Posts by KpopVeteranARMY

Quote from Popper-of-Ks

Because they were never being as genuine about that messaging as everyone liked to think, and they're not very good at keeping up the facade either. I doubt any of them are observing this comeback & thinking, "Oops, we forgot to pretend to be Kpop's resident feminists this time!" They don't care. They also know South Korea is a country that would cancel them for actually taking the whole feminism thing as seriously as their international fans perceive them to. Koreans have witch hunted other idols for exploring the topic.

That’s true about SK canceling them if they took the feminism thing really seriously (aka, all the members actually announced in an interview they are feminists or something lol), and it seems like you’re right about them not being genuine about feminism either. But as a (casual) (G)I-DLE fan and feminist who became a fan of them because of their girl power concept since debut, I’m super disappointed that they so casually ran in the entire completely opposite direction without a single thought, and worst of all, that not as many people as there should be seem to be calling them out for this.

In my opinion, this should be a huge controversy for (G)I-DLE! At least internationally, if not in Korea! Of course, there would be huge backlash from the fans who are either misogynists or don’t really care at all about feminism whatsoever, and just like using it to their convenience when it’s to uplift their favorite idols, and then throw it aside when it’s inconvenient to stanning them, but as someone who ACTUALLY cares about it I will probably stop being a fan of them starting now because of the blatant and unabashed sexism of their lead single. We should not be glorifying, celebrating, or worst of all, actively *inviting* sexual harassment in 2024!

Then again, I still stanned Girls Generation-TTS after their lead single Holler in 2014 which has similar themes of asking men to “holler” at them, and even bought their album in spite of hating Holler because they were so beautiful, talented and successful still, which in my opinion still embodied the ideals of feminism at its core (in addition to their Holler album b-sides being simply amazing if you ignore Holler).

So maybe at the end of the day, I’m just as bad as the fans who may excuse the catcalling theme in this song too simply because they love (G)I-DLE, just as much as l loved Girls’ Generation TaeTiSeo….?

Wahh, how will I look at myself in the mirror from now on….

*escorts self out

Quote from Popper-of-Ks

They've made, like, one feminist song. The rest of their more recent output has just been them positioning themselves as the latest sexy concept girl group while framing it in some girl power nonsense.

Okay, but even if I go along with/humor you and frame their newest songs as “sexy concept framed as girl power nonsense”, why would they suddenly diverge so much from the “girl power” concept which was extremely successful for them to something so sexist, for the sake of one “sexy summer song”?? Doesn’t make any sense to me marketing-wise when most of their fanbase and public attention came from the girl power concept/songs~??

Blop/flop, but does anyone else realize how NOT-feminist the whole concept/lyrics of this song/video is compared to (G)I-DLE’s other stuff?? The whole thing is about wanting guys to honk at you in their cars (usually a way to sexually harass females)

Fromis_9 : Super talented live performers according to one SNSD cover I watched, cute & pretty, but tbh I only know like 2-3 songs by them and I don’t really know the members

(G)-Idle : Soyeon ofc. Yuqi 2nd. Everyone’s very good tho except for Shuhua. Useless filler member.

Izone : I only know members from other groups tbh, Chaewon or Wonyoung

Itzy : Yeji

aespa : Karina

StayC : Yoon or J, Sieun has good vocals too & also cute/pretty

IVE : Yujin cuz she’s both a super visual and ace in terms of talent

Newjeans : Minji has one of the best face cards in Kpop, Hyein and Danielle seem to have good vocals but I feel “icky” about Hyein’s debut age

Le Sserafim : Chaewon/Yunjin, Sakura was my fave for a long time

Illit : Wonhee cuz she was the most adorable in Magnetic and the only one that stood out to me in lives

Kiss of Life : Idk Belle cuz she was on K-Star Next Door and killed the vocals? Natty is talented too just like everyone else in the group but imo overrated

Babymonster : Chiquita, she’s got swag for days, the 5th Gen Lisa

NMIXX : Lily cuz she’s the only member I know cuz K-Star Next Door vocal battle vs KIOF, but her vocals are TOP-tier! Easily the best singer of 4th gen.

Kep1er : Yujin duh ofc cuz she’s from one of my bias groups CLC before they disbanded…besides her I guess Chaehyun cuz she’s the center and best vocal.

Idg y everyone seems to think Xiaoting is a goddess incarnate, to me her visuals are mad overrated (tho I feel bad for saying/thinking so cuz she’s Chinese like me so I should be proud right), imo Bahiyyih is way prettier.

Quote from bethesda

KpopVeteranARMY I know what you're gonna vote for already

Of course

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Yayyy, Jungkook being the most successful soloist in Kpop as usual

Another Day, Another SLAY~

As people once said of the Legendary So Nyeo Shi Dae every time they broke another record every single day of their careers:

Quote from dasirunrun

Sorry it took me so long to reply! You wrote such a nice post that I wanted to read it and reply to it properly.
I think you said everything that needed to be said! The language barrier is definitely a factor for how we judge K-Pop rap.
And that tumblr post was really insightful. There are so many styles in rap, so that it's difficult to compare. And even BTS themselves have experimented with different styles. I learned that Ugh! was done in the style of Detroit Drill, which itself is a subgenre of drill music.
And so many different themes can be covered in hip-hop, and it makes little sense to compare diss tracks/ we're the best kind of songs to social commentary or personal story telling.
I think it's fair to put J-Hope in his own league/put him into the idol box, because he shines more through his dance and is also not a bad vocalist. I don't think that takes away from him as an artist at all, it's just nonsensical to compare. The tumblr post could have included him as well but would have had to shine a light on his other skills.
I'm a little sad we didn't get rapper JK, but I shall never let go of hope (get it? the song is called never let go... uhm anyways...)
Thanks for doing this, it was fun and insightful

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It’s ok, I took a long time to reply to your first post for the same reason too, lol! Plus, mine *was* a REALLY long post so it’s understandable it took a while to respond sincerely to, too~

That’s so cool about the drill genre thing, wow I never knew that. UGH! is actually my least favorite BTS song, but I have a new appreciation for it now for its artistry thanks to your comment. BTS are so real about their artistry and that’s one of the things that sets on a different level apart from most of the rest of Kpop, similar to their 2nd gen predecessors Big Bang, who are also rap legends and were acknowledged as “above” other idol rappers & idols in general during their time. I think that’s a huge reason while people tend to put BTS at the top in these kinds of rankings about rap in Kpop, even though their rapping technique is certainly nothing to sneeze at, either.

Hmm, but while I *DID* post that huge long Tumblr post about BTS’s rapping & songwriting skills both being huge valuable contributions to BTS and non-comparable, at the end of the day tho, I still like to make competitive list rankings for the fun of it in Kpop to inspire critical thinking and discussion about in the community, and I still think that I’m right that RM > Suga > J-Hope in terms of authenticity and rap-writing. So, sorry, but I’m keeping my ranking the way it is! 😂

You’re welcome! I agree, it’s fun having a real in-depth insightful discussion about rap in K-pop with someone~ (I have a few KPOP friends IRL, but I converted both of them and neither of them are as into Kpop nor as knowledgeable about it enough to talk about this stuff w/me~ )

Quote from Znewie71

Yes, and to know BAP are possibly making a comeback, so excited. Zelo has really grown into an amazing rapper and lyricist.

YAAAS, I heard about B.A.P’s possible comeback and I’m SOOO excited too! My Inner BABY is finally going to come back out kicking and screaming again after kicking in my stomach for months waiting to be reborn again ever since I found all their Instagrams earlier this year and saw them constantly posting selfies & whatnot together still!

Still somehow never dared to hope for a real comeback tho bc they’ve been disbanded since 2019 and all went to different agencies and all since then. As one of the OG B.A.P stans who was a fan since their legendary monster rookie debut w/Warrior and a stan since Power both in 2012, but fell off after they left and sued TS in 2014, then last really paid attention to them while they were still active after they settled & returned to TS Entertainment then came back in Young, Wild, & Free in 2015, their last MV I watched right when it was first released was Skydive in 2016 which was amazing but literally 9 minutes long so no one watched it, and the last comeback I was aware of was HONEYMOON but thought it was lame compared to their other stuff after I checked up on them years later, then was super sad but honestly not super surprised when they disbanded in 2019…..

this is beyond all my wildest BABY dreams come true to see them come back from the dead as a group 5 years later~! (And more like 10 years since I last really stanned them, lol.) *BRB ugly sobbing

Kpop has changed so much since they debuted 12 years ago, but they are still one of the very best rapping groups for sure that helped made rapping talent a big thing in Kpop after Big Bang totally paved the way for them, w/help from Block B who first really hit it big w/NalinA a month shortly after B.A.P’s debut w/Warrior that even made B.A.P major rivals w/EXO back in the day who were inspired by their meaningful lyrics about society to debut with their OWN song w/meaningful lyrics about society MAMA and even copy their concept about being aliens from another planet (both groups dropped this concept eventually tho), and totally changed the game for Kpop idols writing their own meaningful lyrics about society in Kpop for good!

Btw omg, Baby Zelo has grown all up and write his own raps now?! Post some songs that he’s written juseyo~! That boy has always had legendary rapping speed and was famous for his “LTE rap” back in the day when B.A.P first debuted, and if his rap-writing game has gotten good too, he’ll be an unstoppable force to be reckoned with in the Kpop rap game if(/when) B.A.P finally come back for sure!

Quote from Disevidence

There's alot of recency bias with Aespa and also I think people just want to poke Yama in the eye (which I can certainly understand sometimes).

If we just look at the digital scores, Aespa have 2 things in their favour against NJ - they had 2 big songs back in 2021 when YTM music (which is not on Circle and slowly eroding it's points) was less prevalent, and more users were on the Korean domestic platforms (Melon, Genie etc). And the fact they've had more comebacks.

Supernova is going well, and 480k uls on Melon in this environment is very very good - I'd say it's the equivalent of about 550k-600k or so ago, which means it's peaked higher then even my faves (G)I-DLE if I'm being honest, and probably only 2nd to IVE in the Peak of ULs, and more or less equivalent to NJ's peaks.

However, this is where seasonality comes into it. NewJeans debut song was in the 500k' ULS, which is a fantastic achievement (songs that take longer to climb generally have lower peaks), and their first comeback, probably the big one for peak, was in a quiet season with a depressed seasonality on users.

Which means, looking at Peaks, it's basically a wash. Aespa have Next Level at 550k but from a far higher user base, and 480k from a much smaller userbase, against NewJeans with basically the same numbers but also with contexts that lengthen or depress the peak.

So for Peak - more or less the same. Lots of factors mean different numbers, but if we try to factor in different seasonality and demographic changes on Melon i'd say they more or less have songs that peak around the same peaks.

Where NJ really pull ahead is the kicker of why they're so strong - they chart very well with ALL their songs, and their multi-title approach is extremely strong. Attention/Hype Boy were 1 and 2 - Cookie was top 10. Ditto and OMG both were smashes topping the charts at the same time. Even as they've weakened with that approach - Super Shy was a smash hit, ETA did ok, and now they've got 2 songs 2 and 3 (How Sweet and BubbleGum).

This is why Yama will use metrics like total Circle Points, or Total Streams, or Total Cumulative ULs - because that highlights' NJ's strength - they don't just pop off with one song like Aespa are doing right now, they pop off with 2 or 3 simultaneously.

Aespa can't compete in that aspect, not at all. Anyone trying to say otherwise is just plain lying to themselves.

Aespa have had 2 songs that were very big hits - Next Level and now Supernova, and a number of other songs that were certainly hits of their time. But they've had 2 songs that were big hits, whereas I would suggest NJ had an entire sound take over the charts for their releases. I think that's probably the key difference between the 2.

Like even now the Aespa fans are trying to talk big, but Armageddon (admittedly early days) is struggling to get above Fate (4 and a half months old at this point) on the Daily Chart. These are the same Aespa fans calling Wife/Superlady a "flop", by the way.

Armageddon Top 100 Peak - 233k

Wife/Super Lady Top 100 Peak- 150k

Armageddon is closer to Super Lady and Wife then it's closer to the peaks of How Sweet or Fate (380k). I find that a bit of irony to all the rather obnoxious Aespa fans of late.

Lastly, most of the longevity aspects favour NJ as well. Hype Boy has the most longevity in 4th gen, and whilst Aespa have certainly had songs that have had good longevity (Next Level), they still pale in longevity compared to some of NJ's biggest songs.

It's still NJ (even now) as number 1. Until Aespa can actually solidify a number 1 and a number 2 on the charts simultaneously, or when NJ don't do what they're doing now (2 and 3) it's still NJ easily the bigger on digital charts.

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Thanks for typing all that out and breaking it down, gave me a much better idea of the full Big Picture of both NJ & Aespa’s digitals in their totality.

I agree, I can definitely relate to wanting to poke Yama in the eye sometimes as well XD

I agree that NewJeans has more name brand power in Korea and their ability to dominate with more than 1 song at a time (How Sweet & Bubblegum were #2 and #3 while Supernova was #1 but Armageddon was #9) shows they still have greater brand power in Korea overall but Aespa basically got lucky with Supernova becoming super popular and with Korea wanting to stick it to HYBE since tbh I still think it was a mid song, even tho it’s definitely grown on me...(I love most of their other discography tho barring their latest album which had a lot of skips tb completely honest w/y’all)

Tbh I think I misunderstood Yama’s posts w/the Tweets since I didn’t understand that the Circle Digital Charts were including ALL their songs in total in that number and not just their most current one. So maybe NewJeans doesn’t have as much edge over Aespa as I thought, since it seems like they’ve fallen in all their metrics?

Both NJ & Aespa have fallen in album sales a lot from their most popular albums in their most recent comeback but I guess Aespa’s did raise SLIIIGHTLY above Drama so I guess at least they didn’t decrease from the very last one? I still say neither of them are doing as great as in the past overall w/fans since either their fandoms have shrunk so much or their fandoms just hated their latest release, but it seems like Aespa definitely has the trendiness edge for now, but maybe NewJeans overall still have a greater name brand power and will rise back with their next Korean comeback if given a song as good as their previous ones.

Overall all the top 5 girl groups these days are not doing as well as expected so I’m kinda worried about the new generation and future of Kpop overall~

Edit: Realized this post kinda made me sound like a hater….don’t worry, I’m still getting 2 copies of Aespa’s new album for my birthday :P I just really didn’t like Aespa’s new release as much as I thought I would, and according to their physical sales, most of their other fans didn’t, either.

Quote from Disevidence

Circle chart is perfectly fine to use as a bellwether on performance, with one major caveat -

Circle Digital Chart consists of 2 main components - Circle Streaming and Circle Download.

Circle Streaming is a very good measure on how the songs went, overall in Korea across most (not all) digital streaming platforms for a song performance. To be honest if we're discussing GG's, it's the one to use.

Circle Download is ... more uneven. The reason for that is simply fan activity. When a BG (or a artist like LYW) releases a song, the BG fans (and to be fair, some GG fans, such as Fromis 9) tend to basically mass download all the songs, including the lead song.

A download counts for something near the equivalent of 1000 streams, so the download effect extremely frontloads the circle points in that week.

So you'll have the situation just recently, where Spot, the main song leading all the charts, was beaten on Circle Digital by a LYW release (80 something on melon) due to the download behaviour on the Download Chart.

If you want to be be a little more limited but a bit more precise on 'rank' then use the Circle Streaming Chart. If you want to capture all activity as a comparison tool on points but rely less on 'rank' then the Circle Digital Chart is fine.

Hope that makes sense.

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Thanks sm Professor Disevidence! Got to go study Kpop digitals for my Kpop dissertation now, brb~

So if NewJeans dominated on both Melon ULs AND Circle Digital Chart, does that mean that NewJeans really *IS* dominating over Aespa digitally on all the Korean charts against what everyone thought, or is Yama just full of cuckoo?

I’m too scared to watch, I don’t want a dark WOOAH, woo-WAHHHHHH~

(even tho I’m normally a girl crush stan when I’m not a huge ARMY and got into Kpop originally because of 2NE1, the OG KPop Girl Crushes)

I want CUTE BUBBLEGUM POP BOPS from WOOAH, not NEW!XG HORROR SHIT!

Oh well, at least it’ll be entertaining to watch to see how they try to pull off the girl crush concept~

(So far they’re succeeding! even tho that bloody hammer at the end scared me * eventually caved & watched it, lol~)

Quote from YamaChwan

You have Disevidence in the thread, who knows way more about chart data than I do; ask them while they're active!

K, thx 4 the referral Dr. YamaChwan~!

Disevidence do people really take Circle Chart digitals seriously, or is it all just a bunch of baloney numbers made up and inflated to make certain internationally popular artists look more impressive to foreigners~?  

Quote from YamaChwan

I was ASKED for it; I stopped arguing a long time ago!

I can confirm, I did ask you for them; sorry Yama!  

Quote from YamaChwan

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And literally everyone uses Circle and takes it seriously; it includes multiple data points in that it aggregates a digital score using an artist's charting performance on each digital streaming platform in Korea, as opposed to looking at just one chart which will use its own internal data (in other words, MelOn will only inform you on how an artist performs on MelOn; it gives you no clear picture of how they do on other platforms).

Ok those Melon UL rankings are impressive, so that should be taken seriously imo.

But the 2nd Tweet you posted is just a record for 1 day. How long did they keep that record?

I understand that Melon only reflects Melon digital charting lol, but thanks for explaining the Circle digital aggregate thing in more detail.

Can other people confirm the thing about people taking Circle Chart seriously for digitals? In my own personal experience, I rarely remember see people talking about it for those~ (and even for physicals, I used to take them very seriously, but everyone’s all “but they just represent shipments to stores and not real sales blahblahblah”~ )

Quote from YamaChwan

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It's a cumulative score based on a group's digital performance across every chart in Korea.

Oh, sorry, but everyone knows Aespa’s beating NJ digitally on all the Korean charts, so isn’t Circle Chart just full of shit~? Like they got paid off by ADOR or some shit?

Plus who even uses Circle Chart for digitals seriously, except maybe retrospectively years later out of lack of proper records left from anywhere else?

They’ve always inflated their points like crazy since 2nd generation, they’re just numbers and they change how they count them whenever they please to make internationally popular bigger groups look bigger and create more international hype & clout (from what I can remember anyway)?

People always use Melon and stuff instead for real digital numbers from Korea reflecting real digital trends~

Quote from YamaChwan

People are hyper fixating on one song and ignoring the bigger picture that is the fact NewJeans is still the top group by a wide margin on Spotify, on all the Korean charts and especially in Japan.

What Korean charts? (sorry if I’m making you repost them again for like the 193801238th time, I don’t remember after all these pages~ )

Quote from gerrard174

i believe most if not all members here kinda agree that overall NJ is still #1, but NOT by a large margin like some Tokkis claim to be

The poll result is mostly due to Yama pissing a lot of fanbase off. Constantly bringing up their 2023 performance is not going to sink in to most because of recency bias

Yeah that’s true, that was the only part of his arguments that I thought he could’ve supported a lot better, especially since NJ really *DOES* actually have 2024 accomplishments (according to him) that could’ve proven those people wrong, not just 2023 ones. Felt very Blink/ONCE-y.

But for most of the thread, he kept citing lots of really big numbers that seemed very convincing, and people kept ignoring them for the above obvious reason~

Quote from Rarami

ugh nvm hes post are quite long

Exactly!

Quote from Rarami

besides digitally what has nj beaten aespa on?

uhhh pls see Yama-Chan for this to repost all the Tweets he posted earlier cuz I'm not The Resident NJ Stan of AKP and I ain't feel like doing that shit~ 😅

Quote from YamaChwan

You aren't. Trust me. All the aespa votes are almost entirely out of spite from other girl group stans or just an attempt to trigger me

Right? Especially the users in the comments ignoring most of your arguments w/unignorable numbers trying to spite you part.

Tbh I almost voted for Aespa at first tbh because they're dominating in Korea atm digitally and that's usually where the battlefield is when it comes to 4th gen girl groups

But then I thought about it more and hesitated bc NJ's still beating them by most other numbers, and this is just 1 comeback that Aespa's beating them in like 1 metric, digitally and in Korea at that, and doesn't necessarily mean an entire upheaval of the status quo, especially when you have a group with as strong numbers as NJ. And Aespa's not exactly consistent, tbh w/you, even as an Aespa almost-stan; their fandom and physicals keep decreasing with each new comeback.

Tbh, even I almost stopped being a fan when they dropped the Kwangya concept, but I really loved their new packaging for their new album so here we are. 😅

NJ still has time, like 1 more comeback or two where they have to flop dramatically more before we simply throw them under the bus ranking-wise, and Aespa still needs to prove themselves with another comeback or two or few, consistently dominating everybody like TWICE or NJ did before, before we just claim they're the new #1 4th gen girl group for good (at least for a while), and not just a one-off "got lucky w/1 trending song" thing. Even tho I'm a big Aespa fan and not really a NJ fan, these are my honest thoughts.

Am I the only non-Tokki in this thread that actually agrees w/Yama & believes that NewJeans is still #1 based on most numbers; just not by much?

They just lost their edge in dominance thanks to all the MHJ/HYBE drama & slightly weaker comeback songs than usual/expected after their 1+ year long hiatus~

I mean, I'm not even a NJ stan and even sort of a HYBE stan, but I can objectively see the numbers lol

Everyone else is just in denial bc Yama dumped on all their faves for the past however-many-months (or years?) and made them mad, lol 😅

Aespa has the edge for this comeback and are the new trend for now, but it's just 1 comeback digitally in Korea; anything can happen. They still haven't beaten NJ in all kinds of metrics amirite? (saying as someone who owns all of Aespa's albums)