Welcome to Comments of the Week! This segment has been on a rather long hiatus, but we’re bringing it back to feature a few of your comments each week!
This week in idol news, we covered Infinite’s upcoming May comeback, U-KISS’ first music show win, the new cast of WGM, Jaejoong’s impending enlistment, and ZE:A’s Hyung-sik’s plans to go solo.
For music, we discussed VIXX‘s “Love Equation” and Boys’ Record, Shinhwa‘s WE and “Sniper,” Niel’s debut album, Rainbow‘s Innocent comeback, overlooked releases of February, Seo In-guk‘s Last Song, OST favorites from February, the indie gem DIEALRIGHT, and MC Sniper‘s latest.
In film, fashion, and TV topics, we looked at the latest episodes of Heart to Heart, Blood, and Hyde, Jekyll, and I while also focusing our favorite performances from last week’s music shows, notable rising variety stars, and photoshoots that played with light and dark.
As for socio-cultural topics, our writers talked about the latest revelations re: Kim Hyun-joong and the hullabaloo about high school girls kissing on TV.
This week also saw the end of the qualifying round of our Seoulbeats March Madness throwdown and the start of the Round of 64. Writers also got together to lay out their thoughts on what makes a good rapper.
Here are three comments that provided food for thought, the last even with a chuckle!
Crystal on Roundtable: What Makes a Good Rapper?
Everyone makes good points but unless you speak Korean (of which I do not) I don’t know if you can accurately assess the quality of a rap artist and his/her lyrics. You can say that you looked up the lyrics, but most English lyrics online are not written by the artist and thus are translations of what someone thinks that the artist is saying. And for rap (which the best can be thought of as poetry), innuendos, metaphors can be hard to transcribe in another language. So that leaves one to judge skill on production, rhythm, timing and overall music that is pleasant to listen to. As long the artist is not affecting a stereotype/using offensive language (i.e. “Tough Cookie”), it all “pop” music. As previously stated, there are certainly those that are much better than others, but authenticity of another culture is hard to for an outsider to judge. Ultimately, the the litmus test for me is in the album liner notes/credits. Did the artist write or produce the song(s). That is authentic. Did the artist have a vision or did they just show up and collect a check? But that goes for any artist worldwide.
whoopdeedoo on High School Girls Kissing on TV Sparks Investigation
It’s important to note that South Korea was a country that had to grow fast. In the mid 1950’s, after the Korean War, over half of the Korean population lived in poverty. In 1997, it became a developed country. There was much to build in those 50 years. From being a very poor country in the 1950’s, it is now an economic powerhouse. The result of that, unfortunately, was that its citizens’ mentality could not catch up with its rapid economic and technological development.
And I think many people forget that.
Korea’s doing very well in terms of progress in many different areas. Yes, you can argue that they have one of the highest suicide rates in the world, or that their education system is terrible… But they’ve also done a lot of things right.
I’m not trying to justify the hate from certain Korean netizens, but considering that it’s Korea, this is a huge leap. There were many supportive comments with a lot of upvotes. The negative comments were kind of expected, though, weren’t they? When it comes to topics like homosexuality, reactions are often mixed — even in America — so let’s not act like Western countries are above Korea when it comes to things like this. No matter how positive the overall reaction is, there will always be one or two insulting comments — this is the world that we live in.
Honestly, I don’t think Korea is as homophobic as people like to say. More and more people are becoming more accepting of homosexuality, and TV shows (movies, songs, music videos) such as this one are going in the right direction with the food for thought they provide. I can guarantee that in 10 years, Korea’s view of homosexuality will be much like America’s today — maybe even better.
1dontcare on Jaejoong Enlisting at End of March
So it begins. While it may not hold true for others, but for the case of JYJ/TVXQ at least, I see the 21 month as a welcome break. They have been in the industry for what.. 10 years? Most people would have gotten tired by now, and would be looking for a change..So as sadden as I may be, I wish them all the best! And just think of all the muscle and abs after they come back *_*
Thank you for being great readers and participating in our discussions! Feel free to add additional comments and thoughts below.
(Images via Arena Homme +, bnt International, Pledis Entertainment, and Stardom Entertainment)
