacks" without Christmas content don't count!  Where I live Christmas comes with desert heat so stop being a culturally insensitive fuckhead who thinks that snow automatically equals Christmas.  The song actually has to have Christmas content to count as a Christmas song.  Lyrically mentioning Christmas counts, as does Christmas decorations in the video, or at least something besides fucking snow, fuck.
  • No ratings, because it goes without saying that you should not subject your ears to any of this garbage.
Now we have a complete understanding of the criteria, let's get started!  I'm sure I missed out a video or two in the following list but it's probably all for the best so please don't alert me to any omissions or link any more videos because nobody cares.

November 22nd - GOT7 - Confession Song





If you're a Korean schoolgirl and two masked men barge into your class and try to grab you, common sense suggests that you should probably start running.  They might be about to rape and kill you and leave your body floating down the Han river, or on the other hand if you're really unlucky they might take you into GOT7's secret gym where boy group members molest you and sing and rap horrible sickening Christmas love songs in your ear without even any lipsync to cushion the blow.  In an absolute worst-case scenario, after the excruciating singing ordeal is over they might set up some ugly guy in your class to reveal his identity and confess his true to love to you, and girl you better not fucking turn him down even if you think the dude is gross because you don't want to break the Christmas spirit and look like a fucking bitch in a GOT7 video, now do you.  If he's not your type that's just too fucking bad, at least wait until the cameras stop rolling before you tell him you'd rather just be friends.

November 23rd - The Barberettes - Lonesome Christmas





As it's well-documented that I like doo-wop influences in k-pop, logic dictates that I should like The Barberettes, a Korean doo-wop girl group, right?  The Barberettes obviously have doo-wop skills to burn and sound just fucking fantastic when they're doing other people's songs, however their original material is all consistently flat, dull, boring as batshit and contains absolutely zero of the spark and energy that made the better songs from the original 1950s doo-wop movement great.  This Christmas song of theirs isn't any exception to the rule, being snoozeworthy even by Barberettes standards, and even the guy in the video would clearly rather be staring out the window, playing with his mobile phone or falling asleep while eating shitty pot noodles than listening to this bullshit.

December 1st - Starship Planet - Softly





Starship Entertainment's CEO as a child must have been that annoying kid who always sets the alarm for one minute past midnight on Christmas morning so he can go into his parents' bedroom, interrupt their anal sex and annoyingly ask them if it's okay to open the presents yet, as Starship are always bright and early hopping on board as soon as they can with the Christmas bullshit collaboration train each year.  This video is pointlessly letterboxed for no obvious reason which means that you get to see only 40% of the Christmas cringe that you otherwise would, the rest of the video being taken up with two relatively appealing black rectangles, but this also means only 40% of Hyolyn and Bora's tits and ass make the cut.  Since the song is obviously crap there's no other reason for fans to be watching this, so Starship now owe us 60% extra fap.  I guess they'll make up with their next hideous "summer comeback" in six months where Sistar's spray-tanned asses will be falling out of the bottom of cut-off jeans and short-shorts again.

December 3rd - Girls' Generation TaeTiSeo - Dear Santa





When giving gifts this year, remember that the best gift isn't just the one that the recipient wants the most, or even the one that you enjoy giving the most - it's the gift which is the most needed which is the best gift.  This truism isn't lost on the young boy in this video, who daring braves both his eardrums and sanity to break in on a TaeTiSeo Christmas vocal practice wanking session and hand the girls an invitation to lift up the fucking pace a bit and do something resembling actual proper music someone might conceivably want to listen to one day.  At 1.25 the girls respond to his invite appropriately and like magic the song's quality is lifted from "stunningly shithouse egocentric vocal masturbation in your face" level to "typically below-average boring Christmas crap" level.  From there it's the usual routine of sleigh-bells, crappy outfits, Tiffany's cringeworthy English and awkwardly shoehorned product placement that you're expecting.  Everyshot app is my best friend, is Everyshot app your best friend?  Awful as it obviously is, it's still the best thing with the SNSD brand to come out this year.  It's been that kind of a year for them.

December 9th - Younha - Bluff





Christmas songs are getting sneakier and sneakier.  Since everybody knows that they're all fucking crap, now agencies are trying a new tactic - the subliminal Christmas song which has all the elements of Christmas sneakily played down yet lurking in the background, but remains the usual ballad garbage anyway with exactly the same musical characteristcs.  "Bluff" initially may not seem like a Christmas song at all, but then at 2:50 the music video reveals its true colours with a tinsel wreath swaying gently on a door like a IU fan hoisted into a noose and left dangling by a deranged netizen lynch mob, as if we weren't going to notice that.  I guess Younha and her agency actually want people to listen to this generic ballad slop after December 25th, and I'd happily say "fat chance" but to be honest this tactic will probably work a treat given the way Korea laps up musical garbage.  "Bluff", indeed.

December 10th - Solar (Mamamoo) - Only Longing Grow





My longing for some decent fucking music certainly only grew after listening to this utter shit.  Another song which keeps the Christmas content light and breezy in the hope that you'll stop puking tinsel long enough to listen to the damn thing, Mamamoo's Solar proves that she's a pretty girl with a nice voice who can make music just as boring as the best vocalists out there.  It's exactly the same as any awful western Christmas ballad tripe only even less catchy, and tellingly the most interesting moment comes right at the end of the song when the piano does a little bit of "Joy To The World" which is also a shit song but still a million times better than this trash.  Not a single k-pop fan would listen to this poo if it was released on Barry Manilow's Christmas album and honestly that's where music like this belongs.  To legally listen to this you should be over 70 and have photo ID.

December 11th - Girls' Generation TaeTiSeo - Winter Story





Well aren't Girls' Generation's TaeTiSeo subunit a bunch of cunts.  Clearly concerned that "Dear Santa" might just be a little too excitable and upbeat in the main body of the song after that horrid sleepytime R&B vocal wank intro for fuckheads, here they come again with a full song of balladeering because too much quality music at Christmas time might get geriatric k-pop fans all fired up and get the blood flowing and the adrenaline pumping then their fucking pacemakers might fail... oh wait, it's young people with their life still ahead of them that listen to this?  Well fuck me.  TaeTiSeo keep things nice and basic for all you 18 year olds with 88 year old music taste, turning some shit Christmas song that already sucked a rainwater tank full of jizz into a generic soundalike of Extreme's "More Than Words", because nothing says Christmas like stupid hair metal bands turning to ballads so they can get on the charts.  I especially love how Tiffany says "take one" at the start of the song, insinuating that they did actually nail this song on the very first attempt and didn't make any fuckups, even though it's all actually prerecorded in the studio and then mimed anyway (you don't get this sort of audio fidelity from five people sitting in a room with unplugged guitars and singing with no microphones anywhere near them).  In any event the real fuckup is obviously that this song exists at all, maybe it really is "take one" because who the fuck would want to sing this garbage twice.

December 14th - Jelly Christmas (Jellyfish Entertainment) - Love Fireplace





You might think wood fires are all cozy and warm and in keeping with the Christmas spirit but did you know that wood heaters totally fuck the environment right up the ass?  The town of Launceston in Tasmania, Australia is small with a population of around 100,000 people yet it was one of Australia's most polluted cities years ago purely because of wood heating.  The town actually managed to improve their air quality by 40% and prevent approximately 30 pollution-related deaths per year solely by getting rid of the fucking wood burners in people's houses.  Burning wood might smell nice, but we westerners with our Internets and fast-paced societies rely on trees to absorb all the toxic shit we spew out into the world during our mad rush to consume every last natural resource ever, and when you burn the wood you release that same crap back out into the atmosphere and before you know it toxic chemicals like benzene, formaldehyde and benzo-a-pyrene are all up in your body giving you terminal ass cancer.  Korean MV directors of course don't care about any of this, because environment be damned there's money to be made, and maybe you don't care either because maybe you're an old fuck like me who is probably going to die before the real global environment-related shit starts hitting the fan - but you're still welcome to hate this song just because the music sucks.

December 14th - Lee Moonsae, Roy Kim ft Hanhae - This Christmas





How much does this Christmas song suck dick?  Let us count the ways:
  • "Happy Christmas, yo" intro
  • Refusal of any of the artists to actually physically appear in the MV because they don't want to die of embarrassment
  • Lyrics appearing on screen karaoke-style just to drive it home that this is as thoughtlessly-made as the average karaoke video
  • Christmas decorations hiding polluted cityscapes in the background
  • Robots seriously wtf
  • Roy Kim
  • Obligatory rap verse
  • Boring mid-paced pop/funk like everything these days
Verily, it doth suck a golf ball through a garden hose.

December 17th - UV - Roasted Clam





I've never been able to work out why this is the case, but there's a big tradition in Australia of eating prawns... at Christmas time only.  (Not "shrimp" - Paul Hogan's iconic "shrimp on the barbie" line was made purely for tourist export - Australians don't call them shrimp and we very rarely barbeque them because the little fucking things are fiddly as shit and they tend to fall down the gaps in the barbeque grill and it's equally as difficult to get them to stay put on a skewer.  We don't drink stupid Fosters beer either - EVER.)   Maybe it's only because we can afford the expensive little shits once per year, or maybe it's because fresh shriPRAWNS are only in season in Australia in December and the imported off-seasondodgy-as-fuck frozen slave labour ones taste like shit in a can.  I honestly have no idea of the true reason.  However, what I can tell you for sure is that the moment in UV's "Roasted Clam" at 1:08 where one of the guys on the group pretends that the prawn is his fucking shriveled tiny cock is not only the most Christmas-like moment of this video, but in all of k-pop Christmas MV making since people began making them.  It really warmed the soul to see this touching moment and it could only have been made better if the song was something cool from UV instead of the usual Christmas ballad trash we've all heard before a million times.

December 17th - Dickpunks - Remember You





I'm not sure exactly how it happened, but Christmas in Korea is primarily thought of as a "couples holiday" where people who are partnered up use the time to buy each other shit, go for long walks in the park, propose marriage, and generally act all sweet and nice to each other in public.  Human garbage like the worthless scum who comment on Nate and Naver (and that international k-pop fans think the opinion of these dullards is oh-so-relevant even though what's being translated is basically the Korean equivalent of YouTube comments) can't stand this of course, because it reinforces their own loneliness - none of them could hold down a relationship to save themselves because no rational human being would date someone as revolting as a Korean netizen.  Dickpunks illustrate the plight of one such netizen who goes out and buys gifts for his crush, which she really enjoys... until the end of the video where she tells him that she discovered he upvoted comments on Nate about how he was disappointed in IU, upon which she rightly scorns him and fades out of his life.  The lesson: all the money, flowers and jewelry in the world can't buy you love if you're a netizen fuckhead, because nobody wants to date a cyberbullying piece of shit.  Just so netizens globally actually do sit through all of this video and absorb this important message, Dickpunks have been careful to make the music as boring and middle-of-the-road as possible so it would appeal to their crappy ultra-conservative music taste and thus keep them watching, which is very thoughtful and clever.

December 20th - April - Snowman





Oh look it's the group with that girl in it younger than Dani but who nobody complains about or calls DSP's CEO a pedo over even though in this video all the girls are in bed together like some creepy underage lesbian porn.  I guess k-pop fans will let it slide because they only like to cyberbully young girls when it's trendy... and the trend of bullying April hasn't really kicked off yet (give it time).  Obviously this song is shit but it's actually better than everything else on this list, probably because musically it's just like any other boring average dull k-pop girl song rather than going for the typical shithouse carolesque melodies or super-soft balladeering that has sunk every other song on this list deep down into the bottom of the tinsel barrel of stale jizz.

December 23rd - BTS - Run (Christmas version)





Fuck it, why even try?  BTS have the right idea.  It's only some imported shitty holiday, nobody cares - just throw a fucking Santa hat on, sing your latest comeback again and call it a Christmas version this time.  BTS did this one so quickly and thoughtlessly that they didn't even bother to adjust their reindeer antlers so they fit properly.  Fans of BTS will love this as you get all up close and personal with the members to the point where you can pretty much reach out with a tissue and wipe off their 23 excess layers of BB cream, plus you get to see them act all "spontaneous" and "fun" in that k-pop agency rubber-stamped way which doesn't involve any actual spontaneity or fun but long-time Kpopalypse readers should be educated enough by now to accept that these things don't actually exist for k-pop employees in 2015.  The song is strictly average all the way, with nothing whatsoever notable about it, which puts it in exactly the same boat as the April song, and the only reason why I like the April song maybe about 0.00001% more is that I didn't already hear it and get bored of it a month ago.

December 23rd - Secret - 2015 Christmas message





I don't usually include these stupid Christmas message things in these lists but this one has a dance at the end and damn they look better in it than they have at any time since "Shy Boy".  Now all someone just needs to do is give them a decent song again one day.  I guess TS Entertainment missed the opportunity to give then the Christmas gift of music that doesn't suck, so maybe they can save that particular present for one of the girls' birthdays.

December 23rd - Chris Jung - Sad Christmas





Why try indeed.  Chris Jung doesn't give a fuck about spending any money at all and has just thrown a snow filter over some postcards, yay cunt.  Notably Seoul isn't a very highly featured city in the postcards, I guess this guy doesn't want people to know where he lives and that's fair enough, I'd be in hiding too after releasing crap like this into the world.  If one of these cities gets nuked in the near future, you know why - they were looking for Chris Jung and playing process of elimination.

December 23rd - In The Moon - Christmas Rain (Love Me Tonight)





In this video for this absolutely generic and standard ballad that sounds like just every other ballad everywhere ever, the female protagonist does the following:
  • Walks to the top of a very small (paved) hill and spins around a bit, going "wow it's a hill!  Isn't nature grand!"
  • Plays team sports without any of the right equipment, or anyone to play with
  • Looks at cheap $2 glass crystals hanging in a store and smiles like they're the most fascinating thing ever
  • Waits at a train station grinning at nothing like that autistic guy who is always on the train you catch
  • Wanders around in the snow like she's never seen snow before (okay this one would be normal if she lived where I do)
These seem like unusual activities however people experienced in dealing with drug users will tell you that they are pretty standard behaviours for people who are baked out of their fucking skull.  I think I've just found Korea's equivalent of Stoner Sloth.  In any event I'm pretty sure I know what's in that box she's holding at the end.

December 24th - Nine Muses - Santa Baby





You can always tell the Christmas videos that agencies have left to the very last minute to create not just by their release date but also because the music videos are consistently lazy as fuck.  Believe it or not this is the official music video on the Nine Muses channel and not a fanmade fap picture collection.  They didn't even bother to fix the fucking aspect ratio on half of these pictures, diluting both the professionalism and the fap value significantly.  This makes Star Empire the k-pop agency version of that idiot you live with who got himself an amazing new widescreen TV and craps on and on about the amazing picture quality and what a great investment the TV was but is too dim to notice everything's all squished and couldn't be bothered taking the five seconds to learn how to use his expensive new toy that he's so fucking proud of well enough to fix the issue.  I know that this song is a cover of some supermarket-background-music trash but I just wanted to end this list with some hot girls.  Don't judge me... well, okay you can if you want (and no doubt will) but I don't care.



That's the end of the Kpopalypse Christmas roundup for another year, merry Christmas to all!  Hopefully you enjoyed this list, and hopefully you were smart enough to not click on any of the videos!  The Christmas roundup will return in 2016!

xmas2015foot

Saturday Shitfest #29

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I hope everyone had a good Christmas. I have plans to meet up with two awesome people, so I hope you all have a fun day after Christmas as well.

Sunday Shitpost #4

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This week's edition is really short because I'll be gone most of the day.



News Story #1: I would pee in Irene's butt

I don't have time to figure out how to get gfycats to work on here again.

News Story #2: This week's Weekly Idol is worth a watch



News Story #3: Journalists are insulting Tzuyu by comparing her to EXID's Junghwa

That's almost as insulting as you guys saying that I look like Jaejoong.

News Story #4: Unfortunately, Lee Hi is working on making new music


I wonder how long it took for the makeup artists and photo editors to make Lee Hi not look like a troll.

I'm sure her music will blow buckets of barf and blue balls' ball-busting jizz.

News Story #5: Kim Hyun Joong, You Are...



Oh shit, you celebrated too soon. You are the father...

UKMAS is Back!

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2015 is finally coming to an end which means it's finally time for The Ultimate Kpop Music Awards Show to make it's return!

I'm sure you all are absolutely ecstatic. 

Yay.


It's safe to say that this has been an okay year for Kpop. We had our fair share of the usual mainstream pop music, some ballads for those who actually give a shit, some pretty competent rookie group releases, and, well, whatever the fuck this is supposed to be. There's been a lot of overrated and underrated music, which is why I once again call upon you, AKF readers, to bring justice to the music that actually deserves acknowledgement this year.

For those of you who don't know how this works, all you have to do is take the survey and nominate up to five songs for each of the following categories. I will tally the votes and the top seven (it was five the last time but, what the hell, let's have two more) songs for each category with the highest number of votes will make it to the next stage, where you guys will take a poll to decide the final winner.

Here are the categories (I didn't want to have too many like the last time because that shit took forever and a half to tally):
  • Best Song 
  • Best Music Video (whether or not the song is good is irrelevant here)
  • Best Album
  • Best Dance (Male)
  • Best Dance (Female)
  • (And the ever so prestigious) Worst Song
Save me all the trouble and only mention title tracks (or at least anything that has an official music video). You can suggest up to five nominees for each category (UPDATE: Make sure you mention the name of both the artist and the song. Responses only stating the name of the artist will be ignored). Also, it's UKMAS 2015, so yeah, only 2015 musicI'm gonna be having shitloads of exams in the upcoming two months, so I won't have much time to tally votes. I can't tell for sure when I'm gonna post the nominees list so let's just say you guys are gonna have a lot of time to vote. Adios!

Here's the survey

Bruce Jenner wins Most Beautiful Face for TC Candler's 2015 List

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I have no idea who or what TC Candler is, but people are making a big deal out of this list. This list just goes to show no matter how hard women try, men will still end up on top.

Stupid Things Fangirls Utter 87

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This comment comes from this AKP article about the Biebs' thoughts on CL's "Hello Bitches".



If you search "justin bieber drugs," there's a whole bunch of articles talking about him snorting cocaine and smoking marijuana. For all I know, he could have been high as fuck while watching CL's "Hello Bitches" and thought it was fucking hilarious. We will never know except for Biebs himself, but given the likely fact that one would have to be extremely baked in the first place to like CL's "Hello Bitches," a compliment from Bieber shouldn't be something you would want.

If you have any submissions for STFU, send them to hanyeseul_fag@yahoo.com or to @antikpopfangirl on Twitter.

The 2015 Honours List

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Throughout this year, we have all aged; grown wiser and more experienced. However, time has also ravaged our once youthful looks, and we are left with a feeling that maybe we could have put our time to better use. I, for one, used my time absolutely perfectly: listening to lots of shit music, some mediocre music, and a decent amount of good music too now that I think about it. I won't bore you with my wonderful opinions on music that isn't performed in Korean and will instead focus all of my buzzwords and poor reviewing skills onto describing my 15 favourite singles of the year created by folks who hail from the same general area as JYP. How I have chosen to construct this is through using the best song from each of the months of the year, whilst adding in three extra tracks at my own discretion to bring it up to a more pleasant number. I know that you readers have not been privy to four of my honours lists, so I will flag up how every song on the list fits into the magnificent puzzle of my opinions. Once more into the breach my friends, before we are done with the crushing mediocrity of 2015 for good.




15



화 (Mad Clown feat. Jinsil) [Best of January]

If you cast your mind back to January, you may notice that there is very little that is worth remembering in the slightest. All except for this song about how an angry glasses wearing nerd feels great anger towards a woman, thank God guns are not legal in Korea. Mad Clown is one of the real success stories of Show Me the Money 2, having signed to a pretty large label and seen a fair amount of success in features and solo EPs. I find his style of rapping to be skilful and technical but sometimes it can be not particularly interesting to listen to for any real length of time. Fire is good because the instrumental directs Mad Clown's flow whilst allowing him to play with the beat just enough to retain his flavour. Starship have also worked out that Mad Clown isn't particularly good at conveying a positive emotion so he came in sounding straight up angry on this, which works with the swanky horn in a pretty major way. Jinsil does her job more than adequately as a chorus girl disguised as the other side of the conflict. At the end of the day I just really like horns on rap music and I think Mad Clown is a good rapper so this song performed admirably in giving the people what they want. Shame that the rest of January was shite.

14

Devil (Super Junior) [Best of July]

As I said in the July Honours List, Super Junior have aged like wine, going from representing everything bad about old K-Pop to the SM artists with the most consistently high quality output. Granted, I still couldn't tell you how many members make up SuJu, or the names of about half of them, but their music is increasingly grabbing me as an innocent bystander. 'Devil' is very much in control of its atmosphere, meaning that the listener finds themselves wanting to dance without explicitly being told to; a cheap tactic relied upon by all too many club #bangerz. You may also notice the prevalence of the horn once again, expect that theme to run throughout this list. While on the topic, I might as well say that the instrumental works as well as it does because it sounds like they got in actual session musicians to play the actual instruments heard in the backing track. I have no problem with electronic music, but if you want the sound of guitar, it is undeniable that the method which will give you the best result would be to call in a guitar player instead of getting a producer to insert a vaguely approximated MIDI sample. Super Junior are dads of the K-Pop scene, but they are doing it better than so many awful groups of children.

13


Everest (Huckleberry P) [Best of November]

Hi-Lite records have remained relevant and high selling despite the fact that their roster of artists is one of the most deeply unappealing I have seen on any record label in history. I mean, they are the home of The Cohort, I don't believe much else needs to be said. Despite the shitness that emanates from wall to wall in the Hi-Lite offices, one sole person wants to project an air of quality onto their work. Step forward Huckleberry P, a rapper who is both skilled and sounds good on record. After still not quite being able to comprehend his speed on the fairly decent 'Bassline' then I think I began to consider myself a fan of sorts. 'Everest' ensured that I stayed that way with its moody production and wonderfully measured delivery on the part of Mr. P. It is also in contention for the edgiest music video of the year as Huckleberry P attempts to climb a mountain of homoerotic thoughts as the jazz piano plays in the background. It's the type of thing I would expect to see in a Herzog film, yet we are given such high art in swaggy music videos. Truly, 2015 was a wonderful time in which to be alive.


12


Awoo (Lim Kim) [Best of April]

Lim Kim falls into the art pop bracket, in that she is able to straddle the line between K-Pop and K-indie and both sides still like her. A critics darling who the public also cry out for, think Kendrick Lamar or Carly Rae Jepsen, but with more songs about cats. In 'Awoo', pop sensibilities are zhooshed up with a bit of indie flair, despite sitting very clearly in the court of the former. Kim has a rather odd voice which is used to her advantage, creating a song around this key appeal of hers, instead of being provided with generic pop production and hoping for a cheap hit. No, 'Awoo' will stand up because no-one else could have made this song work in quite the same way; there are more technically gifted singers than Lim Kim currently working in Korea but they are not necessarily able to provide the same slightly flirtatious tone, the same style of vocal cadence, the fact that her voice actually does sorta sound like a cat. Whilst I can't say I am overly sold on the rest of her stuff, including that which she has done with Togeworl, I can see myself bumping 'Awoo' for years to come

11


거북선 (Ja Mezz, Andup &Song Mino feat. Paloalto) [Best of August]

Say what you will about Show Me the Money and its ridiculous forced drama and turf wars, the songs that came out of it this year were of a surprisingly high quality. None moreso than this first elimination round effort from Team ZiPal. What we all discovered about Zico this year is that we were happy to keep him around provided that he shut his mouth and stayed as a producer. Admittedly later in the year we became increasingly happy for him to make his own annoyingly good music again. Anyways, 'Turtle Ship' incorporates traditional Korean instruments over trap drums; the chorus is about going to war in the title vessel, whilst the rappers on the track generally brag about how great they are. I admit it, only the production sounds like a positive aspect when I explain it like that, but every rapper has a style so distinct from each other that they bounce off each other to create unrivalled energy that they were rightly praised for on the show. It's a shame that after this began the witch hunt for our saviour Blacknut, we saw Super Bee become more vocal, and the final turned out to be really very underwhelming indeed; if they had ended after Episode 6 then we would have had nought but happy memories.

10

 Spell My Name Right (Yankie) [Best of May]

I want to direct all of your attention to this free download of Yankie's album 'Andre' because you all deserve to be happy. Yankie released three songs with MVs this year, any of which could have ended up on this list, but I ultimately used that fact that 'Spell My Name Right' had topped an honours list as a main point of leverage. I have nothing against feature verses; they add versatility to a track, and it can be cool to see your favourite artists working with one another, but I am also impressed when a rapper so effectively carries a track for its whole duration; switching up flow constantly, and sounding like they are enjoying themselves whilst doing it. DJ Pumkin's beat is somewhat clumsy, but it does allow for Yankie to get louder and louder during the chorus and filling the verses with even more bombast than Yankie's machine gun flow already provides them with. If you liked this then I do recommend you check out the album because the dude came through with something that feels whole, rather than a title track surrounded by filler. In order to bring balance to the world he did release a shit song with Jessi, but that ended up on Primary's album rather than his own which means that Yankie gets off scot free.

9


Sober (BIGBANG) [Best of June]

I guess that I will be given shit for admitting to liking a song from YG. I apologise dear reader, we cannot all be edgy contrarians like you. 'Sober', much like the best song that G-Dragon ever did as a solo artist, has a hugely chantable quality to it; it had me jumping along and singing to words about how you needed to get wasted because your girlfriend stopped sucking your dick. BIGBANG have got to a point in their career where they are able to exercise a fair amount of creative control, and because of that 'Sober' actually sounds like it has life to it, too many boy groups this year debuted with incredibly bland songs which were trying to present focus group created ideas of what 'cool' was. BIGBANG's music sounds like they are making what they want to make, warts and all, and 'Sober' is the song that I have chosen to represent this quality, primarily because so many of the other songs were simply god awful.

8


Diving (Zizo) [Best of December]

Many an edgy hip-hop fan will rue the day that beats became more important lyrics, yet I like to rue their existence because for a song which namedrops Macaulay Culkin in the first line to still be good, the beat has to be helping. Zizo should have been a Show Me the Money 2 success story, reaching the final would usually give you enough of a platform to launch yourself, however much like the eventual winners Soul Dive, Zizo has seen nothing but underground acclaim. He dropped this very recently and it has the best beat of the year, overlaying a fat synth with a melodic higher synth and a children's choir. It sounds triumphant despite the fact that neither myself nor Zizo have achieved all that much in the past three minutes. Zizo has merely wandered around New York pretending to be from the streets whilst I have been lying on my back contemplating what to masturbate to next. Watching Bambino fancams has never felt so accomplished.

7

Like OOH-AHH (TWICE) [Best of October]

I can come across as a pretty pretentious guy, I do not deny this fact. However, my love of German cinema and American literary criticism does not stop me from falling deeply in love with a pure pop jam. I tried to watch SIXTEEN but found myself largely disinterested, I kept up with the final lineup and chose Jeongyeon and Sana as my favourites because they were the hottest. When the song dropped I remember thinking 'This is some pretty good stuff' but it was a slow burner and I found myself returning to listen just one more time every hour like clockwork. It was a dangerous drug and I was hooked on whatever the fuck 'colour pop' is. Sure the rap break is utter shite and Jeongyeon gets basically no lines, but I can't hear the hate because I am screaming the chorus too loudly and staring at Sana too much. I have ended up with another group to stan which I didn't plan for, I wanted to keep my heart as cold as humanly possible.

6

Shadow (The Legend) [Discretionary Addition]

The Legend used to be a ballad group, and it shows. They also hired someone who knew how to use this to the best of their abilities to give us some genuinely ambitious pop production. This song very neatly fits into the specific style of pop which can be defined by its ridiculous amounts of pathos that are usually laughed out of the room for taking themselves far too seriously. However, The Legend not only have the singing chops to imbue what they are saying with a degree of passion, but they have a song that sounds like it deserves to be taken as seriously as they are singing it. The beginning of a verse to the end of a chorus has a slow crescendo with the beat buoying on the vocalists, ending with what is potentially the best chorus of the year. The Legend should be used as a lesson in taking a male ballad group and allowing them to indulge in vocal wankery whilst still bringing forth a song that is worth listening to; they don't just need to create static songs which feature them singing over a generic set of piano chords.

5

Mood Swing (Seulong feat. Blacknut) [Discretionary Addition]

You may have noticed that I really like songs with a controlled atmosphere, I have already mentioned this quality about a couple songs so far and I will mention it a few more times before the list is out but I want to draw the most attention to it here because without its controlled atmosphere, this song would be absolutely nothing. Seulong sounds on breaking point throughout the verse and then the instrumentation for the chorus explodes in the most low-key manner possible and he sounds like he is letting loose in some way. The Blacknut verse is fantastic and keeps with the mood, a surprising fact since he is usually known for writing songs in which he challenges people to a fight. I expect quality from him, but not as a featured artist necessarily, so this was a true revelation. Seulong proves to us that Korean RnB doesn't all need to be boring attempts to copy Zion T's boring music, and instead you can make a song which sounds like it was performed by the saddest jazz band in the world.

4

Black Swan (Rainbow) [Best of February]

I don't like to deal with absolutes, not least in matters of subjectivity, but the Korean public were straight up wrong with regards to 'Black Swan' and it causes me great pain to think that we only got half the live versions of this song that we expected because its sales figures were so pitiful. At this point just pretend I went on another diatribe about how precise the control of the song's atmosphere is so I don't need to repeat myself; make it a compelling diatribe, I have a reputation to uphold. I don't particularly care about any group on DSP which is odd considering both Rainbow and KARA have made some of the best Korean pop songs of all time, and AJAX aren't even awful. Is it the willingly indifferent such as myself who allowed Rainbow to flop so badly? We are all happy to enjoy songs and complain when they aren't given enough promotion time, but where are we all when it comes to actively supporting the group? I'll tell you: wanking. We are wanking because Hyunyoung is on screen and gyrating to this fucking fantastic chorus.

3


Wow Wow Wow (Jun Jin feat. Eric) [Best of September]

I am as surprised as you that not one, but two members of SHINHWA made a good song. Admittedly it was the same song and Eric didn't even do that much to deserve any credit but that doesn't detract from my sheer shock and awe that they are capable of musical quality outside of the utterly fantastic 'This Love'. To me, Jun Jin is now the coolest guy alive and I would do anything to be him, looking and sounding so suave in this wonderfully moody sounding anthem which I absolutely adore, despite being unable to place my finger on exactly what imbues the song with such a high quality. Maybe it is the huge drums, the dissonant synth, the velvety vocals, the urgent manner in which the song breaks into the chorus. I just said the main fantastic things about it using a contrived writing device, accept my opinions and swiftly move on please, I still have two more entries to write and very little else in my magical bag of writing tricks.

2

Take Care of You (Giriboy) [Best of March]

I lionised it upon release and lo and behold it is just as fantastic as the day it came out. Giriboy is far from the most talented rapper with regards to interesting flow but he weaves together everything he has in a song which carries a mood that I don't believe I have associated with a Korean hip-hop song before: heartfelt. The lyrics are narratively good enough that I get a little something in my eye just reading along to them as Mr. Boy seems to be pouring his soul out over the fantastically minimalist Nochang beat. Giriboy can come across as something of a neighbourhood wasteman who likes to sit on his laurels due to the fact that girls want to fuck him and he works on Swings' record label, but sometimes he is able to pull it out of the bag and truly justify his place alongside the rest of JM. This song just ticks all of the right boxes for me and I am surprised as you that it has not made it to the top spot. Eagle eyed readers will notice that I have only used two of my three allotted discretionary additions which adds to the huge amounts of mystery and suspense surrounding my favourite song of the year. I would hate to keep you waiting any longer lest you suffer a heart attack due to hyper-anticipation.

1


The Time Goes On (BewhY) [Discretionary Addition]

I used to be hugely derisive off Korean hip-hopp, in my pretentious and stuck-up fashion I considered myself something of an aficionado on the genre and I thought that there was very little skill in the Korean scene and that everything was nothing more than a clumsy mating ritual. As this list would indicate, I no longer think that way; but many hip-hop heads do still shun the Korean scene. I would like nothing more than to direct them towards the work of BewhY, who still flounders in the underground whilst CJAMM can find mainstream success. This song rounds off his ridiculously superb album 'Time Travel' and it comes across as contemplative, defiant, purposeful; all whilst fitting in about three songs worth of lyrics. The fact that BewhY went out so early on Show Me the Money is ridiculous because he is doubtless one of the top five rappers in Korea, but he ended up against recognisable faces. 'The Time Goes On' has a fantastic progression which culminates in the cello-backed final verse before erupting into a triumphant final chorus; BewhY understands that in order for the most energetic bits of a song to work, there must be a moment of calm in order to provide perspective. I find it ridiculous that I didn't include it on the honours list back in March, and I thoroughly recommend that you listen to it many hundreds of times.

RIP Fappable Hani

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Hot Pink is a terrible era for any Hani appreciaters out there. This is what she looks like now.




This was Hani three years ago, when she was her most fappable. It's a sad time.

Stupid Things Fangirls Utter 88

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This queerbait stated that Seolhyun and Chanmi dressed up as Sexy Santas is trash.



This would be one of the STFUs where I could write "I don't have to write shit" and go back to watching A Pink fancams, but I picked this comment for a reason. If you can't enjoy hot Asian girls trying to make Christmas a better experience, you must be one miserable fuck who spends all of their time slut shaming hot chicks on the Internet. Sure, you could eat healthy and go to the gym and learn to style yourself better so that some dudes would want to bang you, but no, you're happily content with being a fatass and hating on hotter women.

What makes everything worse is while what I just wrote could apply to many fangirls out there, a fucking dude wrote this comment. What the hell is wrong with you, dude?

If you have any submissions for STFU, send them to hanyeseul_fag@yahoo.com or to @antikpopfangirl on Twitter.

Why Bandwagons Are Bad.

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Just when you thought it would end, the motherfuckin' saga continues.



"Not this shit again."

You know, at first I thought this whole misunderstanding couldn't get even dumber but as usual, people that live their lives through the internet never cease to amaze me.

7. [+62, -7] The lolita controversy was based off of her '23' music video, not this one... People brought up 'You & I' but most of that seemed forced. So is there a clarification for '23'?


11. [+33, -9] I agree with one of the comments here. If she really had nothing dirty about her and none of her scandals had any merit, would she have fallen as deeply as she has now? From Eunhyuk's scandal to lolita to Britney Spears, it's all just been piling and piling up... so how are you fans going to clarify her scene where she spills the milk then? Sigh, I feel so bad for you guys... IU's fans are impossible to communicate with.

12. [+23, -5] There were a lot of misunderstandings with this scandal but the point of the scandal was the lyrics to 'Zeze', which a clarification still hasn't been given for. Don't try to distract from the main point with posts like this.


IU gave a clarification. Scratch that, two clarifications. The director of the "23" music video gave a clarification. Hell, even the very publishing company that criticized IU apologized after the clarifications. (The apologies count as clarifications because she clarifies within the apologies.)

I don't know what more these netizens could want. They were dumb enough to misunderstand the context of the music video and were so pissed off that IU insulted their own (lack of) intelligence demanding this and that. She gave them what they wanted. Her director gave them what they wanted, yet they're still acting like she hasn't done shit since this whole "scandal" happened.

You know what this whole thing has me scared of? The increasing amount of political correctives that people all of a sudden care about. It seems that if something is in existence it will offend someone just by existing, and the big reason why is because being offended is the easiest way to get attention now a days.



I mean, think about it. Think about how many (really fucking stupid) "twitter wars" have started in K-pop fandoms alone just because someone took very specific screen-shots of a tweet or something on the internet and then spread it around claiming about how offensive it is, without even looking into the context of where it came from.

Via InfinitelySY's ask.fm:



What I'm about to say is an oxymoron, but these people who are pretending to be offended by an issue, are in a sense, being offensive themselves. Why? Because not only are they corrupting an issue that is very serious and needs a lot of attention, but they probably don't care about it in the first place, and are trying to gain internet fame by pretending to care.

Take the "Zeze" issue. When taken out of context like it was, it looks IU was playing with the idea of pedophilia and child abuse, however anybody that actually paid any attention to what she was actually trying to do with "23", "Zeze", and her whole album in general was speak against those issues. However that can't even be looked at with her original intent any more by most because some dumbasses on the internet of all places couldn't understand the basis of a fucking satire and people actually gave them attention, and even worse, believed them.



I don't even know whose worse here: the people that started this mess or the bandwagoners. Whenever Donald Trump *shudders* appears on the news or television in general my mom always says "He's not the scary one. All of his supporters rallying behind him are the scary ones because they're out there making this ideology into a reality." The people who made all this shit up are of course dangerous, however the bandwagoners are the ones who give them attention and spread all of the lies and misguided non-evidence around. 

When it comes to issues like this, you cannot just take everything you see someone on social post about as 100% accurate information. Can you think about how shitty this planet would be if we only had YouTube comments as our only source of information? Pretty damn shitty if you ask me. In order to fully make a conscious opinion on a subject you have to be well versed on the context, especially in something like music where everything is pretty much up to interpretation and speculation. Can you simply interpret IU as supporting pedophilia? Yeah, but that doesn't make you right. Especially when you demand she prove you wrong and she and others involved have released clarifications explaining their intentions with their work proving you to be wrong.




The Top 10, Top Lists of 2015

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It helps to display lists graphically for even more efficiency.
If there's one thing people love, it's lists. Nothing else but lists. This year had a lot of lists, most of which came out at the end of the year. Probably so people know what things to put in their lists. As part of my community service, I've taken the initiative and compiled the best lists to come out this year, so you can quickly and efficiently figure out what things to like and what things are better than other things. This list isn't in any particular order nor is it year end lists, mind you.


1.) This person really likes making lists of dick sizes and bulges, and to be honest, I don't really think there's anything wrong with that. I mean, if that's what your audience likes, then go for it. Let it never be said that Soyeon Friend doesn't appreciate an analysis of things that some people might be grossed out by. I particularly like how this person breaks down their analysis by both bulge and dick size.

2.) Here's a list of bad k-fashion. You should bother clicking on it for the section about camel toe.

3.) This really was the year for Seolhyun's coming out as evidenced by this list that shows she was the most searched for/fapped to k-pop idol of the year. Another equally good indicator of how popular someone is, is the amount of butt-hurt surrounding an idol, and as I recall, Seolhyun had a bunch of it. On the plus side, I did really like when she got to meet the cardboard cutout of herself.

Umm ... Excuse me, but the door is open ... E ... Excuse me. OK, I'll come back later.
4.) It's painful to realize it, but the vast amount of k-pop fans are 14-year-old girls who don't really know what to like. If they were older, they would probably like better things, unless they were idiots. Unfortunately, people who don't know any better like dumb things as evidenced by this list that shows that Big Bang was like the best thing on YouTube this year as far as k-pop goes or something. I hold out hope that in a few years these girls will outgrow their Big Bang phase and move on to better things. I mean, I've never liked anything dumb.

That other girls like, "Dayum gurl get at me about dat padding."
5.) Thankfully, it's not all 14-year-old girls. Yes, kpop is big enough to have enough room for even people like CarolinaPanthers2015. I'd really like to get in touch with him again to ask him how he feels about this list of the best tits in kpop. I'd also like to ask him about the Panthers' undefeated season coming to an end, but as I found out while interviewing him, I don't think he actually likes football.

6.) I guess this list might be sort of cheating, but I still like it as it's like a barometer of the most fapped to things of the year. I'm sort of disappointed by Bambino being at the top because, well, it's just cheating, heh. If you're like me and like to peruse new fancams, you've no doubt been inundated by Bambino this and Bambino that. It's pretty much just there to be not-porn. Oh well, at least we get things like this actual porn.

7.) This is just a list of No. 1 hits of the year. Enjoy.


8.) This isn't really a list, again; however, it does raise the really important question of which k-pop has the wettest pussy. I'd really like to get some input on this, as well as which k-pops can squirt. I'm sure people would list the obvious ones like Hyuna or something, but I'm more interested in which k-pops are like secretly wet, you know the ones who if they crawled across the floor would leave a trail like a snail. I bet it's the one you least expect, not like the one pictured above.

9.) This is just funny because someone bothered to write words about iKon.

10.) ...

Best of the Worst: Dec. 31, 2015

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Welcome, friends, to the last Best of the Worst of 2015. So what's been going on in kpop in the final week of the year? Fans getting outraged about stupid shit, of course.

Yes, TVXQ fans have been cry-crying about iKON's fandom light sticks, which are the same orangey-red color as their beloved group's. It seems that by being a similar color, the iKON sticks are fucking with the integrity of kpop and "disrupting the peace" between fandoms.

I think it's time to call in Officer Yura to maintain the peace. 





  • Fuse rates this year's kpop rookies in the most incomprehensible fashion. Their questionable list includes The Ark, a group they describe as "working it." Apparently, releasing exactly one single in April then falling off the face of the earth makes a group standout stars. By Fuse's own rating system, I'd say this list "needs work."


KPOPALYPSE's 30 favourite k-pop songs of 2015

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The Kpopalypse 2015 favourites list is here!  Read on to discover what Kpopalypse liked the most in 2015!

2015favehead


For my money, 2015 wasn't much of an improvement over 2014.  It wasn't much worse either.  After a peak between 2008-2011 and then a sharp decline, K-pop quality seems to have now flatlined according to Sturgeon's Law which states that 9 songs out of 10 will generally be shit.  That's fine, because I don't mind sifting through nine pieces of shit to get to one good song, as a radio DJ I do this sort of thing all the time.  Now you are the beneficiary of my investigation as I bring to you the best songs of the year, according to me!  Some things to note:
  • This list is inclusive from January 1st 2015 to December 31st 2015 and was published on December 31st 2015.  It may appear at a different time for some due to timezone differences.
  • Yes these are really my opinions, I haven't included anything for clickbait/edginess/troll purposes (although if you find yourself trolled I consider this an acceptable secondary outcome).
  • If this post is too sunny and positive for you (doubtful), I have a worst k-pop songs list for 2015 as well, so why not read it instead?
  • Only k-pop feature tracks with MVs or music show promotions are included, because I can't listen to everything.  Also it makes the post more visually interesting if there are videos.
  • Songs by k-pop artists in English, Japanese or other languages do count for this list, but covers of popular western songs do not.
  • Whether something is popular or unknown is not a factor in this list.  I don't care what won an award, how many fans something has, etc. - that's all herd-mentality stuff that doesn't interest me in the slightest.
  • Songs for OSTs, sporting events and Christmas songs are not eligible for this list, although none of them would have gotten into this list even if they were.
  • Contrary to popular belief of those who don't really read my posts properly (and probably won't read this either), I've never once claimed that my music taste is better than anyone else's.  Yes I do have a music industry background (teaching, management, touring, composition, audio engineering, production, blah de blah read the FAQ if you give a shit) but no that does not make my music taste "better".  If you enjoyed songs on my worst-of list and hated songs on my favourites list, that's totally fine.  The primary purpose of both the favourites AND the worst-of lists is laughs, entertainment, something for you to read to take your mind off the pointlessness of existence, discovery of songs for those of you who don't keep track of k-pop closely, creative writing fun times for myself, and documentation of songs for myself so I have a nice reference that I can link to friends and others who ask what I like and dislike.  Hopefully you enjoy the lists.  If not, that's fine but why people who hate my posts continue to read and comment about them is a continual mystery to me.
2015flower

Okay, that's enough preamble, time to count down the list!

30.  T-ara - So Crazy





For those who haven't noticed, much-maligned yet commercially successful k-pop songwriter Bravesound tends to write songs in pairs - almost every reasonably well-known Bravesound song also has an "evil twin".  I'm guessing that Bravesound habitually writes two songs with the same feel and farms them out to different agencies, and MBK has a tendency to consistently wind up with one of the "twins" (check the similarity between Teen Top's "To You" vs SPEED's "Pain The Love Of Heart" as a good example).  T-ara's "So Crazy" is a bit like the evil twin of AOA's "Heart Attack", and it's a slightly softer iteration of the same type of idea (although I believe it was originally written before), it doesn't quite contain the addictive melodies and squared-off dancefloor stomp that make "Heart Attack" so great but it makes up nicely by substituting it with some sexy tremolo guitar and interesting rhythms of its own.  It's clear enough at this point that T-ara don't give a crap about Korea and that this is a previously-rejected feature track which has been sort of lazily thrown out there by MBK to satisfy the group's core audience and tide them over until the next T-ara song for the market that actually matters (China) comes out, but it gets on the tail end of this list anyway for being funky and cool.  It's far from the best T-ara song out there but even a 2015 T-ara lazily phoning it in for the weak Korean market are still better than everything else released in k-pop this year... except the next 29 songs.

29.  Romeo - Lovesick





Apparently this group have been accused of copying Infinite, which is a hilarious theory to me given that every single k-pop boy group ever is copying various shades of New Kids On The Block, New Edition, Backstreet Boys, N-Sync, Boyz II Men, One Direction, etc etc fucking etc.  If we're going to start trying to throw copyrights onto "a bunch of guys with stupid hair standing around in suits" then it may be legally impossible for any agency to create another k-pop boy group song ever again.  Some people would probably be pretty happy about that, including me because it's no secret that I prefer the girl groups more but let's wait up before we throw Romeo to the Capulets because "Lovesick" is actually pretty damn impressive.  If you're actually able to stand watching the creepy camera stares and blinding white-on-white shots that take up about 75% of this video you'll find a decent song here complete with pedal point harmony, cool 80s style drum machine fills and no shitty breakdowns to kill the momentum.  Infinite fans are just jealous that this is the kind of quality song that they wish Infinite made this year but didn't, and if Infinite DID make this song, all you haters would be all over it like white on rice.

28.  Dynamic Duo ft. Nafla - J.O.T.S.





When Dynamic Duo aren't suckling at the twin teats of yolotrap/R&B hybrid bullshit and soft smooth p-funk inspired slop like every other Korean rapper ever these days, they unquestionably still have the ability to pull out something decent.  "J.O.T.S." (Jump Over The Slump) sounds to me like the type of track that they dearly want to produce all the time but rarely do because lord knows actual decent rap music doesn't pay the bills in 2015.  After all Dynamic Duo are older as Gaeko points out at the start of the first verse - they're old enough to remember the ancient (but not that ancient) quality days of hip-hop that the style has fallen so very, very far from since.  The music here rocks an atmosphere similar to Diabolic/Immortal Technique's "Frontlines" but the beat's got a little bit more pace and is dirtier, two very welcome improvements.  If I was Sulli I would appear in a nudie film so Choiza could fap to it as a reward for not writing stupid trendy bullshit for once, but I'm not, so all I can do is thank him and Gaeko from the bottom of my sweg.

27.  A.KOR - Always





When "Always" came out people commented that A.KOR had finally stopped copying 2NE1 and were doing something softer.  Of course those people were wrong, A.KOR are just copying a different side of 2NE1 now, the mid-tempo laid-back pop side rather than the bzzzt-bzzzt-bzz-bzz-bzzz-bzz-bz-bzzzzzzt-bzzzzt-bz-bz-bz-bz-bz side.  The result is great because Shinsadong Tiger hasn't had his brain cells all shoot out of the eye of his penis and into Han Ye Seul's snatch like Teddy has and therefore he still actually has some vague idea about how to write a pop chorus.  Blackjacks can't stand it of course (check out the wacky like/dislike ratio on the video plus all the general moaning about Kemy everywhere as if she's the only person in the group) but fortunately their sandy vaginas only contributed to the global reach of this great song which would have probably sunk without a trace had 2NE1 fans just learned to shut the fuck up and not say anything.

26.  D.Holic - Chewy





D.Holic might have an unfortunate name which seems purpose-built for making puns but they're one of the most promising new groups to come along in a while, simply because whoever is writing their songs isn't afraid to do some different shit which really stands out in a genre where musical progress tends to happen in very small increments.  The messing around with diatonic modes to give things a faux-Middle Eastern feel reminds me of f(x) and 2NE1 at their peak but D.Holic's songwriter has got a bit more harmonic sensibility and actually includes matching chords in his music at the same time, wow imagine that.  The production is also great with clear elements across the mix, not too many layers of noise and nice juicy sub-bass but without the boring slow beats that are ruining so much of k-pop right now.  I wouldn't be too hopeful about the girls' actual careers (I've heard one member has already left) but as far as probable flash-in-the-pan nugus go this'll do nicely while the rest of k-pop spins itself in relentless circles of "anything you can do, I can do exactly the same way".

25.  MBK Project - Don't Forget Me





Here's a song that I theoretically shouldn't like, but I do anyway.  Featuring members of T-ara, SPEED, The Seeya and DIA, "Don't Forget Me" both looks and sounds like a Christmas song, but mercifully it's just a "winter comeback" which is not quite the same thing (especially where I live).  Usually "winter songs" are so maudlin and boring that I just can't listen to them, but MBK show one again that they're the masters of the "ballad that isn't", creating a song which has a smooth ballad feel but is pushed along nicely by brisk chord changes plus a faster BPM than about 90% of Korea's hip-hop comebacks in 2015.  The styling is amazing given the puffy-jacket-and-beanie limitations the video directors were constrained by, and T-ara's Snowyeon in particular is looking better than she ever has.  The whole thing is really cruisy and nice, never once falling into dull R&B/yolo/vocal wank territory, and if you don't feel like waving back at Eunjung when she waves at the camera at 1:35 then you're a cold unfeeling machine as sociopathic as Dara+ and you should probably be deactivated by the YG ice cream truck for the greater good of humanity.

24.  Pure Boy - Wedding Day





You can always tell the "innocent male" k-pop group concepts because the members are wearing so much white all the time, which is a western cultural import as white represents virginity, clean sheets and fluffy bunnies, plus they have cheesy names like "Pure Boy".  In reality, like most cultural artifacts, "white = purity" is not grounded in reality - fluffy bunnies fuck all the time, white sheets are handy mainly for hiding cumstains and the young men in Pure Boy are probably just as likely to be dicking some nugu girls as they are to be masturbating each other in their dorms.  Concepts like these never age well for those down-the-track scandals, and if it were me debuting a male k-pop group I'd call them something honest and straight to the point, like CUMRAG.  Anyway these white-clad smiling young men sure do have themselves one hell of a decent song so who really gives a fuck, and it took me a while to get into this but once I closed my eyes, stopped watching the cheesy wedding crap in the video and imagined I was listening to After School Blue's sequel to "Wonder Boy" being covered by the Pet Shop Boys then it all kind of fell into place for me.  The only thing I'd really like to know is why does it say "The Look" in the bottom of the screen the whole way though, I know Koreans like English words and shit but there should be a legal limit to how much real-estate they should take up in a music video.

23.  Lovelyz - Hi~





Lovelyz are only ever good when they're working with songwriters OnePiece, who consistently get it right - whenever their feature tracks are farmed out to other producers instead we get crappy Fender Rhodes-driven shitballs like "Shooting Star" or generic-as-they-come "Into The New World" clones like "For You" (because k-pop apparently doesn't already have enough of those yet).  OnePiece (the name makes me cringe because it's the same as a lame anime or something but anyway) are working a signature sound into Lovelyz but they only get to write 50% of their feature tracks, probably because decent songwriters work at premium rates, only one good song per album is necessary for promotions, and so Woollim have nothing to lose by farming out the other tracks to different people and playing lucky dip.  I'll save a full discussion of Lovelyz' songwriting inspiration for another time, but in the meantime "Hi~" is bouncy, melodic, has some cool harmony and doesn't drag on any longer than it needs to, unlike my blogs, so I'll stop this write-up right here because now I feel self-conscious, gee thanks Lovelyz you cunts.

22.  Purfles - Bad Girl





Nugu girl group Purfles win again in 2015 with a catchy as hell, upbeat number that sensibly plays down the members' vocal talents in favour of a stomping bass-guitar driven funk beat which unlike 99% of limp k-pop funk excursions might actually threaten to create a dance situation on a dancefloor somewhere.  Using a bass guitar riff to drive the beat plus keeping the chorus ultra-simple are the factors which carry this song, it means that the constant breakdowns when some girl goes off into vocal solo land don't get too irritating because it's offset with some simplistic upbeat fun.  Of course if this version is too high quality for you, you can always listen to their godawful insipid, cheesy disgusting jazz remake for fuckheads which strips every last ounce of fun and excitement out of the song and replaces it with endless self-serving vocal showing off to cater to the ever-growing "oh wow look how well she can sing never mind that they just threw the song's melody in the gutter" nauseating, shallow vocaphile crowd.  Of course I'm sure that you're not that kind of utter pathetic loser because only smart people with good music taste read Kpopalypse blog, I'm just sharing this information in case you need to know about this... you know, for a friend.

21.  Pocket Girls - Bbang Bbang





Pocket Girls were that "other" nugu group packed with big boobed models to enter k-pop in 2015 along with Bambino, but there's an important difference between them: Bambino's "Oppa Oppa" was a crappy piece of music whereas Pocket Girls' "Bbang Bbang" absolutely rocks.  Say whatever you want about Pocket Girls and their big boobs/surgery/makeup/cheap video/nugu status/fancams/ludicrous race queen image or whatever other bullshit that has nothing to do with music that you think is more important than the fact this song rules, because I couldn't care.  What I do care about is that "Bbang Bbang" is a great upbeat track with cool synth riffs, offbeat rhythms and not too much syrup in the mix, with a beat as rock-solid as these girls' chests.  Actually musically it bears more than a passing similarity to Badkiz' "Ear Attack" to the extent that I wouldn't be surprised if the two songs share the same songwriter, and hey I'm cool with that because I think that if you're gonna copy something you might as well at least copy something that is fucking cool.  The only weak spot of any note is the dubstep breakdown, a genre that k-pop is gradually learning not to flirt with, but it'll probably take a few more years yet for that sound to completely vanish, in the meantime it's not enough to ruin this great song, or my fapping rhythm.

20.  Stellar - Vibrato





After many years of trying different things, Stellar's agency have finally worked out for sure which side their bread is buttered on and "Vibrato" is exactly the sort of concept that their fans want, to the extent that it's easy enough to get confused and accidentally call the song "Vibrator", which would be an apt title given that the excellent breakdown and subsequent climax has multiple speed settings.  Of course there's really no need for me to make up any extra innuendos when the music video full of all kinds of very obvious imagery that shows that the video directors know exactly what they're doing, and also exactly what you're doing.  More importantly for me however, the song is actually a pretty awesome Sweetune track and typical of the kind of musical consistency the group have been rocking ever since "Study", with a pacy electro-funk sound spiced up with cool keyboard stabs and bass guitar.  "Vibrato" treats me like an adult, conceptually, visually and most importantly musically, which is a refreshing change in a genre packed with twee nonsense melodies, cringeworthy ballad slop and fake pretensions of "innocence".

19.  Hello Venus - I'm Ill





We didn't really get the big dancefloor-stomping club hit from T-ara this year like we did the last two years, but Hello Venus have stepped up to the plate in their absence and delivered something pretty similar in look and spirit to "Sugar Free" and "Number Nine".  It's not quite as good as either of those T-ara songs but "I'm Ill" is close enough and will do nicely until T-ara's epic Chinese mega-hit drops early next year and lays waste to the entire planet by forcing millions of Chinese to all access the Internet at the same time and heat up the planet to boiling point with their relentless simultaneous fapping.  Maybe you should get some environmentally-conscious faps out of the way now to Hello Venus so that way when T-ara comes out you won't be all fapping right at the second the video comes out but will need some recovery time, therefore allowing the heat effect to become more staggered.  You know you want to - one of the girls in Hello Venus looks pretty close to Jiyeon anyway, that might help you along a little.

18.  Nine Muses - Sleepless Night





The most surprising thing about this song is the quiet intoning of the word "Bravesound" in the intro.  You could be forgiven for not even noticing, after all it's such a common feature to hear his name at the start of k-pop songs, but it really hits me here because "Sleepless Night" is the kind of mesmerising ambient swinging dreaminess that I didn't know Bravesound had in him.  Even more astonishingly I can't think of another song he's done that sounds exactly like this one, but perhaps this song's evil twin hasn't been written yet (but if history repeats will probably go to an MBK group when it does).  Sure there's not exactly a whole lot happening in this song in the way of variety, but it's okay in this case the repetitive groove is an asset - once an ambience is set up the key to making it work is not to fuck with it.  The revolving-door of girls look like quite an asset too with the typically impeccable Nine Muses styling, they even manage to make puking into a toilet bowl look fashionable and sexy.  I'm not sure if they're promoting vomiting as a symptom of bulimia or drunken debauchery but either way I'm sold.

17.  Smells & Reno - Nothing





Believe it or not, dubstep doesn't have to be total fucking useless trash.  Festering cancers on the global musical landscape like Skrillex have of course ruined dubstep for everybody (their butchered shithouse version that most k-pop emulates is actually technically a different genre called brostep but I'll just call it dubstep anyway from here on in because everyone else does), and have tarred the reputation of not only themselves but much of electronic music as a whole, a great shame.  Smells & Reno actually get dubstep right with "Nothing", an excellent track that is high on the slow electronic dub groove and moody vocal samples and mercifully low on the WUBWUBWUBBZ ZZRTBBZZTTTT WEEOOWWWWEWWW FFTTZTTTZZ WUWBUBWUBW.  The neat little video even tells the story of someone who is a failure at life and can't do anything right just like Skrillex, how sweet and heart-touching.

16.  History - Might Just Die





Speaking of which, classical music and dubstep, two genres of music that are completely useless and crap, yet when they combine in this song the result is great, probably because the chorus has a nice easy-to-follow melody which keeps everything else glued together and stops it all from falling into the shitter.  Also harpsichord and dubstep wubwub is actually a pretty sweet combination here, who would've thought?  It also probably helps that dubstep is incorporated across the whole song, rather than just appearing awkwardly in the breakdown and fucking the pace of the entire tune like in 99% of k-pop (or even worse, cutting in and out schizophrenically like SHINee's disastrous "Everybody"), making "Might Just Die" the first k-pop idol song that truly delivers on the promise of Younique Unit's "Maxstep".  Plus there is guys dancing if you're into that sort of thing, although I'm pretty sure the guy in the center has some serious paint or CGI on his abs at 2:40 because his stomach looks like the fucking Alien, I'd be afraid to touch that thing just in case he did a body roll and broke my fucking hand in half.

15.  4Minute - Crazy





Wow, 4Minute are back and not sucking for once!  There sure have been a lot of shit songs from 4Minute from pretty much the start of 2013 onward, and "Crazy" has finally broken the drought.  The group are at last getting back to being decent by surprisingly yet thankfully throwing away the Bravesound tracks which didn't suit them and muscling in on 2NE1's old turf with a tough beat and some bold eastern-style backings - I guess since 2NE1 aren't interested in making songs like that anymore, someone's gotta run the old neighbourhood.  "Crazy" is pretty much infused with the yolos but it still works out okay because there's some fucking pace to it and the drums really thump you over the head enough to compensate, only in the breakdown does it revert to the more typical bounce bounce yolo check my swag type fluff that everybody else in k-pop is doing now, but that doesn't last long so I can forgive it.  Welcome back, girls.

14.  Block B Bastarz - Zero For Conduct





Block B's new "Bastarz" sub-unit gets this year's "metal by stealth" award, the chorus of "Zero For Conduct" is pretty much just groove-metal with the guitars replaced with keyboard-triggered-brass.  I wouldn't expect the majority of k-pop fans to get the connection, but some of them certainly at least picked up that there was something different about the song even if they couldn't put a name to it:

bastarz

"Bobbing your head real hard to the beat" is also known as "headbanging" and that's a metal thing.  Any song that inspires that sort of movement can generally be regarded as metal, and the comment is right that it's a completely different feel from BigBang's "Bang Bang Bang" which has a totDING-DING-DING-DA-DING-DING-BOM-BOM-BO-BOBOBOOOOMMM-BOMMMBOOOM-BOBOBODING-DING-DA-DING-DING-BOM-BOM-BO-BOBOBOOOOMMMDING-DING-DA-DING-DINGBOM-BO-BOBOBOM-BO-BOBODING-DA-DING-DING-BOM-BOM-BO-BOBOBOOOOMMM-BOMMMBOOOM-BOBOBODINGally different kind of sound.  Groove metal isn't exactly my favourite type of metal but hey it's k-pop which is usually soft as shit especially these days with 99% of fans being tiresome ballad-preferring vocal-obsessed bores so when it comes to metal influences I'll happily take what I can get, cheers Block B.

13.  Lizzy - Not An Easy Girl





Clearly a song that Lizzy wrote after finding out she was on an old Kpopalypse bias list, I can't tell you how hurt and rejected I felt to be told "don't poke around", because Lizzy is just so pokeable.  I guess she realised that since Raina was higher on the same list that I wasn't actually looking at anything serious with Lizzy but just a bit of fun, so I guess kudos to her for being perceptive - there goes my "use Lizzy to get to Raina" plan.  I guess k-pop girls are just like Pokemon, you can't "poke 'em all" - most of them are pretty easy to catch but there's always one or two that are just impossible to get hold of so the full set increases dramatically in value.  Anyway once I got over the fact that my game had been totally busted wide open by this ultra-perceptive woman I had to sit back and admit that the song was pretty damn fine, I don't think I've ever danced so much on the outside while crying on the inside.  Gosh I hope she doesn't say anything to Raina about it.

12.  N.Flying - Awesome





Easily the best Korean male idol/rock group hybrid ever created, "Awesome" beats the pants off of everything by CNBlue, FTIsland and everyone else plowing this particular road.  The secret to this song is that the cyclical chord progression has an ascending structure that never changes (apart from one tiny breakdown) and constantly propels the song forward, making it sound like it's always building up to something more.  It's the opposite to most Korean rock/idol hybrids where the big song-driving chorus hook either has a static four-chord structure like FTIsland's "Pray" or works in circles of descending fifths like CNBlue's "Hello".  Breakdowns to just the voice and piano emphasise the continually pedaling structure even more and the overall effect is tense and exciting, which is what anything passing itself off as "rock" should definitely aspire to be, instead of fucking boring plodding bullshit like Nell or whatever.

11.  Primary ft. Choa, Iron - Don't Be Shy





Who would have thought that k-pop would actually one day do dub reggae correctly?  Most k-pop flirting with Jamaican music styles sounds to me a bit pissweak and limp but Primary fucking nails the dub reggae sound and atmosphere here in a way that I never thought I'd hear, right down to the shitty trademark tin-can equalisation and analog delay.  I'm surprised not because I think Korean producers are incapable of this or anything, or even that it's that difficult, but just because dub reggae isn't exactly the trendy sound right now.  To top it off both AOA's Choa and rapper Iron sound fantastic - Choa gives an appropriately lazy vibe with her vocals sensibly never allowed free reign to completely dominate the mix, and Iron sounds like he's just smoked his own body weight in marijuana which of course is the perfect sound for this kind of groove.  All that suspicion on poor innocent Bumkey but he never did any tracks that sounded remotely like this, if I were Korean anti-drug enforcement I'd be busting down Primary's front door right now, this track is hard evidence that he's clearly got a stash in there somewhere.

10.  Tren-D - Affection (Jung)





Not an original song but a much improved reboot of an old tune by Young Turks Club, "Affection" oddly combines the former with a snatch of Salt N Pepa's iconic experiment in having as few rap lyrics as possible in a rap song "Push It" to create something better than the sum of its parts and almost as good as Tren-D's previous non-hit "Candy Boy".  The melody and harmony moves in a fairly predictable trot-style formation but it's carried along nicely by exactly the right level of instrumental detail and a bouncy beat that even one of the most bizarre and pointless breakdowns in the entire history of k-pop can't ruin.  The girl with the "R" enclosed in a diamond freaks me out though because it's identical to the "restricted" symbol for adult movies and bookstores in Australia, which makes me think that these girls are part of some new plot to spread acceptance of porn through k-pop.  If so, Tren-D please know that Kpopalypse has your support and is backing you all the way.

9.  Minx - Love Shake





Once again "Love Shake" is not an original song for Minx but a cover of an excellent non-feature track by Dal Shabet however to say that it's a cover isn't really accurate either as both groups are under the same agency (Happyface Entertainment) so it's the same songwriting and production team on both versions.  Oh well, I guess the agency realised the error of their ways by not throwing it out there originally and Minx are now the beneficiaries of this awesome song, and fuck knows why Dal Shabet never got to put it out with a music video and some performances but whatever, at least we get to hear it again.  The new Minx version is barely any different with only some very subtle changes in levels but it is a slight improvement overall, just sounding a little bit neater.  It honestly wouldn't even surprise me if they didn't actually replace most of Dal Shabet's vocals, because you know people sing on each other's records uncredited all the time, just because group X is on the front of the box and in the video doesn't mean that group Y or solo person Z didn't actually do the vocal part.  EXID's LE could probably afford a private yacht if she was paid western rates for all the uncredited work she does on other people's albums.  Just saying.

8.  AOA (Ace Of Angels) - Heart Attack





I never thought I'd hear AOA do another song that matched the quality of "Get Out" but "Heart Attack" is such a great bouncy number that it almost made me forget that their band unit existed... you know, just like how everybody in Korea forgot that it existed back when it was active.  With the right equipment you could probably condense all the hypocrisy about the AOA band concept into a solid object and use it for something productive, like the guy who sucked the smog out of China's air and baked it into a solid brick.  "Heart Attack" is such a great song and FNC wisely milked it to fuck, with choreography versions, eye-contact versions, let's all dress in tight pink clothes versions, individual member versions, fapper in the audience versions, grindcore versions, Kpopalypse cat reaction versions etc etc.  It certainly cemented the group's fame and for once something that I like is actually popular in Korea which is kind of nice I guess although I don't give a fuck really as long as there is the token five-second Chanmi part in the video.  Jaehyo fans, I know how you feel.

7.  Shannon Williams - Why Why





Everybody lost most of their cum in 2015 fapping to Twice's debut song "Like 'Ooh Ahh'" but it never had a jizzball's chance in hell of a place on this list and the reason is right here.  Shannon's song is basically identical but massively superior in every single aspect, helped along greatly by about 67 less layers of clutter from random-sounding instruments and vocal lines cutting in plus no annoying girls yelling "Twice!" at really inappropriate times.  Everything in "Why Why" actually serves the quality of the song rather than the desire of a producer to fill every last available space in the frequency field with random fucking crap.  This song also notably breaks the "Curse Of Chad", showing that solo performers from countries other than Korea can break into k-pop and perform a song with actual quality high enough to get on my favourites list.  She doesn't even look ridiculously cringeworthy in the process which is something of a miracle.  Hopefully her presence in the k-pop scene won't inspire any crazies to start being delusional about "making it in k-pop" - just remember kids, Shannon Williams hasn't exactly "made it" yet herself and is probably busy scrubbing bricks in the Bad Thoughts room for an extra buck in between dance practice sessions and taking endless selcas with Dani.

6.  4TEN - Why





Super-ultra-nugus 4TEN (aka Poten) have not one but two uncanny-valley girls in the group who look like their faces have been constructed entirely from Project Luhan's factory seconds plus a third girl who would probably look acceptable if she wasn't rocking the worst bowl-cut this side of George Harrison.  I almost want to tell off the one generically-k-pop-pretty member of the group for letting the team down, but it doesn't matter a bit because this is a subtly-80's-infused pop gem of the type that many girl groups used to do well in k-pop's Golden Age but now mostly suck at.  4TEN might fail at getting their hair and makeup done properly but even though they're the antithesis of fap they win at having a nicely anthemic upbeat pop song, and that's all that really matters for this list.  This song came out right at the start of the year and the few people who listened to it back in January 2015 (the video is stamped November 2014 but it didn't get on their official YouTube channel until 2015, which is always the release date I work from for these lists) have probably mostly forgotten that it exists by now so I hope they appreciate my rehighlighting it here as a community service.

5.  Jimin ft. Iron - Puss





There's two types of songs that came out of the first series of Korean female rapper "reality" (ahem cough splutter gasp) TV show Unpretty Rapstar: songs with AOA's Jimin in them, and complete fucking soft bullshit with either lazy impotent trap beats or disgusting R&B slop.  I know this because I bought the soundtrack - boy, what a mistake that was!  I'm not sure if it's coincidence, Jimin's own influence, her label's idea or something else, but for some reason Jimin is the only rapper in that entire series so far who has occasionally been given any actual beats worth a fucking shit.   Just as well too because her squeaky voice works perfectly with something with some actual punch to offset it.  The uniquely "irritating" quality that Jimin's voice has and that garners her so much hate everywhere is of course why Jimin is perfect for any kind of rap music, as long as the beats actually go hard (think about how perfectly Eazy E's annoying squeaky schoolboy voice slotted into NWA), and the backing for "Puss" goes harder than just about anything this year, incorporating modern hip-hop sounds into a beat which doesn't compromise on catchiness, has a cool-as-shit chorus riff and actually goes at over 60 BPM, a combination which is getting harder and harder to find these days.  The above video only has Jimin's verse and that's okay because Iron is just the sideshow here anyway but if you'd like to hear a full version with both of them, you can click here to watch the live version from the shithouse TV show that I didn't even watch with all the stupid cuts to other rappers' lame reactions removed thank fucking christ.

4.  LaBoum - Sugar Sugar





Girls' Generation tried hard for the retro-pop concept with "Lion Heart" and only got it about half-right, however nugus LaBoum are having a good year and have decided to take over the reigns from the Hateful Eight, injecting their version of the same type of thing with a much lighter feel that suits the material better.  Borrowing about equally from 1960s girl group style and The Archies' popular namesake, LaBoum's producers nail the early Phil Spector/Motown sound in a way which is fun, bright and breezy and not "ironic" in the slightest.  The only problem with this is that girls don't wear bras over their pajamas, every girl I've ever had a relationship with is always removing the bra as soon as they get home and get relaxed, those fucking things are uncomfortable as shit.  Hopefully future k-pop pajama videos show a higher commitment to gritty realism at least in this important area.

3.  Rainbow - Black Swan





"Black Swan" was the first truly astonishingly different song for k-pop in 2015 that also had extremely high quality generally, and while I hoped it would initiate a trend, at the time of writing nothing else in k-pop before or since sounds even remotely like this.  The different between "Black Swan" and just about everything else is the clever instrumental arrangement - at first the song sounds extremely sparse like there's something obviously missing, but try listening to it closer and you'll notice that there are many subtle elements to the backings which aren't immediately apparent and gradually build as the song progresses.  In a genre which thrives on hitting the listener over the head repeatedly with the obvious, this type of production approach is almost completely without precedent.  The song's main elements are kept simple on purpose so the underlying layers have room to breathe, for example the chorus is mainly just one note with a super-cool-as-fuck keyboard riff behind it providing the actual hook, and that's about all it is or needs to be.  The regular pre-chorus breakdown reduces the song again to one single note, although this time it's Laurie Anderson's "O Superman" slowed down which perfectly matches the mood plus the general feeling of sparseness, and is about as far away from typical k-pop listening as anything I can think of.  This is k-pop's first genuine "headphones song" and I can see why nobody does this in k-pop as all that effort was definitely wasted on an audience who mostly didn't appreciate it.  Oh well, at least the video has a sexy gothic/art deco/"I don't know whatever the fuck you call it but it looks cool" style and the group's girls all look stunning and better than they ever have.

2.  Crayon Pop - FM





Musically an update of T-ara's "I'm Really Hurt" within the meter of "Roly Poly", Shinsadong Tiger has customised the aforementioned song hybrid for Crayon Pop use by adding guitars, subtle industrial dance elements and more explosions, and with a template like that to work with there was no way this song was going to be anything less than great.  Chrome Entertainment seem to know their audience now at least where this group are concerned, and have aimed Crayon Pop conceptually to suit with a deliberately cheap (but not as cheap as it pretends to be) and cheerful Power Ranger theme, pop culture references, illogical silliness and lyrics aimed directly at the heart of the FM ("Field Manual" - slang for people who are afraid to break society's unwritten rules, like the rules that Crayon Pop themselves broke on their way to fame).  Crayon Pop are the group that should not exist - the cavalier punks who jimmied the gates, crashed the perfect k-pop beauty queens' palace party, pissed in the punchbowl, smuggled out all the snack food and then read about themselves on SNS the next day and laughed.  They'll probably never have another "BarBarBar" in terms of fame but to expect or even want that from them is to miss the point of why they exist.  You only need to block up the palace toilet with party sausages one time to make your point.

So what's #1, if not Crayon Pop?

pawuse

1.  Lovelyz - Ah-Choo





Yes that's right, you knew it had to be Lovelyz.  Previous years have been a close race, but for 2015 the Kpopalypse favourite song was an easy shoe-in... but why?  Is it because the best ever cum in my life Seo Jisoo returned?  Well no, because she reunited with the group firstly with "Shooting Star" so if I was all about just celebrating her return I would have shoved "Shooting Star" in my #1 instead, however as previously discussed I thought that song was a horrible turdmonkey of a ballad (and only got left off the worst list due to extremely hot competition for utter crap this year) so that's not the reason.  Is Lovelyz #1 here to make confirmed "Ah-Choo" hater Asian Junkie suffer?  Well no, because even though fighting with Asian Junkie over music taste is hilariously funny, I wouldn't seek to define my music taste purely in relation to someone else's and besides we do agree on some stuff occasionally (like the Choa/Primary song earlier in this list being cool).  So that's not the reason either.  Is Lovelyz #1 because I find certain members of Lovelyz cute?  Well no... I mean yes I do like Kei and Sujeong quite a bit but I wouldn't put them on Raina level or even include them in my bias list at all, and in fact I probably won't be updating that list for the start of 2016 at all because most of the 2015 debuts haven't featured girls who can knock out the existing entrants in my eyes (don't get me started on Twice, they're all a solid "meh").  So no, that's not the reason.  The real reason for "Ah-Choo" being #1 on this list is, of course, and as always - I liked the fucking song more than all the others in 2015.

Further up this blog I wrote that "I'll save a full discussion of Lovelyz' songwriting inspiration for another time", and that time is now.  Many k-pop fans have singled out either j-pop artists (or j-pop as a whole) or Apink (and other supposedly "cute" k-pop groups) as the inspiration behind the Lovelyz songs that I enjoy, but these types of comparisons are wildly off-base in terms of both image AND music.  I think k-pop fans see girls not showing that much flesh and because k-pop fans (of all genders and sexualities) are all so superficially sex-centred (and honestly, I can relate), that point of comparison supercedes all other factors for them.  However as someone who grew up with 80s pop it's blindingly obvious to me what producers OnePiece are really doing with Lovelyz.
People tend to look at 80s pop like any other style from yesteryear with rose-coloured glasses, they remember the good stuff, and the bad stuff kind of gets ignored because it gets lost in time - most of the absolute crap from the 80s is out of print and you can't even find most of it on YouTube.  The fact was that most 80s pop was actually fucking atrocious garbage from the pits of hell which was why I actually wasn't that much of a pop fan in the 80s myself, however the best 80s pop acts were ones which had roots in the 70s UK post-punk scene like New Order.  Spawned from the remnants of Joy Division, New Order combined Joy Division's post-punk style with emerging trends in electronic and pop music to create a style that was uniquely robotic, melancholic and decidedly upbeat all at once.  Their single "Blue Monday" was (and still is) the most popular 12" single of all time, and was such a huge hit that the record label nearly went bankrupt making copies of it to fulfill the demand from consumers.  "Ah-Choo" borrows a great deal from early New Order in terms of sonic textures, mood (an undercurrent of stark ennui sharply at odds with the musical and ideological values of k-pop as a whole) and even visually/conceptually in terms of a similar commitment to bizarremelancholicabstraction that New Order displayed in most of their music videos during their creative peak.  Other 80s pop touchstones that are clearly evident in "Ah-Choo" include the Van Halen-style keyboard pads that also made Crayon Pop's "1,2,3,4" so great and which not only embellishes the chords in "Ah-Choo" but provides a counterpoint melody, and the 80s slap-bass playing which is incredibly busy yet never once oversteps the boundaries of the song itself into self-serving wank-town.  Vocally the group is firmly rooted in early 80s UK pop sensibilities where the song's true melody always came first (this is pre-Shitney Houston ruining pop for everyone) and "Ah-Choo" never degenerates into the simple-minded showing off that so many k-pop vocalists these days consistently do ad nauseam, and that garden-variety k-pop fans routinely fellate themselves over.  As I mentioned in 2014's favourites list, Woollim were careful to train Lovelyz to work as a team and the singing doesn't sacrifice any part of the song to serve the role of an individual or their ego, nor should it, in this song or any song.  To top it all off, "Ah-Choo" has quite easily the best breakdown ever in the history of all k-pop to date, a sublime (and 100% trap/dubstep-free) half-time piano-and-bass-propelled excursion that slots perfectly into the song's structure, making the a capella section after it feel like a true climax and not going a second longer than it needs to for the effect to work as intended.  I wouldn't say it's the best k-pop song ever written, but "Ah-Choo" is certainly the best ever k-pop related cum in my life.



That's the end of another Kpopalypse favourites list!  Hopefully you enjoyed this list, or if not, hopefully you found something profound to complain about that will get you lots of dogpile comments agreeing with you about how Kpopalypse is scum on your favourite k-pop-focused circlejerky rabid hate-filled internet community!  See you next year!

KPOPALYPSE's 30 worst k-pop songs of 2015

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Welcome to the post all you cynical fucks have been waiting for - Kpopalypse's 30 worst k-pop songs of 2015!

2015worsthead

Read on to find out which k-pop feature tracks Kpopalypse hated the most in 2015!


So what do I think of 2015?  Well, overall not much of a quality change from 2014, with one major difference - the absolute shittest songs were really, really shit this year, there was an impressive consistency to the low quality of k-pop songs in 2015.  Competition to get on this list was as a result extremely hot, and if some of you are wondering "where's [crap song x]" - well it was probably strongly considered but didn't make the cut.  Or it's on my favourites list.

Here is a preamble to this list which explains its intentions for the 2% of you who actually read these introductions instead of skipping straight to my picks and then whining about them.
  • This list is inclusive from Jan 1st 2015 to December 31st 2015 and was published on December 31st 2015.  It may appear at a different time for some due to timezone differences.
  • Yes these are really my opinions, I haven't included anything for clickbait/edginess/troll purposes (although if you find yourself trolled I consider this an acceptable secondary outcome).
  • If this post is too negative for you sunny positive demeanour, I have a favourites list for 2015 as well, why not read it instead?
  • Only k-pop feature tracks with MVs or music show promotions are included, because I can't listen to everything.  Also it makes the post more visually interesting if there are videos.
  • Songs by k-pop artists in English, Japanese or other languages do count for this list, but covers of popular western songs do not.
  • Popularity of the songs (or lack thereof) is not a factor for this list.  I don't care what got on the charts or not, what won an award or didn't, that's all herd-mentality stuff that has nothing to do with my personal music taste.
  • Songs for OSTs, sporting events etc do not count because they are generally the same generic song over and over again with minor variations and not interesting to write about.
  • Christmas songs do not count, they are a special breed of shitstain and thus have their own special post dedicated just to them.
  • Speaking of shitstains: contrary to popular belief of those who don't really read my posts properly (and probably won't read this either), I've never once claimed that my music taste is better than anyone else's.  Yes I do have a music industry background (teaching, management, touring, composition, audio engineering, production, blah de blah read the FAQ if you give a shit) but no that does not make my music taste "better".  If you enjoyed songs on my worst-of list and hated songs on my favourites list, that's totally fine.  The primary purpose of both the favourites AND the worst-of lists is laughs, entertainment, something for you to read to take your mind off the pointlessness of existence, discovery of songs for those of you who don't keep track of k-pop closely, creative writing fun times for myself, and documentation of songs for myself so I have a nice reference that I can link to friends and others who ask what I like and dislike.  Hopefully you enjoy the lists.  If not, that's fine but why people who hate my posts continue to read and comment about them is a continual mystery to me.
2015worstfoot

That's enough of the preamble for the newbies and those who don't get it - the rest of you know the real deal, so it's time to get started!  And what better way to kick off this worst-of list than...

30.  CL, Diplo, Riff Raff & OG Maco - Doctor Pepper





That's right kids, 2015 was such an extreme year for k-pop bullshit that CL's embarrassing American excursion into stream-of-consciousness trap nonsense "Doctor Pepper" was only just shitty enough to scrape onto the far end of this list.  Even CL fans are under no illusions about how bad "Doctor Pepper" is, with most of their comments on the video either writing off the song as an ambitious failed experiment...

cl2222

...or saying "it's only a collab so it doesn't really count", encouraging 2NE1 fans to stay strong because she'll no doubt do better soon.

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CL herself didn't even give that much of a shit about it, freely admitting that she just sang any old bullshit into the studio microphone because she didn't want to waste any more time than absolutely necessary on this crap (hence the very honest lyrics about "I've got a plane to catch").  Mind you the song still does have a certain fascination about it thanks to some decent production and a creepy, foreboding atmosphere which I'm not entirely sure is intentional but helps a little nonetheless.  Whatever the case, when you actually look forward to the part of a song where Riff Raff appears because of the slight lift in interest level that it provides, then you know that whatever you're listening to has got some major issues on a basic music quality level.

Now it's time for 29 songs that I thought were worse than "Doctor Pepper".  Oh boy.

29.  Sistar - Shake It





About a minute into this atrocious mess, Bora (I think) walks toward the camera with an apron (or something) that reads "don't set your goals by what other people deem important".  There's certainly no fear of that kind of behaviour from Sistar in 2015, who seem content to disregard the wishes of everyone interested in actual music and now just continually recycle a bland pastiche of all their other "summer songs" every year.  The vocal melodies all sound copy-pasted from their past hits and the song's shrillness never lets up, with every single second from the first verse onward taken up with endless vocal clutter.  I'd fathom a guess that Starship just aren't trying all that hard anymore - they've realised that nobody is interested in Sistar for the music nowadays so they just throw together any old bullshit so they can get the girls to get the girls out every summer.  However disregarding the music "Shake It" is even a failure on a basic fap level - the video is edited at T-ara levels of frame-juggling so the only way you're going to get to appreciate important details like Soyu wearing a Pocket Girls-style tits-harness is by continually freeze-framing it.  Watching this for fap is like going to watch a Michael Bay film just for the explosions and finding out the sad truth that Michael Bay isn't actually all that good at filming explosions because he keeps zooming and cutting everywhere so you can't actually see anything explode properly.  Nobody expected this to actually sound any good but when a Sistar video can't even deliver the goods as jerkoff material it's a sad day for k-pop.

28.  Taeyeon ft. Verbal Jint - I





Everyone expected this solo debut to be some horrid R&B vocal wank trash from the pits of hell, but SM surprised us all by taking Girls' Generation's Taeyeon down the sleepytime-radio-rocker route instead.   Taeyeon performs admirably in the shit music stakes and even manages to out-Coldplay utter garbage like Nell with this incredibly turgid ultra-conservative middle of the road mid-paced ballad complete with 576 layers of clean electric guitar-plucking weighing down the track every second so things don't get too exciting or out of hand like a song you might want to listen to.  Mr. Jint (do his friends just call him Verbal?) doesn't spice things up either, his impact on the track is essentially nothing, with his rap part being out of the way before the song proper even begins, leaving Taeyeon to screech and yelp unaccompanied to her heart's content with that pissfartingly annoying climax.  Who says Korean rock isn't as advanced as the west, this is just as boring as anything coming out of America and England's shittier shoegazey pop/rock hybrids.  At least the box video is decent (some quaint green islands and buildings leased from the New Zealand government being the box of choice), with Taeyeon quitting her day job after spying a butterfly and longing for freedom, suggesting that maybe she's a little more understanding about Jessica's situation than SM will allow her to openly admit.

27.  Berry Good - Because Of You





Berry Good's "Love Letter" was fantastic and one of my favourites last year, but it was actually a (much-improved) cover of an old Click-B song, and while not wanting to take away from how awesome it was, doing an established song is always the easiest road to take when debuting an unknown group.  Naturally I was curious to see what Berry Good and their agency could do on their own when not riding on the coat-tails of someone else's past hit, and as it so happens, sweet fuck all.  The melodies of "Because Of You" are unbelievably twee and irritating, grinding over the root note constantly like a rainbow-coloured electric drill only capable of one speed being thrust repeatedly into the side of my skull, except for that other bit where they do a quasi-descending scale which sounds like something that'd be rejected from a J-Rabbit song for sounding too much like The Wiggles.  This song really is awful and even the dull nondescript ballad that they churned out six months later was still way better than this.

26.  Red Velvet - Automatic





In 2014 Red Velvet released the awful "Be Natural", a cover of a turgid S.E.S song that sounded so similar in every aspect to the original (except the obligatory rap break) that if it was promoted as a remastered version of the original recording instead of a cover by some different group of girls, everybody probably would have believed it and said "wow, they really cleaned up that old S.E.S recording nicely".  "Automatic" is essentially the same thing again, swiping exactly the same rhythm and textures from "Be Natural" and this time changing the chords and melodies only the absolute bare minimum required for it to be technically classed as a different song.  You're only listening to a new piece of music here in a strictly technical/legal sense rather than in spirit, and the whole experience makes me feel like the girls must have felt in the video when they had to sit in front of a dinner table full of delicious food that their idols diets strictly forbade them to eat.  I can never remember whether this side of Red Velvet is considered the "Red" or the "Velvet" side, but either way it's the shit side and thank god they redeemed themselves somewhat with the actually-pretty-decent "Ice Cream Cake" by releasing it the very next day, presumably to make us forgive and forget "Automatic" as quickly as possible.

25.  Ben - Looby Loo





The door to the office of The VIBE Entertainment's CEO bursts open.

"That's it!  I've got it!  I've found the secret formula for Ben's next hit!" screams a wide-eyed music producer, rushing up to the CEO's desk.

The CEO rolls his eyes.  "Okay, what is it this time?  This better not be another one of your crappy BigBang cover ideas..."

"What we need is a k-pop version of the Hokey Pokey!"

"The what... ?"  The CEO raises his eyebrows.

"You know, the Hokey Pokey!"  The producer starts singing: "put your right foot in, put your right foot out... put your right foot in and shake it all about...  It's a public domain song so we can't get sued for using it, and everyone knows it!  An instant hit!"

A slight pause, as the CEO thinks.  "No, that'll never fly.  Kids are growing up fast these days.  They're developing yolosweg tendencies earlier and earlier, we don't want to sound too immature or we'll lose that lucrative 'I check my swag with daddy's credit card' demographic."

"Well... I don't know, what about if we add some trap somewhere?"

"Add some trap?  In a children's song?  No, you're nuts... that's crazy."

The composer takes a deep breath.  "Well, it won't be perceived as a children's song if there's a little trap in it.  Maybe on the way to the chorus, the beat can slow to half-time and we can put in some of those sweg drum machine sounds, and maybe a few dubstep bass drops..."

"Dubstep bass drops?  I've had quite enough of your crazy schemes!  You're fired, get the fuck outta here!" the CEO yells.  "Get your things and get outta my sight!"

The composer runs out the door, crying.  Meanwhile the CEO sits back in his chair, thinking.  "Hmmm... now that composer's gone, I can take credit for his idea.  Hokey Pokey... dubstep... AND trap... it might just work.  I guess I don't really know anything about songwriting, but hey the kids will listen to any old bullshit these days, after all it's 2015... how hard can it be?"

24.  Global Icon (GI) - Doligo Doligo





When Global Icon debuted in 2013 with "Beatles", they showed a slightly different k-pop concept to normal with the group being made up of five tomboyish Amber types.  The song was kick-ass but sadly this was an image that was never going to fly in Korea - an agency in a genre that thrives on endorsements and CF work as the main money earner will find it very hard to attract sponsors if they promote girls that are so different from the idyllic Korean beauty queen.  One tomboy girl within a group of traditionally-adorned girls is fine as far as the industry is concerned, but not every member of the group, because who's going to cross over to CFs, endorse those feminine beauty products and make the agency some damn money?  Young girls might be hesitant to buy makeup with Krystal from f(x) endorsing it on the front of the box if she looked like a dude, so GI are now back with a slightly more web-searchable song title and a more conventional image similar to EXID.  Despite the whining of fans who miss the old look, no-one is happier for the image change than the girls themselves who admit that the boy concept was forced on them as a way to make them stand out and wasn't something they were super-comfortable with.  Unfortunately the new song they've been lumbered with is shitty musically, with an annoying chant chorus and that same funk guitar riff that everybody uses... but then "Booshit" back when they were still doing the tomboy thing was a pile of crap too, so let's not blame the change of image - whoever writes songs for this group just sucks now and a few haircuts won't change that.

23.  Miryo ft. Gain - Queen





Miryo's BDSM-wear in this video looks like a stage outfit Judas Priest would reject for containing too many leather straps and is at least as terrifying as JYP's plastic pants.  For once I was grateful to watch a k-pop video where the girl's boobs are mostly obscured by her hair because I really don't want a better look at what's under there.  She seems to me like she's trolling us all with that cheeky smile and I don't mind a bit of beingtrolled but what I do mind is music sucking and boy does this suck.  Supposedly Miryo has some kind of underground rap pedigree so I was expecting something at least lyrically decent but when I heard this song I remembered that even most underground rap sucks now and I reminded myself about how foolish I was to think that this would be a guarantee of decent music.  When she says "the sun is going dooooown" and then "the club's in down tooooown" I can't stop cringing, it's the k-pop sweg-lite version of listening to some 80s glam rocker with poncy hair singing "I'm all alone/waitin' by the phone", or "it's Saturday night/and I'm feelin' alright".  It all makes me wish for someone (preferably Gain) to walk into the video shoot and slap Miryo across the head with a thesaurus.  I could have tolerated these crimes against lyricism if the song had a decent beat but sadly it's a failure there too, being just the usual trendy crap completely bereft of all the qualities that makes the better hip-hop around the world actually worth listening to.  Maybe Miryo will one day get to flex those supposed underground rap skills properly but that day didn't happen in 2015.

22.  Bumkey - My Everything





At one point in this song Bumkey quotes the bible: "pray without ceasing, give thanks in everything" (Thessaloninans 5:16-18 yo) so I guess he's a christian and gosh that's probably a nice uplifting little quote for all you christians out there, isn't that nice that he's sharing his religion with us, it must be because he's a virtuous person who cares so much about our welfare.  I of course also care about the welfare of my readers so it's time for a little religious sharing of my own.  I loved the idea of christianity when I was a kid, because the thought of "just follow the rules in this book and be kind to everybody and good things happen and hey even if they don't you get to go to paradise later as long as you follow the instructions correctly" seemed totally awesome.  I read the bible quite a bit, and in the bible, god was always doing lots of "stuff" - making bushes burn, making the world flood, sending person A over here and banishing person B to over there, and most importantly talking to his followers constantly.  I prayed to god a lot when I was really young for all sorts of shit - destruction of my fucked-up school, the banishment of brussels sprouts, a Commodore 64 joystick that was durable and wouldn't stop working after a month of use, etc - but I never got any response about any of it.  The world that I lived in didn't deliver on the promise of the bible - my school and brussels sprouts both remained terrifying and the best that god could manage on the joystick front was the TAC-2 which was hyped as sturdy and durable but the buttons always gradually died after a month of use.  I quickly worked out that no matter how hard and sincerely I prayed or how nice a person I was, it didn't make any difference to the world around me.  So I tried being a total cunt for a while instead just to see if anything would change, and it didn't - my school continued to remain structurally sound and impervious to fire and flood, brussels sprouts continued to grow on earth and would continue to appear on my dinner plate at about the same ratio as previously, the replacement TAC-2 I bought also broke and god remained quiet about all of it.  Then one day during a game of Decatholon on the Commodore 64 (a notorious joystick-wrecker of a game due to the fast waggling action needed to make the athletes move) the supposedly "unbreakable metal shaft" of my third TAC-2 snapped and was revealed to be just a thin metal veneer over flimsy plastic - a construction as brittle and unsubstantial as the last few remnants of my faith.  As I looked down at the crumbling metal and plastic concoction a moment of clarity occurred and I realised then that if there was a god, he didn't give a flying fuck what I did.  Maybe he wasn't real at all and I along with billions of others had been told a lie - or maybe he was real but was too busy eating mountains of chocolate and getting titwanked by big-boobed angels to care about worldly concerns or the prayers of his followers which to be fair is exactly what I would also do if I were the creator of the world.  Obviously christianity was incorrect, but without it where was my moral compass?  How would I know for sure what was right and wrong in the world?  Also, heaven sounded really fucking cool and I wanted to get in, how was I to do this now?  Fortunately recently I discovered the religion of Rainaism so now my soul is at peace, guided by the always-relevant teachings of Orange Caramel's Raina who advises that one should not covet the next life when one can fap to Raina in this life.  The book of Rainaism also has some relevant words that Bumkey should have heeded:
  • Thou shalt keep thine vocal overdubs to a bare minimum necessary for function of the song
  • Thou shalt not abuse the use of Fender Rhodes keyboard to over-smooth a backing track
  • Forsaketh thou soft wimpy R&B bullshit
  • Sepia-toned drawings do not a good song make, nor a visually compelling video
  • Do not use the words "I'd rather have bad times with you than good with myself" as verily thou art a doormat to believe such
I believe that Bumkey should get rid of this video and song, as it is offensive to Rainaism.  I'm not pushing my religion on him, I'm just saying that he should remove it out of respect to my religion.  Why would someone make a song so obviously offensive to my religion?  Clearly it must be banished, as it intones lyrics specifically forbidden by my religion.  I think this is a reasonable request.  Gosh, it's enough to make one behave inappropriately in the name of their religion, but fortunately Kpopalypse's faith is too strong for that.

21.  GD&TOP - Zutter





Hey all the people who claim that I'm a YG hater, do you know what I actually liked in k-pop a few years back?  The feature tracks from BigBang members G-Dragon and T.O.P's first album.  "Knock Out" had a bizarre and cool beat that allowed me to overlook anything else possibly wrong with it, and "High High" impressed me as a k-pop reimaginging of RUN-DMC's "It's Like That" remix that successfully captured the same sort of party atmosphere.  You won't find the MVs of those songs anywhere on BigBang's official channel due to the group flashing the Playboy logo everywhere without permission (one of k-pop's very, very, very few legitimate copyright infringement cases which was silently swept under the rug by their agency while k-pop following idiots incorrectly complained about IU or Primary or T-ara or whatever innocent people were trendy to hate on at the time) and it's a shame because it means two MVs from back when BigBang members on average produced decent music are now out of official circulation.  Still, I was looking forward to "Zutter" in the hope that GD&TOP decided that since G-Dragon's solo stuff is all trendy yoloswagfest, that they weren't going to cave into that exact same sort of sound for the duo unit but instead retain the vibe that made the original two feature tracks work and... yeah okay, never mind.  Anyway the video sums it up, this is a good designated piss-break song for my radio show.

20.  Girls' Generation - Party





Girls' Generation years ago actually introduced me to the concept of "the k-pop girl group that doesn't suck" as a thing that was possible so it's kind of weird how almost everything they do is crap now.  "Party" isn't the worst feature track that they've ever done, but it's pretty fucking close.  The tune kicks off with Tiffany's "do you know what time it is?" intro which provides much second-hand embarrassment but once the "generic k-pop summer song 101" groove kicks in it soon becomes apparent that her limp Flavor Flav impersonation is actually the most interesting part of the song.  It's little wonder that Girls' Generation can't pull off this party concept to save themselves, as being friendly and social is new territory for the group and isn't something within the Hateful Eight's comfort zone, as it would eat into valuable time that could be used for either furthering their careers or ostracising members.  At least the video has Sunny wearing something that shows some boob flesh for a change (slyly edited in a "I know you're looking at my tits and I'm totally cool with that" way at 0.46, all you feminists who believe in the "male gaze" feel free to use this observation for your next thesis) so this comeback isn't a total waste.

19.  NS Yoon G - Honey Summer





If there's one thing worse than a Sistar summer comeback these days, it's a soundalike of a Sistar summer comeback that isn't even as good as the excuse for music that Sistar puts out now.  Yet another clumsy entrant into the urine-soaked wading pool of "generic k-pop summer songs 101", there's really nothing to say about "Honey Summer" musically because it's so utterly generic, so let's talk about NS Yoon-G's boobs instead.  It hurts to watch her in a video like this because while I'm sure Korean summers are pretty mild, where I live the summers routinely get into the heat-death zone where healthy young men collapse into comas and sensible people stay the fuck indoors if they have a choice.  I'd be devastated if anything bad happened to NS Yoon-G because of the extreme heat, like dehydration, heat exhaustion or cleavage tan lines, so let's not let that happen.  I hope for her sake that it was actually really overcast and non-sunny on the day of the shoot and the MV colourist has just messed with this a little to make it look like the sun was actually shining.  She should do more indoor videos like "Yasisi" and take care of herself better rather than risking her career and livelihood on the beach following bullshit summer video trends.

18.  Amber ft. Taeyeon - Shake That Brass





This song will be on a lot of other worst-of lists too, but probably for the wrong reasons.  Adrian always gets an unfair hiding from k-pop fans who can't handle that she looks tomboyish because they're homophobes who probably have nightmares about her breaking into their house and giving them a pegging (the scary part of the nightmare for them being that they would enjoy it).  Picking on Arnold's appearance is one of the most basic and unfunny of basic, unfunny jokes you can make about anyone in k-pop, right down there with "Hyuna is a slut because she has big tits herp derp" in terms of the sophistication of the satire level and the amount of amusement it can provide to anybody with a brain.  All this "I can't accept the song because of Manber being manly" is a joke, are you really that much of a sexually insecure silver-spoon Mommy's boy that you can't handle a girl dressing like a guy?  All the girls in Twice and Gfriend probably look even manlier once you take off the 76 layers of expertly applied makeup, put them in a suit, strap their boobs to their chest and give then a bowl cut.  Let's hate "Shake That Brass" not for your inability to deal with people who are different from you, but for the reasons that actually matter, like how it's a piece of shit musically.  On the positive side the song has a refreshingly quick pace, sounds unique in k-pop thanks to the tuba, and Anthony actually gets a full verse or two of rapping in which obviously suits her (if not us) better than the four bars of her rap that we get drip-fed every year via the f(x) comebacks, but then there's that shitty chorus and all the stupid chanting and cheesy English use which fucks up all that good work.  The biggest problem however with "Shake That Brass" is Taeyeon's contribution, and she leaves a great big warbling vocashit all over everything in her usual style because she's a one-trick pony who can't do anything else and I hope that once Adam has finished pegging all you Internet-teat-suckling homophobic "I fapped to DMX's 'Where The Hood At' once just to see what it felt like, no homo" closet gays in denial she shoves the strapon down Taeyeon's throat and glues it in there for the future good of all music everywhere.

17.  Taeil - Inspiring





When people start talking about how they like a song and the only reason that they can give for liking it is the singer's voice and talent, then that says a lot to me.  It tells me straight away that the song must be fucking crap, because if the technique of the singer stands out to the point where it doesn't occur to you to say anything at all about why you like the song itself (other than that you like it because of the singer, which is circular logic), then the song must not have been very engaging to become so easily overshadowed.  The whole point of the singer is to strengthen the song to the best of his ability, not to create a bunch of stupid fawning over his own voice.  It's like buying a dress because the workmanship on the cross-stitching is really good and not even caring if the dress actually fits or looks any good on you when you put it on.  But then there are actually people out there who buy toys and leave them in boxes and never open those boxes ever and there's a big business in selling shit to those people so I guess if stupid people can be robbed and the money can be used for something useful it could be said that they do contribute to the greater good.  Notice that I've left any specific reference to the singer or the song itself out of this write-up, that way I can just copy and paste it the next time some bullshit song exactly like this comes up for review, which will probably be pretty soon given that about 25 songs are released exactly like this each week in Korea.

16.  Untouchable - Crayon





One of the most effective parts of the satire in MC Vagina/Jon Lajoie's "Very Super Famous" were the bored as fuck women standing around in the background of some of the shots, because that's actually exactly what being a woman on these video shoots is like.  Any video shoot for anybody on camera is 90% standing around either getting styled or just waiting around for something to happen while tech crews do stuff, it's boring enough for the person who is the focus who actually has things to do when the cameras rolls, imagine if your role actually in the video itself was also sitting around doing jack shit while some super-generic yolo bullshit music played.  Untouchable have some of the most "fuck this for a joke, where's my fuckin' money" girls in their "Crayon" video that I've ever seen in k-pop and you can tell by the eye-roll at 0:43 that the girl with the big boobs in the passenger seat of that stupid impractical vehicle is so fucking over it and hates this song as well as the carrying on of rap guys in general as much as the next rational person.  I hope at least she made more money than the guys did rapping in this garbage.

15.  Girl's Day - Ring My Bell





Many years ago I was poking around at a garage sale when I found a Roland TR-808 drum machine.  The guy who owned it really didn't want it and was selling it for $30, citing how horrible and unlike anything resembling a real drumkit it sounded.  I talked him down from $30 to $5 and then snapped it up happily - unbeknownst to the seller, a TR-808 in new condition is worth thousands of dollars because although those machines were wildly unpopular at the time due to not sounding anything at all like a drumkit, their characteristic non-natural sounds were unique and found their way into several classic rap, soul and techno recordings, making the value of them skyrocket a few years after Roland stopped producing them.  Unfortunately for me as I found out shortly afterward on a studio session, this particular 808 was in far from "new condition" and had an interesting fault where it would just change tempos all on its own for no reason.  Listening to Girl's Day's "Ring My Bell" the chorus where the drum machine rockets along at a crazy pace totally reminded me of the studio session that I had to blow out because the 808 kept fucking up the tempo of everything and dialling itself up to face-mashing speed.  Unfortunately Girl's Day doesn't sound as good as the broken machine did thanks to way too many instruments cluttering up the mix, constant annoying vocals that never let up and that fucking godawful harmonica, which is always a warning sign in k-pop songs to stop listening immediately as no good will come of it.  The broken machine is probably still worth a few hundred dollars too which is probably more than a Girl's Day member would cost at a tenpro, so there's another advantage.

14.  Fly To The Sky - If I Have To Hate You





I didn't know what to say about this song and felt somewhat at a loss for words, so in the spirit of "a picture is worth a thousand words" I looked deep inside myself, harnessed my creative energy, and painted a picture to show you all how I felt.  I know it's very self-indulgent to post my pictures here especially as I'm still very new to painting, but please bear with me as I share this creative work now with you all.

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I feel like this picture really encapsulates the emotions that come to the fore when I listen to "If I Have To Hate You".  I especially feel like I've captured an accurate depiction of the song's dynamic contrast, variety, range of emotional content and ability to hold my attention.  I know I'm still an amateur but I worked really hard on this picture and I hope you all appreciate it and can at least see what I was trying to convey, even if my technique still needs a lot of work.  I will endeavour to work harder in the future to bring you an improved image as a painter.  Thank you.

13.  A.KOR Black - How We Do





After Minju and Kemy's excellent mixtaperaps, I expected big things for the A.KOR Black subunit.  How foolish was I?  In hindsight, conformity to the "let's stick a colour onto the end of our group name" trend of mentally lazy subunit-naming should have tipped me off that maybe the full breadth of music and conceptual imagination was perhaps not going to be applied in this case, but even if this had occurred to me I doubt I would have expected a perfect storm of elements quite this terrible.  The chorus here is one of the worst rap choruses ever in the history of the form (although incredibly, not the worst this year!) and the rest of it has a cheesy, tinny beat similar to but even worse than the crap that was used for Miryo's "Queen" - Minju and Kemy's raps over the top are acceptable enough but even the best MC in history would be fighting a losing battle against a backing this bad.  Visually the video doesn't fare any better, with both of them rocking the kind of eyesore yolo fashions that 2NE1 used to wear before they "turned 20" necessitating the covering of more recently-scarred flesh, and it's all shot as deliberately high-contrast as possible just to make sure your eyes don't derive even the slightest pleasure from focusing anywhere on the screen.  That includes any pleasure from me looking at Minju who is terrifyingly hot with the right styling but just looks disgusting here, maybe it's the same stylist who made Minah look like rubbish in her solo because I can't think of any other recent example of a hot k-pop girl's look so completely and utterly destroyed beyond recognition with the wrong makeup, clothing and hair.  They've even got those fucking awful Dara painted-on hair strand things that look like someone attacked her forehead with a ballpoint pen, and I know A.KOR's plan is basically to copy 2NE1 in all ways possible known to humanity but someone should have told them that the whole point of copying someone else's shit should be to improve on it by copying the good bits and discarding the bad.  Maybe this entire track is A.KOR's producers showing that they can be just as shit as 2NE1 at their worst, so they can show the world how it feels damn good to be bad.  I suggest if anyone ever gives you a physical copy of this, that you light it up and let it burn like you don't care.

12.  Lim Kim - Ah Woo





There's a section of this song at about 1:18 where Lim Kim plays the annoying main riff on a Casio keyboard, just to emphasise that there is in fact a keyboard riff in the song in case you missed it gradually plodding away and grinding your eardrums down into a paste all the way through the song's first verse up until that point.  You'll notice how her right index finger does nothing but continually hit the high Eb key, gosh I can't imagine how listening to that over and over might get a little fucking irritating after a while if it was played, say, fourteen times over the course of two minutes, and observant viewers will notice that the logo is blurred out on the keyboard which proves that Casio understandably weren't willing to pay endorsement money to have their business associated with whatever Lim Kim was doing to their equipment.  Then the verses when she starts singing it's about 70% all the one note hammering at you like some sort of fucking vocal water torture until the chorus happens which is almost entirely made up of fucking cat noises.  Sure she sounds unique (hey everybody let's pretend we haven't heard of Jane Jang ahem), but me doing a k-pop livestream where I spread my asscheeks and take a shit on someone's face would also be unique, but that doesn't mean that people would want to listen - mind you some deviants would probably enjoy it, just like some crazy folks actually preferred this godawful ear torture over the vastly superior "Love Game".  It's all a bit like listening to a k-pop ballad version of Hatebeak with the key difference that Hatebeak is supposed to be funny whereas I'm pretty sure whoever wrote "Ah Woo" is expecting me to take it seriously.  Mystic89 tellingly don't have this particular full video hosted on their own channel, maybe they didn't want to be associated too strongly with it, and we're apparently supposed to believe the hype from k-pop fans that Mystic89 is somehow "different" to other agencies (despite just having signed Brown Eyed Girls, the most idol of idol groups that ever was idoled) so I'm going to blame Lim Kim 100% for this nonsense until otherwise notified.

11.  Pungdeng-E - Ppippippappa





Pungdeng-E are like the bastard child of Crayon Pop and J-Rabbit, combining Crayon Pop's penchant for oddball concepts and screechy yelpiness with J-Rabbit's sickeningly awful childrens TV show style melodies and commitment to completely unexciting music on every single level.   The Pungdeng-E girls do their best to appear as "zany" as possible but they're completely hamstrung by the extremely basic music which has no harmonic movement beyond I, IV and V and plods along at a completely inappropriately slow pace for this kind of material, throwing you chord changes at a rate of once per four seconds at their fastest.  All those vocal yelps and shouts to try and give the song a vibe of "gee what great fun we're having" aren't convincing at all and don't hide the fact that someone is selling plodding children's TV show theme music to people over 8 years old and expecting them to accept it without complaint.  This supposedly upbeat song is actually a boring children's TV ballad in disguise.  If you're still not convinced, go to YouTube's playback settings, change the speed of this song to 1.5 and listen to the quality of the song vastly improve.  Also as an added bonus, if you play it faster the song finishes sooner and you can get back to staring at a blank wall or whatever other more stimulating activity you were up to before you clicked on this.

10.  CL - Hello Bitches





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9.  Luhan - Lu





Luhan is so baby-faced and lithe, he's got the completely wrong image for yolosweggin' like this, hearing him sing about how he's "out here with my crew" (crew of what - hair stylists and makeup artists?) and going to "press you like some juice" doesn't fit his persona at all, it's like listening to a song from T-ara's Boram called "I'm So Tall".   I guess that's why this video tries to make you forget about Luhan's image up until now by supplanting his facial features with some scary deer that are really scary, but not as scary as his gumnastic lyrics.  However ignoring where it's from, what's being sung and who's signing it, "Lu" is made awful primarily by that chorus where he sings "blow it like a flute" and then proceeds to chant "oooh" like he's straining out a chunky constipated shit.  The T-Pain style hard-Autotuned R&B warbles of course only add to the shittiness of proceedings and just when the song starts improving a little with some layered keyboard it ends.  It's hard to imagine how this could have gotten the green light as a feature track, maybe it was to try and make Luhan's other solo songs looks relatively good, in which case the strategy definitely worked.

8.  Jay Park - Sex Trip





I like Jay Park as a person because he's honest about being a complete pervert but boy he puts out some shit tunes.  Songs like "GGG" and "Mommae" were far from great but "Sex Trip" is that same crooning nu-school R&B ballad that he puts out every single year with a different name, and they never get much better or worse.  The main problem with Jay Park in particular doing this type of material is that he loves to sing in falsetto which is always the wrong type of choice for a guy singing any sort of slow sex song.  If Barry White sung his entire repertoire like someone had kicked him in the nuts, I'm sure he wouldn't be as well known as he is today.   But then I could be wrong, maybe the modern woman likes to dream about a short emasculated man with his balls cut off making soft-as-shite music, maybe it shows that he understands their needs or something and I just need to get with the program and realise the desires of today's music-listening females.  Feel free to comment below about if I'm right or wrong about that.

7.  Livii - Watch & Learn





For some reason this entire video is framed with the most bizarre border full of random crap, which reminds me of those Fischer-Price toys I had as a kid where you'd draw something on a gaudily-framed plastic screen and then once you were done you could wipe it away with a sliding bar or shake it a bit or whatever.  Unfortunately both the music and video also look and sound like they were recorded on the same Toys R Us equipment, and I wish I could wipe the existence of this generic yoloturd away as easily as moving a sliding bar on one of those sketch-magic things.  Already covered on Kpopalypse Nugu Alert, Livii has one of those songs which proves that I don't cut unknown artists any slack on these lists when it comes to song quality just because they're nugu.  It's a pity that I'm compelled to hate on this music so much as Livii has a kind of tacky-but-cute hoodrat look somewhere between Qri and Miley Cyrus that I'm actually really attracted to (even though in this particular video she has no idea how to dress herself, so I recommend her YouTube channel for later use) and I'd happily reach out to her for an interview but it would be fucking awkward if she discovered her entry in this list before that happened.

6.  BigBang - Bang Bang Bang





You know, I really think BigBang get way too much hate these days.   Everyone in the group are such talented artiB-B-BDING-DING-D-DING-BA-BA-BOM-BOM-BOMMM-BOMMMMM-BABABOM-BOM-BA-DANG-DONG-DING-DINGsts and in fact YG Entertainment as a collective is a whole beehive of talent.  Not only are all their artists great singers and perfoDING-DING-DING-DA-DING-DING-BOM-BOM-BO-BOBOBOOOOMMM-BOMMMBOOOM-BOBOBODING-DING-DA-DING-DING-BOM-BOM-BO-BOBOBOOOOMMMDING-DING-DA-DING-DINGBOM-BO-BOBOBOM-BO-BOBODING-DA-DING-DING-BOM-BOM-BO-BOBOBOOOOMMM-BOMMMBOOOM-BOBOBODINGrmers but they even learn music production so they can have useful skills after their careers on the pop frontlines are over, something that I wish more labels would have the foresight to do.  There's not many artists out there in Korea who arBOMM-BOMMMBOM-BO-BO-BOMM-BA-DING-DING-DA-DING-DA-DA-DA-DA-BAR-BAR-BA-BOM-BOMBRAAAAM-BOM-BA-DING-DIN-DONG-BANG-BO-BOM-BOOOOOOOOM-BOMMBOMBOOOOOOM-BO-BO-BA-DING-DING-BAR-BA-DING-DANG-BOMMM-BARABOM-BOM-BOMMMM-BO-BOMM-BA-DING-DING-DA-DING-DA-DA-DA-DA-BAR-BAR-BA-BOM-BOMBRAAAAM-BOM-BA-DING-DIN-DONG-BANG-BO-BOM-BOOOOOOOOM-BOMMBOMBOOOOOOM-BO-BO-BA-DING-DING-BAR-BA-DING-DANG-BOMMM-BARABOM-BOM-BOMMMMe so in completely in control of their own product as BigBang and they really do their best to deliver what their fans want every single time.  I think that's something which should be acknowlEBRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABADING-DING-DONG-DANG-BA-BA-BOM-BOM-BOMMMBOMMMM-DA-DING-DING-DING-BAR-BAR-BA-BA-BA-DING-DING-BOM-BOBOBOOMMMM-BOMMMM-DING-DING-BA-DING-DONG-DANG-BA-BA-BOM-BOM-BOMMMBOMMMM-DA-DING-DING-DING-BAR-BAR-BA-BA-BA-DING-DING-BOM-BOBOBOOMMMM-BOMMMM-DINGBA-BA-BOM-BOM-BOMMM-BA-DING-DONG-DANG-BA-BA-BOM-BOM-BOMMMBOMMMM-DA-DING-DINGBA-BA-DING-DING-BOM-BOBOBOOMMMM-BOMMMM-DING-DING-BA-DINGdged and respected, don't you?

5.  B Free ft. Play$tar & Sway D - Kawasaki





In 1978, seminal English industrial music group Throbbing Gristle released their album "DoA - The Third And Final Annual Report", featuring what would come to be regarded as their most iconic song, "Hamburger Lady", a relentless slab of deliberate aural torture paired with vocalist Genesis P.Orridge reciting sections of a letter describing the unfortunate plight of a burns victim.  Throbbing Gristle were admired by few even at their creative and popular peak - many critics and casual music-lovers alike thought of the group as a joke, and even those who loved the group often conceded that it was music so far ahead of its time that they weren't sure if it would ever come into mainstream fashion within their lifetimes.  Fear not, late 70s industrial music fans (if you're still alive), as that moment has now arrived!  B Free has collated all of the main sonic elements of "Hamburger Lady" to create "Kawasaki":
  • Slow repeating tuneless bass-heavy pulse - check
  • Oscillating seasickness-inducing siren noise - check
  • Gibberish lyrics examining human atrocities - check
Exactly how this is supposed to sell a motorcycle I'm not sure, but then I don't really care about that, just like I don't really care about how B Free for some reason has some kind of beef with someone in BTS which has got all the rabid BTS fans (called Armys, presumably because like good soldiers they act violently on command and don't demonstrate independent thought) complaining about and downvoting his video (also see: A.KOR).  What I do really wonder about is how this song has such a great musical influence yet turned out so shitty.  I guess "generic yolosweg turdshit" is a force of evil in music so powerful that it can cancel out even the most positive and creative musical influence.

4.  Brooklyn - Go Brooklyn





"Yeah... y'all ain't ready", begins Jay Park at the start of this video, and for once this typical cliche hip-hop intro line isn't a bluff or a brag but closer in spirit to a public health warning and in any event certainly a statement of pure unadulterated trufax.  I definitely wasn't ready for this, and neither will you be, regardless of what I write here.  Of course it's not the kid's fault, I mean yeah he sounds comical but hey he's better than me when I was his age, so let's not be too harsh.  He's called Brooklyn but he's Asian, so what, lighten up - I'm sure there are Asian people who live there and would be proud for him to represent, plus anyway his breaking moves are sweet.  Yes the kid slurs his words and staggers around like a bitch when he raps as if he's a bit fuckin' drunk but that's pretty much the standard mode of operation for all rappers in 2015 regardless of age, gender or colour so perhaps he studied that style and is just being an authentic G.  I don't actually know what he's rapping about but hey at least he's not being creepily sexualised like Little PSY was so that's another positive.  The real problem with this is actually the backing track, which is that typical annoying fucking B-B-B-BOINGBOING-B-B-BOING yoloshit that nobody wants to listen to.  I'm holding Jay Park responsible for not giving this kid a better beat, Jay's clearly holding all the better beats for his own proje... um... oh wait, never mind.

3.  Dok2 - Riatch





And then there are people who have no excuse.  This video is by and featuring an actual adult (at least in terms of physical age, if not mentally) and it's also 19+ rated, presumably for public health reasons once again, after all children are impressionable and the last thing we need is the movers and shakers and leaders of tomorrow looking up to and emulating horrible beats like this.  The lyrics are on another level however.  While I was watching this I decided to turn the captions on to see what Dok2 was actually saying, and the auto-generated subtitles came up with all these nonsense lyrics that were complete crap and didn't seem to have any relation to anything at all.  It must be working perfectly, who know it could translate Dok2's Korean to English so accurately.  Sadly I'm still not sophisticated enough to understand the true depth of what he's on about though even when translated but I do understand that he is conveying that he is "riatch, biatch" which makes me wonder why he still needs to ride his school bike to the video shoot.  Maybe he just lost his driver's license by making too many illegal u-turns to fetch his swag.  He's also not wearing any bike safety wear and his bicycle doesn't even have a rear reflector, let's hope he rides carefully on those dangerous South Korean roads and doesn't end up in a diatch.

2.  Henry Bloomfield - Kiss A Kumiho





Don't you just hate the word "problematic"?  Once a useful word with an actual meaning, now it's just a plaything for whiny Internet fuckbags and it loosely means "things I don't happen to approve of because I'm a morally grandstanding cuntface who likes to lecture others about how to run their lives from the safety of my computer chair to compensate for the fact that I'm incapable of running my own life".  High on the list of concerns for those hunting for things to feel "problematic" about in the world of k-pop would probably be Henry Bloomfield, who is kind of like Chad Future with a lounge-jazz twist, and his ode to chasing Asian girls with nine tails, "Kiss A Kumiho".  It's all in good-natured fun and not racist at all, I'm sure he's just interested in Korean culture and the fascinating Gumiho legend like the rest of us who forked out for the Ahri skins in League Of Legends and watched T-ara's "Bo Peep Bo Peep" on repeat and slow-motion to appreciate the finer nuances of the story.  Sure he overacts like crazy and it's cringeworthy but it's not any different to what happens in other MVs or shitty Korean dramas, we're only reacting with knee-jerk revulsion because we're used to seeing an Asian guy do that stuff and not some buggy-eyed skinny white guy.  What's wrong with a white guy trying out entering the k-pop scene and shoot a music video dancing with hot Korean girls anyway, why shouldn't he?  Why is that bad - just because he's white?  Ahhh - look who's racist all of a sudden, you hypocrite.  I've got nothing against people with caucasian backgrounds (or any other racial backgrounds) getting into k-pop and doing it, observe Shannon Williams on my favourites list as proof of that.  Lets cut any crap out about the girls being "exploited" too - judging by the smiles on their faces I'd say that they were renumerated fairly for their services, and in any event we see far more of Henry Bloomfield's flesh in this video than anyone else's (lucky us).  The singing is fine too, that sort of semi-talking style is actually pretty normal for this particular genre of lounge-jazz-fusion-whatever and he's doing it just as well as anyone else ever did, certainly as well as he needs to.  Frank Sinatra pretty much made a living out of sing-talking to the extent where he was almost an early form of rap and nobody cared back then so there's no need to be a worthless complaining cunthole about it now all of a sudden.  If you're going to get all "problematic" about "Kiss A Kumiho", at least do it for a real reason.  You don't have to invent all these extra bullshit reasons to hate it when the song being truly a piece of fucking unlistenable jumbled cacophonous shit that sounds like it was improvised during a particularly messy enema is perfectly valid and all the reason anyone needs.

So what's the number 1 worst song for 2015?  Well it probably goes without saying that...

IT'S A T-RAP! (MQ v.2)

The density of shitty trap comebacks was so intense that I could have easily made this list just 30 trap or trap-influenced songs, and it's in fact a minor miracle that there were also k-pop songs that weren't trap-based that also sucked enough to actually compete and score places on this list.  The equal parts puzzling and disgusting trend of "rap without proper beats, clever rhymes or any semblance of intelligence" that is trap swept strongly into k-pop over the course of 2015, pushing humanity closer to "peak sweg" and dominating this worst-of list, and the following song is not only the worst one of them all, but it's probably largely to blame.  It was released right at the start of the year on January 1st 2015, and started such a vile and cancerous trend that it condemned the entire year to an influx of trendy nonsense from every sweggot whose agency thought they could swig a swag.  Yes that's right it's...

1.  Keith Ape feat. JayAllDay, Loota, Okasian & Kohh - It G Ma





Earlier in 2015, I had a health scare - I start feeling slight pain whenever I took a piss.  The pain wasn't very severe, just a dull ache, but it was certainly annoying enough and consistent enough to get me worried about what it might mean for my health.  I hoped that the pain would go away on its own but after a few weeks and no noticeable change, I decided that it was time to see a doctor and get myself checked out.  I'm lucky enough to have a doctor who is actually pretty awesome plus also lucky to live in a country with a normal healthcare system where people can actually afford to see a doctor (i.e not the USA).  I told the doctor about my pain, and he told me about the process of diagnosis.

"Well, it could be nothing, or it could be something serious.  In a worst-case scenario it could be bladder cancer, but it's unlikely to be anything that bad.  We'd better do some tests to make sure.", said the doctor.

Cancer?  Uh oh.  "If it's bladder cancer, what happens?  Is that as deadly as terminal ass cancer?"

"It's easy to treat if it's caught early before it spreads.  The survival rate for bladder cancer is excellent."

"How is it treated?"

"We put a small torch up through the eye of your penis and burn off the cancer cells inside your bladder, then you pee out the scar tissue later.  The entire operation only takes a day."

A needle up my cock?  "Can I just rip my own cock off and eat it instead?  I think that would be less painful." I asked the doctor.

He seemed unfazed, no doubt he's seen people react this way before.  "It's a pretty simple operation.  I won't lie to you, it's pretty nasty, I certainly wouldn't want to have to go through it.  But there's quite a few steps before we get to that point, so don't worry prematurely."

I had some blood tests and urine tests done, which determine if the pain is a result of a urinary tract infection.  These tests both came back negative, so it was time to see a specialist.

"I'm going to need to do a prostate check" the specialist said as I sat down in his operating room.

"Okay, what's that?" I asked, already having a pretty good idea of what he was going to say but hoping against hope that it was something else and my anal virginity wasn't going to be taken by a 70-year old man.  No such luck.

"Oh I just put a glove on, shove a finger up your ass and feel your prostate gland, just to make sure that it's hard and firm like it should be.  Just take your clothes off and lie on your side for me over on the table, it'll only take a few seconds."  I did as the doctor instructed and before I knew it I suddenly had a newfound respect for all those pornstars who had enhanced my life over the years - it wasn't exactly pleasant but it was certainly over with very quickly.  It's important for any older men to get their prostate checked regularly, but I also recommend prostate checks to all you younger men so you can fully understand and appreciate the eye-rolls and grumbling you get when you ask your girlfriend if she'll do anal sex for you.  There's nothing like experiencing something firsthand from the other person's perspective to increase empathy.

After this it was off to radiology for some nurses to give me an ultrasound.  They asked me to drink a litre of water and not take a piss for an hour, then they smeared x-ray contact jelly over my lower abdomen and then rubbed it with some hand-held x-ray thing, which isn't anywhere near as sexy as it sounds and actually really uncomfortable because the x-ray thing puts pressure on my bladder so I wanted to pee again but of course I wasn't allowed to because it would fuck the scan results.  This was actually more painful than the prostate thing because even though the discomfort was milder, it took a lot longer, and not only is the bladder pressure an issue but they have to get photographs from several different angles so they're there doing it for a while and all the pushing on my pelvic bones got a bit irritating.

A few days later I went back to my doctor, who looked at the scan results and told me that my prostate was slightly larger than normal, but it wasn't cancer.  The doctor put it down to the large amount of bike-riding that I do and suggested I get a softer bicycle seat which had a gap in the middle so it doesn't put pressure on the prostate area.  I went out and bought such a seat, and in a few weeks, the pain cleared up, everything was okay, and I went on about my pain-free existence.

OR SO I THOUGHT.

A while later, I discovered Keith Ape's "It G Ma".  "Gosh, I've heard it's a trap thing, and I usually hate those but hey it's got over 17 million views, there must be something good about it, let's be completely fair and reasonable and give it a chance to impress me", I thought to myself as I clicked on the video, turning my speakers up to give the song every advantage possible to blow me away.  My first thought was "wow, these intro sounds are pretty crap on their own but they could build into something cool", as the lazy 50 BPM beats kicked in, which is slower than any Shitney Houston song ever recorded, not that I've checked because it's bad enough that I have to listen to "It G Ma" just to review it, let's not lobotomise myself with her garbage as well.  Then the guy started screeching over the top something about "underwater squad" and I could feel the pain in my prostate returning, indeed his castrated yelps reminded me of just how I felt on the inside when the doctor's fingers were shoved deeply up my colon.  The song grinded on for another minute as I realised that the flaccid backing track wasn't building anywhere at all and the whole song was in fact going to be just like this, as my entire lower genital region resonated in throbbing sympathy with the horrible music, the tinny keyboard making me shudder as I imagined a hundred resectoscopes probing my genitals in painful synchronisation.  Mercifully, the main guy's chanting eventually stopped while some other useless non-rapping idiots commenced some uncoordinated drunken slobbering warble, with the last guy who non-raps bearing a close auditory resemblance to the noise that the x-ray contact gel tube made when it squirted out its contents just before the hand-held x-ray machine painfully pushed on my bladder.  Just like the ultrasound, the song also painfully overstays its welcome, clocking in at nearly the six minute mark, and if you want to know how my several weeks of medical checkups made me feel in auditory song form, it's all right here in "It G Ma".  Just don't ask me which experience is more unpleasant, I'm really not sure.

2015worstfoot2

That's it for Kpopalypse's 2015 worst k-pop songs list!  Thanks for reading my worthless opinions, and thanks to Dwelph for the Admiral Boram image!  Don't forget that there's a favourites list as well, and here's to a hopefully less trap-infused 2016!

Fancam Appreciation #15 - Fiestar's Cao Lu

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With everyone jumping on board the Cao Lu hype train, I figured it was time for people to have a chance to fap to Cao Lu. More fancams after the jump.








Are there fancams that you want to nominate? Email them to antikpopfangirl@yahoo.com or tweet them to @antikpopfangirl.

suho_ftw's Top 25 Title Tracks of 2015

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At first, I wasn't going to post this here to avoid overkill, but I got the OK.


This list was not easy. It took revising and re-editing, and it eventually came down to me with a pencil and paper writing down the songs it would physically hurt me not to put on the list. It started out as 15 and ended up being 25 because fuck it, why not? Not every song I loved wound up on this, just the ones that had to be in the top 25. 

Criteria/Disclaimers:

- Song must be a title track. B-sides have a separate list.
- Rap songs can be included, but this is primarily k-pop so I kept it down to a minimum.
- It's all my opinion.


25.) Seventeen & Ailee - "Q&A"



I know this song literally just came out, but that doesn't stop it from being a song I will play the living hell out of. It's catchy and always stuck in my head. The female version is Playback's maybe musically better "Playback," and while that song is totally awesome and deserves all the love, it's "Q&A" that I just like better. The '90s piano beat, the goofy rapping, and enjoyable vocals by Ailee and Woozi make this track a pure ear-worm.

24.) Rainbow - "Black Swan"



At first listen, "Black Swan" probably will sound jarring and even a bit sloppily put together. But when I listened to it again, "Black Swan" was amazing. It just doesn't carry the traditional method of structure, and that works to its strengths rather than make it sound like total shit. The instrumental follows a simplistic approach with a subdued electro-pop sound, a catchy melody and a catchy chorus all leading up to a killer end-chorus where all the instruments collide, and it's awesome.

23.) MyB - "DDODDO"


MyB may look like a bunch of Red Velvet fangirls got together one day after school and filmed a music video, but that doesn't make their music any less great. Seriously, "DDODDO" is catchy as hell. It's very, very '90s. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if this took inspiration from the "Mickey Mouse Club." Everything about this, from the child-friendly colorful MV to the actual music, looks like it time traveled 20 years in the future. The dance is also pretty great and easily one of the best girl group dances to come out of k-pop this year. 

22.) A.Kor - "Always"



When this song first came out back in January, I replayed it for a good week. I'd come home and put on repeat while I was doing homework or projects etc ... It's just that good. I love the simplicity of this song. The warm guitar strings layered with the drums surprisingly make a good dancing-around-the-house-while-shouting-the-chorus-at-the-top-of-your-lungs song. Do you know how long it's been since a song made me do that?

21.) Got7 - "Just Right"



The fact that some people still consider Got7 nugus is a shame. They've literally not had any bad songs since their debut, and I'm happy that "Just Right" got a little bit of airtime. The scratch hip-hop beat mixed with those warm melodies on the acoustic guitar sounds terrible on paper, but you can't deny that JYP can pretty much make anything sound good when he puts his mind to it. And with "Just Right" being one of his more weirder sounding tracks, I hope that Got7 and Twice become the SHINee and f(x) of JYPE and can both be given great experimental tracks to work with. Or he can just keep doing what he's doing because that's working just as well.

20.) Hello Venus - "Wiggle Wiggle"


Like 4Minute's "Cut it Out," "Wiggle Wiggle" reminds me a lot of the kind of hip-hop that was being produced when I was a kid. Think about Pharelle's (or Underdog's if you want to get technical) early-to-mid-2000s production. I love everything about this song from the bass-line to the whistles to the dude that sounds like Tyga in the background saying shit like "I'm feelin', feelin' good" and "Shawty, where you at?" That is the kind of 2000s cheese I didn't know I was missing in my life. The video is also full of that type of cheese with matching sporty hot-girl outfits, white sneakers, and wonky angles. All of it very cheesy and very good.

19.) Dynamic Duo - "J.O.T.S" (Feat. Nafla)


Remember American rap in the '90s and how much it didn't suck? While I was born in the late '90s and don't pretend that I grew up on Tupac and Biggie, I still have a deep admiration for that time of rap music, as any actual rap fan would. This contains all the hard beats and conscious messages that would have been prevalent during that time. While the instrumental is absolutely awesome, it's the message that really stuck to me as it's very uplifting and welcome. This is especially true in a time where rappers are just now getting out of the rut of rapping about how much money they make and how many hoes they fucked (like we actually give a damn), all while the actual music keeps sucking major amounts of dick with the same old bass line layered under the same old trap beat. "J.O.T.S" is everything American rap music needs more of.

18.) Nine Muses - "Hurt Locker"


Speaking of awesome instrumentals, "Hurt Locker" was the anthem of the summer. It didn't follow the laid-back, half-assed vibe most songs this summer came with. It went hard with a clubbing beat and never gave up. While the lyrics are sad, the song is upbeat and makes you want to dance and sing at the top of your lungs like T-ara's "Sugar Free," and anything that reminds me of that song is automatically gold.

17.) Up10tion - "Catch Me!"


If Up10tion keeps their current sound up, I can see them getting huge in Korea. They have everything a boy group needs: hard hitting beats, hot boys, catchy melodies, hot boys, music videos with interesting concepts, hot boys, catchy chorus, hot boys, cool dances, and of course hot boys. Did I also mention how great this song is? It's weird and energetic and in all the right places receiving an A+ from me. Also Wooshin is hot.

16.) OMG (Oh My Girl) - "Closer"


Another great song from another great rookie group. This mixes the melancholy aura of a breakup song with a good amount of dance aspects of a pop song. What more could you want?

15.) Red Velvet - "Automatic"


I swear only me and like two other Red Velvet stans love this, but it doesn't matter. I'm cool with R&B as long as it's well done. On a personal level, "Automatic" is one of those smooth and sophisticated R&B songs that made me fans of the likes of Mary J. Blige and Ne-Yo, so it's impossible to act like this song doesn't keep me coming back like an addict.

14. 4Minute - "Crazy"


You know why Western pop is sucking so much as of late? Poorly done trap+hip-hop songs. You know why Western hip-hop has been in a rut for the past, like, eight years? Poorly done trap+hip-hop songs. 4Minute perfected that formula to a tea and actually made it listenable. This is the type of nut-crushing-in-your-face party anthems that the West needs more of, and that 4Minute needs to keep doing.

13. CLC - "Pepe"


I swear I didn't plan to put two Cube artists back to back; that's just kind of how the list came about. But anyway, while "Crazy" was awesome because it was in your face, "Pepe" is awesome for the opposite. It's an upbeat and playful jazzpop song, and the fact that while CLC has some pretty good singers in it, they don't overpower the song but let their voices flow with it, makes for pretty good classic ear candy.

12.) Infinite - "Bad"


Violins in mainstream music is something I didn't know I needed. The tension they bring here is stellar. This song is so bombastic and fresh. This song cemented Infinite being in my top 5 boy groups. K-pop gods please listen to me: Give more boy groups songs like this. Pretty please?

11.) BESTie - "Excuse Me"


RetroModern can make some killer ass songs, and that shows no better than in BESTie's amazing "Excuse Me." Old school horns(?) accompany the melody here along with a chorus that will knock you on your ass. How could this not be one of my favorites of 2015?

10. BoA - "Who Are You?" (Feat. Gaeko)


"Kiss My Lips" will forever be worthy of praise, but I had "Who Are You?" on repeat for the longest. Upbeat R&B can almost never fail especially when BoA, a person who composed gems such as "Only One" and "Disturbance," is given the wheel.

9.) Crayon Pop - "FM"


Everything about this song is catchy — catchy melody, catchy chorus, everything is catchy catchy catchy. A lot of people call it a T-ara b-side, but can you really call that an insult when T-ara have more solid b-sides than most K-pop groups? Also extra points for the Sailor Moon concept.

8.) Lovelyz - "Ah-Choo"


Upbeat '80s synth-pop coming from a girl group that uses the school girl concept is rare since most cute groups go for the '90s sugar pop sound (nothing wrong with that, but still). What I love about Lovelyz is their songs always sound like they were produced for them as a group instead of just being handed an A Pink b-side, which is what a lot of cute groups get thrown these days. This song was produced to pure perfection with no part being dull. The verses contain a certain "umph," the chorus is stellar and even the bridge is very well done. Another triumph for Lovelyz!

7.) Yankie - "Sold Out" (Feat. Tablo, Zion.T, and Loco)


You know what will make my ears have an orgasm? Gather a group of good rappers and combine with A Tribe Called Quest-like jazz-meets-hip-hop beats, and boom, you pretty much have me sold. No pun intended. Also it contains a chorus by Zion.T, which mixes well with the song instead of sounding jarring. Even the aesthetic of the MV seems to be very '90s with those rounded-out Busta Rhymes camera lens and baggy clothing. "Sold Out" is pure old-school hip-hop fun, which is all very good.

6.) Purfles - "Bad Girl"


I know this song just came out like two weeks ago, but I replayed it so much it threatened to become my favorite song of the year. This is the kind of cool '70s funk that needs to become a thing in K-pop. I get bored very quickly with the subdued '70s funk that gets pushed so hard these days. More producers need to follow Purfles and Primary's example and put some damn energy into it! Also, extra points for sounding a bit like Sailor Moon transformation music.

5.) BTS (Bangtan Boys) - "Run"


While this strays from their normal sound, "Run" still kicks all kinds of ass. BTS doing a non-hip-hop but still kind of hip-hop dance number? On paper, that sounds horrible, but the result is damn near flawless. Also, good God, they look so fucking hot here. I especially like that pillow fight. I want to see more male pillow fights. Jimin, please crush my head with your beautiful thighs.

4.) Stellar - "Vibrato"


Sweetune nailed it with this: funky guitars and bass mixed with a seemingly modern dance beat, all tied together with a music video that means more than what meets the eye. It's the Stellar comeback that everyone can get something out of, and what I got was a treat for the ears and a teaser for the brain.

3.) SHINee - "Married To The Music" + f(x) - "4 Walls"



I couldn't choose which one I liked more, so I put them both here. SM's two best groups put out equally great songs this year. Coincidence? Maybe. "Married to the Music" is an awesome retro dance song with an upbeat and energetic '70s funk beat, hard hitting synths, and awesome climax. Pure, raw awesomeness. Nothing to hate. "4 Walls" is a sleek and sophisticated deep-house track with a very f(x)-ey melody and also a great climax. Both of these songs impressed me and had me hitting the replay button, and while they're two vastly different songs that take vastly different approaches, they're both equally awesome. Therefore, they take up this spot on my list.

2.) Seventeen - "Mansae"


"Mansae" rocks so hard, though. No seriously, the song doesn't waste any time. It just goes right into some thick bass licks under an opening (and a very typical Vernon swag-lite style rap you've probably become accustomed to) before kicking into a very '90s but very awesome dance track. So much about this is so right. The chorus is just fucking stellar. The music video is interesting ... but hey, if you don't like the opening rap, Vernon gets bitch slapped in the video. So you have some visuals if you wish to see what that would like. Keep in mind, he appears to like it, so you might be encouraging him. What also helps is that this is a song where the breakdowns don't sound jarring or pulled out of left field. Everything in this song has a purpose, which makes "Mansae" pretty "flawless."

1.) Red Velvet - "Dumb Dumb"


Funny isn't it? My favorite song of the year is kind of a "non-song." Everything about "Dumb Dumb" is pretty much just weird isn't it? The song sounds like it had your typical structure at one point with nothing special about it, but then someone threw it into a washing machine (Kpopalypse metaphor here), added brass, thriving bass and a slew of other random shit to spice it up then said, "There, that's better." While other songs that have this similar "thing" done to them are utter shit nine times out of 10, "Dumb Dumb" turned out absolutely fantastic. Would you believe the first time I heard this it gave me headache? I came back to it a while later and couldn't get it out my head nor stop replaying it. "Dumb Dumb" is easily my most played song of the year, it never fails to make me want to dance or put a smile on my face or make me stupidly sing along to the chorus. Sure, it has flaws. Sure, most of it is probably just noise, but it's the kind of noise that I love. And to be honest, I'm pretty sure only Red Velvet could be given a song like this.

See you all in 2016! Happy 2016!


Saturday Shitfest #30

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Hnnng, Victoria covering Jolin Tsai's "Honey Trap". 8======D~~~~

I hope you guys had a great 2015. 2015 was a great year for me, but it made me busier, as evidenced as me being gone for the majority of 2015. 2015 was the slowest year for AKF with the least number of posts, and that is primarily my fault. However, being busy as fuck really teaches you how to manage your time, so expect 2016 to be about as busy as 2014 was. 2016 will still have all of the scheduled posts that we started rolling out in December, but during my slower seasons I'll be able to post a lot more, including long articles.

Also, AKF is already entering its sixth calendar year and the five-year anniversary is in April. I didn't expect this site to last this long. I really don't have anything planned for this year aside from just keeping this site alive.

Weekly Showdown: Battle of the Labels

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[Results of last showdown here]

Since there hasn't been any good new music (or at least anything showdown-worthy) these past two weeks, I decided I'd ask you guys this instead: Which record label do you think put out the best music in 2015? I'm just gonna put the "Big three," but you guys can click "other" if you think none are worthy enough.




Best K-pop Label of 2015

SM
YG
JYP
Other
Please Specify:
Poll Maker



I won't even bat an eyelash before saying this: It's SM for me. 2015 was definitely a great year for SM. Why? Three reasons: F(x), Red Velvet, and EXO. All three have put out spectacular albums this year. Granted, they may have shitty management that probably treats their idols like shit, but there's no denying their music quality. So yeah, SM, you may suck at a lot of things, but making music isn't one of them. Although you might wanna work on Girls' Generation a little harder than that.
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