Warning: This video contains a lot of flashing bright lights and camera distortions. Those prone to seizures may wanna stay away from this one.
Solving the first part of YG’s latest “Who Is Next?” puzzle, GD and Taeyang give us club banger “Good Boy.” Though not exactly the five-member mystery release fans were expecting, at least a small faction of the VIPs was sated with this über-colorful, borderline seizure-inducing piece of club fodder.
The opening of the video borrows from P-Type’s homage to hip-hop with “Timberland 6”—the camera panning to a wall of kids getting their haircut from barbers of different ethnic backgrounds. But from there all semblance of something having to do with hip-hop at all sort of fizzles away. There’s no narrative, no overarching theme. The video, quite frankly, is just a bit of fun and fluff — lots of colors and flashing lights.
[youtube http://youtu.be/1ZRb1we80kM]“Good Boy” seems like a 16+ episode of Nickelodeon’s The Roundhouse, complete with inside jungle gym, bubbles, and glow-in-the-dark clothes and accessories. The most outrageous accessory of all is G-Dragon’s hair. His decision to use fluorescent black boba tea bendy straws and schoolgirl braids as hair extensions — complete with barrettes and baubles — takes him from the haute couture of his latest videos to a position as the bad boy next door on The Muppet Show.
As far as the choreo goes, it’s sharp as most YG choreo is. But fans have seen it before. A little bit of “One of a Kind” mixed with a dash of “Ringa Linga,” and you’ve got the long and short of the choreography for “Good Boy.” In fact, the video in and of itself seems to just be outtakes from Taeyang’s MV version of the hit song. It’s almost as if this whole thing was thrown together in a few days just to keep fans from nagging about subunits they’re neither interested in nor asked for.
As far as the song, it’s basic. Basic music, basic lyrics, basic vocals. While there’s no crime in keeping things simple, this is really just a low blow for a duo known for their creativity musically and visually. What we get in “Good Boy” is a hodge-podge of all the same YG concepts with nothing remotely intriguing to keep audiences interested past a few listens.
The men do what they always do well. The song is about the same as what we’d expect from the unit. For all the hype YG continues to build up with his newest and favorite catch phrase — “Who is next?” — fans get nothing more than a bit of distraction and halfhearted appeasement for the missing members of Big Bang and lack of actual girl group.
The concept as a whole seems lazy. No one would accuse these men of resting on their laurels, as it were, but everything from the song to the music video seems like no one really wanted to make it in the first place. It was just something to do one weekend when they weren’t — hopefully — coming up with new material. There’s nothing wrong with having a little bit of fun just to pass the time, but how necessary it is to release it to the public is up for debate.
To sum up: recycled sets and choreo, flashing lights, an arcade, and Sesame Street hair. Very little to see here, folks. While not exactly bad, “Good Boy” is terribly uninteresting; it’s a bit of fluff and fun that was put together to keep fans entertained. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. After all, that’s what the whole business of music is about: entertaining the masses. However, just how long does Papa YG think he can keep swinging subunits in the faces of fans to pacify them until they finally, finally get their Big Bang comeback? I’d say at this rate, their patience is wearing thin, and YG is running out of ideas.
Song: 2.25/5
MV: 2.25/5
(YouTube)
