NOTE: This list was already written when we received the news of the apparent suicide of SHINee’s Kim Jonghyun. At the time of publication this development is still less than a week old, but I cannot write it into the main article without sounding flippant about it, and so have left the list un-edited. Kim Jonghyun was literally the first male voice I heard after discovering that I liked K-Pop, and his voice also kicked off my first K-Pop Top 15 at the end of 2012. His loss has rocked the K-Pop community worldwide, and on a personal note has hit me just as hard as the Chester Bennington tragedy earlier this year. I can only imagine how his family must be feeling. He will be missed.
Ah, 2017. If you were a K-Pop fan around when I started being invested in the genre (is it even a genre anymore?) half a decade ago, and you’re still here, then congrats. Your ears have clearly been through a lot and your tastes must be resilient. Though 2016 saw many more big-name K-Pop groups bite the dust, the official dissolving of Sistar and the Wonder Girls in 2017 – alongside respective three-member exoduses from T-ara and Girls’ Generation – meant a 2017 K-Pop fan can hardly be accused of holding on to past glories.
There were quite a few fresh influences and trends worth getting excited about this year, even if they flooded the market so quickly it was hard to find quality at times. The most prevalent surely must be the KARD-and-Winner-led influx of tropical house, because at one point it felt like every group was trying on the sea-and-sand beats. Korea’s ongoing recent fascination with contemporary EDM beat drops also spread into the realm of American DJ collaborations this year – particularly so among the top-tier boy groups – and that helped solidify BTS in rarefied air on the Billboard Top 10 Artists chart in the USA. It seems K-Pop’s year-on-year growth in online popularity around the world has reached a point that no “niche” categorisation can hold back some fandoms. Let’s not forget that we now live in a world where the CinemaSins guy can riff on a Red Velvet video and get views for it. But fear not, because K-Pop was still pulling out plenty of offbeat gimmicks all its own in 2017, from the song-a-month themed schedule of Day6 to the slow revelations of new LOONA members one solo performance at a time. I found a decent amount of K-Pop to enjoy in 2017, and hopefully you did too.
As always, some rules I like to hold myself to: No more than one song from each act and no B-sides. A song needs to have its own official music video and be sung primarily in Korean to be on the list, even though this disqualifies some pretty good songs like Girl Next Door’s Deep Blue Eyes, EXO’s Electric Kiss and Dumbfoundead’s Water (although, to be fair, the latter comes from an actual American rapper). Here’s my sixth annual K-Pop Top 15 list.
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VR BEST OF 2017 DISCLAIMER
This list represents my opinion only. I am not asserting any kind of superiority or self-importance by presenting it as I have. My opinion is not fact. If you actually agree with me 100%, that’s strange. Intriguing, but strange. Respectful disagreement is most welcome.
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15. Don’t Wanna Cry – Seventeen
It felt like this song was around every corner when I was looking for K-Pop throughout the majority of 2017 – on YouTube, on curated streaming playlists, on podcasts – and for good reason. It may not have the most exciting backing track, bridge or rap section, but it sure has one catchy hook. Some nights I just can’t get that chorus line out of my head. I want to scream it out right now. Also, it’s Seventeen, so the choreography is amazing and executed with ridiculous accuracy to boot. Who actually wants to cry, though, Seventeen? Who?
At the end of last month I put to bed a small regret of mine – Half a decade ago I was presented with the opportunity to attend the Sydney debut of Symphony of the Goddesses, a worldwide concert tour immediately following on from the special Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary concerts in Japan and the USA. For reasons I can no longer remember clearly (probably funds), I did not take this opportunity. Naturally I regretted my decision pretty soon after the performance dates arrived and several of my friends raved about how good the show was. I told myself the next time I had such a chance I would not let it pass. But for years, no such chance appeared.
So when, after years of sporadic worldwide tours with varying set lists, the announcement was made that Symphony of the Goddesses would be returning to Sydney harbour this year, no price would have been too high for me to snatch up a ticket. Two years after entering the opera house for the first time to attend the Pokemon Symphonic Evolutions showcase, I was back in the venue’s main concert hall to take in the fully-realised music of one of my absolute favourite media franchises. And what an evening it was.
There are three main reasons I’d go to see an orchestral performance of a videogame music selection – The atmosphere, the craft and the arrangement. Hardly groundbreaking reasons of course, and I’m sure the majority of the people in attendance on the night had similar motivations. Atmosphere is created mostly by said people, whose collective energy and passion tend to elevate an event that otherwise gets by on a uniquely strange blend of nerdiness and class. This department provided the largest point of difference between the Pokemon concert and the Zelda one for me. At the Pokemon event, there seemed to be more themed and/or casual dress in and around the hall, while during the concert the audience reacted loudly to each track and arrangement – especially the more widely recognised ones. While the Zelda show was hardly black tie – and cosplay was there if you looked for it – I definitely noticed more of a conservative attitude to dress code in general. What’s more, during the concert you could tell a crowd favourite by a groundswell of hushed whispers and gasps rather than whoops and shouts. I can’t quite put my finger on the reason for this (perhaps Zelda’s slightly older fanbase, or the fact the concert landed on the exact weekend of PAX Australia in Melbourne) but it certainly lent the atmosphere a more reverential tone and allowed quieter pieces – of which Zelda boasts several – to shine.
All things considered, 2016 was pretty good for the entertainment media I cover on this blog (I use “cover” loosely – sadly I barely wrote here in 2016). And I don’t even really watch TV shows! 2017 can potentially be even better when you look at what’s coming on paper, sitting there all promising in its un-delayed state. Here’s to a more consistent videogame release schedule, more wonderful RPGs, maybe a decent DC universe movie? 2017 looks like it could have a nice ring to it. In any case, here are all the links to my 2016 countdowns:
What a fantastic year 2015 was for entertainment media. 2016 will have a hard time topping it, though it will certainly try with quite a sizeable suite of big guns up its proverbial sleeve. Before any of the big stuff hits, however, have a look back at the year that was with the stuff that helped make my 2015 so enjoyable. Below you’ll find all the links to my year-end countdowns, featuring a new list concept and the longest games countdown post I’ve ever written. Happy new year!
Yep, another concert post! What a time to be alive.
I’ve lived in Australia for 17 years now, and been a tourist to these great shores before that. But last night marked the very first time I had the pleasure of entering the Sydney Opera House. My reason for doing so was not exactly standard for the venue, mind you, but it was certainly worth the wait. The long-hyped orchestral treatment of the music from the Pokémon series had finally arrived in our backyard, and the event did not disappoint.
It was a bit of a sore spot for me that I had never seen the famous Sydney Symphony Orchestra live in any capacity, not least of all because that meant I’d missed both 2011’s Distant Worlds concert (music from Final Fantasy) and 2013’s Symphony of the Goddesses (music from the Legend of Zelda series). But I was never going to miss this one, and there were very obviously hundreds of others who felt the same, because there was a real excited buzz in and around the iconic Darling Harbour venue. Continue reading →
That’s it – It’s happening. I’m finally going to start reviewing K-pop albums. Perhaps not regularly, mind you, but any reason I may have had against doing so in the past is starting to look a bit arbitrary in light of how little content I’m able to get up on this blog these days. Sometimes if an opportunity appears, you have to take it. And people should know about such brilliance as this. People. Should. Know.
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Released: August 2015
Label:JYP Entertainment Genre: K-Pop -◊-◊-◊-◊-
It’s not enough for the album to sound like the 1980s, it has to look like them, too.
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TRACK LISTING
1. Baby Don’t Play 2. Candle (feat. Paloalto) 3. I Feel You 4. Rewind 5. Loved 6. John Doe 7. One Black Night 8. Back 9. Oppa 10. Faded Love 11. Gone 12. Remember
1980s pop musical tributes may not quite be a dime a dozen at the moment, but they’re certainly in vogue. When someone as big as Taylor Swift decides to emblazon her polaroid-inspired album artwork with the title “1989”, you just know a trend is in motion. Synth hooks, big bass and full-ham electronic mixing are all back and you don’t have to look very hard to find them, as this entertaining 2014 list from Pigeons & Planes paints clear as day. And that’s amazing, because the musical quirks that define a “1980s sound” are pretty damn fun, particularly when used skilfully. Trend or no, I’ve always got time for a good 1980s inspired album.
REBOOT, the aptly named, long-awaited comeback piece from one-time Korean supergroup Wonder Girls, is a very good 1980s inspired album.
Time for another all-too-uncommon album review, this time from guest writer, graphic artist and DJ extraordinaire Youniversal.
—Written by Youniversal—
—Edited/formatted by Vagrantesque—
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Released: August 2014
Label:Virgin Records Genre: EDM -◊-◊-◊-◊-
All ethereal-like.
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TRACK LISTING
1. Divinity (feat. Amy Millan) 2. Sad Machine 3. Years of War (feat. Breanne Duren & Sean Caskey) 4. Flicker 5. Fresh Static Snow 6. Polygon Dust (feat. Lemaitre) 7. Hear the Bells (feat. Imaginary Cities) 8. Natural Light 9. Lionhearted (feat. Urban Cone) 10. Sea of Voices 11. Fellow Feeling 12. Goodbye To a World
There comes a time in every conceptual cycle where the new kid on the block finds a unique answer to the age old question: “What comes next?” On August 12th 2014, 22 year old Porter Robinson released a masterpiece that used its devices to break the limitations of what the industry would consider EDM. ‘Worlds’ is a 12 piece synthpop album that takes the charm of a late 90’s 32-bit title and the flare of otaku culture, then shoves them together to produce what you could call a beautifully glitchy nostalgic mess. Using the english vocaloid AVANNA by Zero G and the help of artists such as Amy Millan and Urban Cone, Robinson guides his listeners through a universe of escapism and the unlikely relationships that blossom between reality and the digital world.
2015 is off and kicking, already delivering quality movies and videogames right here in Australia less than a week in! It’s going to be an incredible year for entertainment media, but if you missed any of my countdowns wrapping up the year that was 2014, here are the links to every one:
Last year I began my year-end countdowns with a list of a more negative flavour than the stuff I’m usually inclined to write, but it received a pretty substantial amount of attention (who knew?) and was a refreshing challenge to put together, so here we are with its 2014 return. I present my opinion on the top 10 entertainment media disappointments of 2014.
In the early months of the year, I didn’t have much of a list building. Almost every widely anticipated movie proved to exceed expectations rather than dip below them, and as for videogames, despite a relative six month drought of major releases, there was always something good to play. Then, in the second half of 2014, things started to unravel, with huge, emotionally charged media stories abounding over controversial issues. They were mostly gaming related, which stung a bit, but that was fine with me in at least one department, as it ensured I wouldn’t have to think up a new type of list for 2014. Here we go.
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10. Interstellar fell short of the hype
One could make the point that no movie of 2014 felt the weight of expectation more than Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar. Many people, myself included, waited with baited breath for more details to be revealed about the sci-fi epic following a highly cryptic opening teaser and an even less transparent first trailer. Few would disagree that Nolan’s highly impressive track record justified the kind of hype afforded to Interstellar, but when the disappointing first wave of reviews came through for the American release of the film, that hype backfired. Then, as my free time began to dissipate due to new commitments, a lot of my friends started to see it without me, and several of them raved about it. So my hopes were raised again – then I saw it myself. While I do think Interstellar is a good movie, even a very good one, I just can’t get past its messy attempts at sentimentality which, for me, place it below every other (admittedly excellent) Nolan movie thus far. It’s a compliment to the director, really. .
I’ve been listening to this one for over a month now, and I’m about ready to call it pretty damn awesome.
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Released: October 2014
Label:Big Machine Genre: Pop -◊-◊-◊-◊-
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TRACK LISTING
1. Welcome to New York 2. Blank Space 3. Style 4. Out of the Woods 5. All You Had to Do Was Stay 6. Shake It Off 7. I Wish You Would 8. Bad Blood 9. Wildest Dreams 10. How You Get the Girl 11. This Love 12. I Know Places 13. Clean 14. Wonderland (Deluxe only) 15. You Are In Love (Deluxe only) 16. New Romantics (Deluxe only)
I used to be really, really apathetic about Taylor Swift. For a long time I, like many people around the world today, barely batted an eyelid at a new single or album release from the Nashville-raised countrified pop star. I’m not exactly sure when that opinion started to change, though I know it probably had a lot to do with her refreshingly down-to-earth, highly entertaining public interviews with Ellen DeGeneres. Then in late 2012, Redhappened. An album that seemed impossible to avoid, Red represented a tangible departure from Swift’s country roots, pushing towards a more universally appealing sound. I let my curiosity get the better of me, bought it, and didn’t look back. Aside from its perhaps overindulgent length, the album was very hard to fault, and it was quickly deemed a modern classic by critics and fans alike. I kinda liked it too, so when the talented singer-songwriter announced an album with my birth year stamped on the front cover earlier this year, I was instantly hyped. The album promised a sound that borrowed liberally from late-1980s synth pop, and that it most certainly does. Yet 1989 still feels like a worthy successor to Red. It’s not as good, but it’s still a really enjoyable listen over and over again.
Vagrant Rant 