It’s time for the first QRIMOLE of 2022!  Let’s take a look at this year’s first reader questions for Kpopalypse!

Hi oppar, hopefully I’m not too late for this months Qrimole! I wanted to ask what your thoughts are on this weird idol group(?) I found called HDnG. I think it’s pronounced like “hidden gem.”

From what I can gather, they are promoting themselves as faceless idols and are out to prove that they can be successful and make good music without being attractive or having a lot of money behind their releases. I don’t think it takes a rocket scientist to make the assumption that a sound like this won’t be trending anytime soon, though, so I can’t help but think this claim isn’t what it seems like on the surface, although the kpop fans in the comments who are buying the marketing gimmick for whatever reason are a little funny. If someone is into dubstep gugak I think that’s great for them and I’m happy if they’re getting some enjoyment out of this, but I think it’s pretty clear this is out of most kpop fans’ comfort zones or realm of interest.

I’ve found that the group has a whole lore wiki and they even have an official tumblr where they post weird little ARG style puzzles. Interestingly despite their being low budget as part of their whole schtick, they also seem to translate all of their stuff into a variety of languages that even a lot of fairly successful modern day kpop acts don’t.

I’m starting to think this might be a social experiment rather than an actual attempt to “be a kpop.” Maybe trying to see how weird and not-kpopish they can be while still roping in international fans, as long as they still claim to be kpop? Maybe it’s just a new marketing gimmick? I do wonder where they’re getting the money to hire translators since their fanbase is very small and they supposedly have next to no funds backing them. Any thoughts on if there’s something else going on here?

This is really the wrong way to do “lore” for a music project, too exposition heavy, nobody will give a shit.  The Loona way is the correct way, put forward the elements that people actually want to see first (people that are likeable, singing actual songs) and build up the esoteric elements over time, Blockberry didn’t smash people over the head with lore wikis right at Heejin’s debut, and if they did nobody would have cared then either.  This is just tedious art wank, maybe it’s for a university thesis or something (hence all the translations).  If they wanted to “prove that they can be successful and make good music” they could have started with an actual good song instead of whatever this is, but I think music isn’t even the priority here, someone’s probably just trying to pass their degree.

why did 2nd gen idols look more mature? You’ve insisted that the more modern “girl crush” and the older sexy concept are the same but I think this is one of the parts that makes it majorly different. If you compare a pic of early nine muses to aespa it seems that aespa is much younger, even though i think 9muses were slightly younger at debut.

Second-generation idols look more mature because they are – remember that age does not equal maturity.  Nine Muses carry nearly a decade of pain from being in an unsuccessful idol group, living a hand-to-mouth existence, now an experience like that breeds maturity (if you survive it).  When you look at the girls who have had long hauls in that group, you’re looking at some girls who have really battled hard, of course that kind of struggle is going to show on their faces, how they carry themselves, etc.  On top of that SM’s video direction, makeup products and botoxing is probably of the higher standard you’d come to expect from the “leaders in culture technology” or whatever.

why does SM celebrate/preserve their idols much longer than other companies? Especially their female idols. Usually the idol industry moves through idols pretty fast, esp female idols. But now 1.5 gen BoA is debuting in a group!

I wouldn’t say that’s the norm for SM, they definitely ditch most of them.  BoA has ascended the internal heirarchy of SM to some extent so she’s a special case, she gets red carpet treatment reserved only for her and you can’t judge how SM treat female idols generally by looking at the exception rather than the rule.

If it had not been for Mino and Oh My Girl, which songs would have made it into the dishonourable and worst lists?

I don’t remember.  I delete the ones that don’t make it.  Just be happy that your fave might have just dodged a bullet.

How the heck did you end up finding out about Mozart and scatology? I am proud/horrified to say I read the whole Wikipedia article

I wanted to learn how he died so young, since he was known to be a bit of a lover I suspected he might have died from something related to extreme sex play.  Turns out he was the classical world’s GG Allin.

Not related to k-pop at all, but:

1. Does this porn have a good music?
2. Does the singer MRS?
3. Is that shit on 2min36sec actually safe for her? I mean, it seems dangerous as taking a cumshot in the eye. 
4. (Even more off topic) If I ever visit Australia, where would you recommend me to go (based on your preferences only)?
Wish you an excellent 2022!

1. No.
2. No.
3. Depends what’s in that gas cylinder.  If it’s just CO2 (dry ice), which I suspect it is, then it’s fine.  You’d have to be pretty unlucky to go to hospital for a self-inflicted cumshot, can’t say that I’ve ever had more than 30 seconds of stinging from that.
4. Coober Pedy.  Visit all the tourist traps.  I guarantee that you’ll come away from that town saying to yourself, “yes, that was a place that I went to”.

im thinking of studying musicology, can you tell me some things i need to know before deciding to do so? i feel like you’re the right person to ask. dont wanna have unrealistic expectations of what im really going to be studying and then get let down

Musicology isn’t strictly music theory, music history, or ethnomusicology (basically, musical anthropology), but it draws elements from all three.  How much of each of the three is in the mix depends a lot on where you’re learning it.  Given that a musicology degree is as useless as any other type of music degree, I’d probably pick one of the three disciplines above that appeals to you the most and study just that instead.  Unless you’re really not sure what you’d like of course, in which case maybe musicology is the way to go.  Try and get a synopsis of the content ahead of time if you can, you could ask the faculty, but if they’re pricks about it just ask students who’ve already done it.  If you have no choice but to go in blind then from your list I’d study classical music theory, get as much of that under your belt as you can before you go in, as musicology classes and texts often work with a certain level of music theory as assumed baseline knowledge.

What is it about trot vocals that make them sound instantly recognisable as the trot genre? Is it the singing style? Something about the melody? Something else entirely that I don’t notice? Or a mixture?

The vocal style tends to favour a stronger vibrato than modern idol pop singing.  Modern pop tends to only vibrato the latter part of long sustained notes, and even then it’s optional – whereas trot will quite often do the vibrato the whole way through a long note.

Listen to all the long notes on “Cheer Up” and how the vibrato is applied to pretty much the entire note.  This is very much a trot style of vocal delivery.

Whereas a singer like Ailee is more influenced by western R&B where they pitch the note first and then vibrato only the tail end.  Good example at 0:52 and 1:00 here.  A trot style vocal would be considered “too sweet” for this type of song.

my basically only friend is no longer my friend. ive been going through an extremely rough patch lately thanks to a bad breakup (random aside but she never liked him until after we broke up and now she’s terrified of bringing me up and making him mad because she’s decided they’re friends now? and she’s a lesbian! she doesn’t even wanna fuck him! she’s just a bad friend! all this was BEFORE she friend dumped me) and admittedly had been taking out some of my very deeply rooted anger issues out on her (it might be bpd but it’s much easier to blame it on me being greek), but knowing im kinda in the wrong doesn’t make it feel any better when she calls me “emotional labor” and sends a condescending text about how she hopes i get better before blocking every single contact method knowing she’s really the only person i can talk to. all this to say i started cutting for the first time in my life. i haven’t been able to listen to music in over a month because my mind drifts and i get upset all over again everytime, so ive been sticking basically to podcasts and, annoyingly enough, directors commentaries, but it’s so hard to ignore my pain altogether. i know much of my melodrama stems from being, you know, 19, but im really scaring myself at this point. realistically, what can i do to fix myself? or what can i do to keep myself from cutting and keep the racing thoughts at bay? sorry for the depressing ask, hope your new year is well ❤

These sorts of questions are always a bit out of my depth.  From knowing plenty of people who have cut at various times in their life, I know in their cases it mostly wasn’t suicidal impulses behind it, more a way of releasing the emotional pain physically.  Emotional pain can be a tricky thing to handle directly as there’s often no clear path forward, by ‘converting it’ to physical pain, it then becomes something you know how to deal with (clean the area, apply a bandage, etc – be clear I’m not condoning or suggesting this, just explaining the most common motivation).  I think a lot of the problem is you don’t really have a human outlet.  Music, TV, podcasts etc can only go so far, so why not try to replace your bad friend with a better friend, perhaps there’s someone else close to you who you can trust and reach out to.  If your family relationship is good then perhaps start there, if not then another friend might be the way to go.  You say you only have one friend but there are probably others on the periphery of friendship who might come through and surprise you in a good way if you got closer.  The other thing you should definitely do is talk to a doctor that you trust about these issues (and one who isn’t too conservative, they need to understand the issue).  Don’t worry they’re not going to try and lock you up (fat chance in the already overcrowded mental health system most countries have) but they might have other suggestions and they’re definitely more qualified to advise you than I am.

any movies you liked this year? the only movies that i think I wholeheartedly enjoyed this year were malignant and venom and i am hoping you have recommendations. thanks oppar!

In all honestly I can’t remember the last time I watched a movie, between work, writing, and more work I have barely had the time.  I may not have seen any 2021 films.

im in a pretty serious long term long distance relationship and im feeling weird feelings about someone else that happens to go to my school. i dont interact with him but i keep glancing and today when he glanced back i got a tingle in my nether regions. what do i do to stop feeling like that? im very much in love with my bf and i dont intend to cheat or anything, but i want to get rid of that crush or whatever it is i have

I never had any luck controlling these things in school days either.  The only real way is to ride it out, which SUCKS but that’s all you’ve got.  If it were me, I would also let your actual bf know about your frustration (and that you don’t intend to act on it, but that it’s there), which will be a great test of his personal character and if he’s really true physical relationship material.  He’ll either be understanding, or not, which will then give you a clear path.  If he’s totally understanding and cool about it, remain totally loyal – he’s a keeper.  If he starts becoming a possessive asshole or acting like a jerk, don’t hesitate to punish him accordingly.  But then, I’m cruel like that.  This is what happens when you ask an asshole for relationship advice I guess… but it is honestly what I would do.

(This isn’t a question, just a thought I came up with when reading your articles)
You once said that you only were interested in Kpop in its Golden Age (if I remember correctly) makes me realize how lucky am I as I was exposed to Kpop during the Golden Age with many excellent and catchy songs by many popular groups (such as the iconic Roly Poly by T Ara, Gee by SNSD, I am the best by 2NE1, and f(x) songs,…) and stan Kpop since then (in my country the Kpop wave became popular during 2010 and I could watch Kpop songs on the TV). Imagine if I was born in a country where Kpop only started to get big when BTS, Black Pink and TWICE are a thing, then maybe I wouldn’t into Kpop at all, as the choice I like is too little, in comparison to the Golden Age where I can like many groups for their decent songs (I only like TWICE songs so far, Black Pink is meh, and I just can’t remember any BTS songs after listening to them)

This isn’t an answer but I just clicked trending hashtag “Jett” on Twitter expecting to see some Valorant cosplays and maybe Shannon Williams and sure got more than I bargained for, lots of gay pornstarts out there with “Jett” somewhere in their name apparently.  Oh and JAV recommendation for December OKSN-341.

hello kpopalypse,
I took a narcissism diagnostic test online for covert narcissism a few weeks ago. Covert narcissists are more passive aggressive than the traditional grandiose (think Trump) but they both have a severe sense of low self-esteem that they try to fix by appeasing others. Covert narc is more like the nice guy type who’ll say “oh no one will ever love me..” and they wallow in self pity while thinking highly of themselves
etc you get that concept
I took this test and scored alarmingly high. While I’m not fully convienced by a random test online I have a personality disorder, I realized I was fucked up in the head, which had been excerbated by quarentine. I realized that I don’t like myself whatsoever, I honestly find myself gross. I want to change. I’m 20 now so I don’t feel like there’s that “oh it’s a puberty thing” anymore.

And the only way I can ignore how gross I am is by being successful and being cooler than everyone else. So I read a lot, learn a lot, and try not to do anything too “cringey”. I’m always thinking in every situation “how do i make myself seem as cool as possible?”
This has worked to some degree. My friends see me as confident and cool. But now I don’t feel like I have room to be vulnerable and I’m always sort of watching myself perform when I’m interacting with others.
I think the only time I don’t is when I’m talking to my therapist.
So then I fell down this hole constantly analyzing people to see how I’m better than them so I had “leverage”. It wasn’t used to do anything malicious per se, but I felt I needed to do it just so I wouldn’t be terrified of talking to people. Basically, I was lowering others in my mind so I had the confidence to interact with them. In time, it got to the point where I genuinely felt I was more deserving or better than other people. I still have these thoughts now, especially if I’m on reddit or x social media and I read some racist/sexist/whateverist post that makes me think “wow, what a terrible and awful person. glad i’m not that stupid.” I’m aware of how problematic thinking you are better than others is, but it’s like everyone on the internet is out to prove me right lol. And in real life where people are more reasonable, I’m always anxious or jealous.
The worst thing about all of this is that I feel so isolated and like genuinely fucked up in the head. Like there was a train of morality and understanding human worth that I accidentally got off of and now I’m going to have to fight to attempt to build a semblance of a similar train. Even now as I type this I’m thinking…”once you write this all out kpopalypse will validate your self-pity by telling you you’re not a narcissist and then the cycle will restart.”

if you wanted this in a question format, less ranty…can I get advise for my narc traits? What would you advise?

I wouldn’t even know if you’re a narcissist or not to be honest.  For all I know maybe I am one also.  I was curious so I took the narcissism test here and my result was that I had no narcissism at all, which surprised me as I thought I would definitely have some, being a z-tier k-pop writer I would assume it came with the territory.  Then I took a “covert narcissism” test here and I scored “moderate”, around 40%.  Upon reading the questions I felt like I second-guessed a lot of them though and might have answered on the “more narcissistic” side just by thinking to myself “well, surely I’m not perfect, and isn’t everyone at least a little bit narcissistic”… so I wonder if a true narcissist might score lower as they might not see such “negative” traits in themselves?  I guess this is part of the problem with online self-diagnosis.  So what I’m trying to say is basically… who the fuck knows, I’m in no position to diagnose you, I can’t even diagnose me.  You’re already seeing a therapist, I’d definitely float that question with them.

Aside from (again) seeing a medical professional, which you already are anyway, I guess I just hope that what I do can maybe serve as an example about how not to worry about if others think you’re “cool”.  I’m under no illusions, I know I’m not “cool” at all.  I might have done a “bunch of cool stuff” but that doesn’t really seem to translate into making a person “cool” as far as I can tell.  In fact I’m still not even sure what “cool” is other than I’m definitely not it.  I long ago gave up trying to figure it out, I just don’t worry about it.  The only thing I know about cool is The Fonz in Happy Days, he was cool.  If you’re not The Fonz, you’re probably in the same boat as me, so I think we should all just not worry about it together.

What do you think of people fapping to leaked nudes?

I think the leaking is the issue, not the fapping.  K-pop fans always focus on the fapping instead of the big issue.  So we get concerns like “are people fapping to underage idols” instead of “are companies abusing and harming underage idols”, or “are people getting off on idols who are starving” rather than “what the fuck are these companies doing putting idols on restrictive diets in the first place” etc etc.  K-pop fans online are obsessed with fapping!  Trust me, nobody apart from these online clowns cares who you fap to.  We do care about things like stopping revenge porn and child exploitation though.

Curious Cat is back but, as you said, you’re not going to use it ever again. That’s a shame, because anonymity allowed a lot of people to ask about personal or very tricky stuff, plus sending “what do you think of this video” questions to Qrimole feels a bit like a waste of space. RIP Curious Cat 😦

Yeah the Curious Cat domain, after being offline pending deletion for a week, has been taken over by someone with a shaky grasp of the English language who is all like “oh we went down, our bad, we won’t give out any official statement, now please use these other links over here, you can trust us”.  Yeah, nah.

I agree it was a useful tool, although if I lose a few of the more thoughtless questions it’s probably for the best.  I talked a bit in this post about what could potentially replace Curious Cat, see a question below about Retrospring which I’m going to cautiously trial.

I’m surprised no one has asked this yet considering the large amount of Orbit Caonimas, so I might as well do it *puts on tinfoil hat*: I believe aespa’s lore and this “SMCU” extended SM thing they’re trying to force down our throats is literally ripped off from Loona.

I know your post about conceptual continuity and I am aware that Loona didn’t invent this shit, I am aware that half of what Orbits call the Loonaverse is just a product of their own imagination and batshit fanfiction and I *am* aware that according to SM the primary influence is actually that Marvel capeshit cinematic universe that has been rotting people’s brains for a decade, but there’s no way this is just a coincidence between BBC and SM. (also, if it’s really based on Marvel why didn’t they do this earlier considering the grip that the avengers have had for years in SKorea?)

I don’t believe SM came up on this by itself coincidentally after LSM got interested in Loona and “produced” their album (an extremely rare occurrence for him apparently?) saddling them with the worst of the worst NCT rejects available. I will concede that Loona’s musical derailment into girl crush hell was due more to the loss of Jaden Jeong than to SM purposely sabotaging them** but the similarities? are too much. aespa has lore specific videos (not the musical videos), their lyrics are cluttered with lore, and now SM’s artists are name-dropping and putting references in each other’s videos and lyrics in the exact same way Loona’s pre debut videos connected all the members.

Even the fact that Naevis is like this evangelical figure feels as if LSM got triggered at the very inoffensive critique (if you could even call it that) of Christianity, and fallen angels and lesbian undertones and genderbending in the Loonaverse and decided to do his “own” version in the most cringe and pandering to the lowest common denominator way.

A very important detail! is that Loona managed to gain a strong and loyal international fanbase, getting fans even outside of kpop circles. SM has been obsessed with western success for years, you’ve said so yourself, we all know this too, and we know that the existence of SperM was a way for SM to catch up with BTS’ unexpected worldwide success and try to prove who’s really boss in the kpop industry. Why wouldn’t SM rip off an idea of a minor girlgroup from a minor company that no one in South Korea even cares about.

Do you agree with me? explain why if yes/not

** I know someone in a past qrimole asked something similar to this (not mentioning aespa but specifically mentioning that LSM has a history of investing in groups to sabotage them, probably referring to Infinite) and I don’t quite remember your answer but you were mostly skeptical. But this was before the SMCU was announced.

PS: It’s honestly so… relaxing. Refreshing. To be able to ask this question in this space like this. If I were to have this conversation in any other kpop website I would have to preface with 6 paragraphs about how I am not an aespa anti and how I don’t mean to attack them and how I am not jEaLoUs of them and I would have to reword the contents of my question so extensively carefully to avoid triggering SM stans that the end result would be an illegible mess even worse than the illegible mess you’re getting here.
So, thank you so, so much for keeping your commitment to this website.

Thanks for noticing!  Yeah I accept questions on face value generally.  No need for disclaimers and bullshit, that’s for other sites.

I honestly haven’t been following SMCU but I think the key difference here is levels of esotericism.  SM are going to great lengths to explain their conceptual continuity-laden universe ahead of time and make sure that people broadly “get it”, hence the ten minute long exposition-packed video above (not as full-on as HNdG though, thankfully).  Whereas Blockberry just dropped random symbolism and connective content in videos, and didn’t even state that there was any kind of “Loonaverse” at all until after fans started picking up on the idea that there might be.  Essentially Blockberry have allowed fans of Loona to write their own lore, and haven’t made any precise statements or anything else to suggest that a certain perception is wrong or right beyond the very broadest strokes.  SM are being much more matter-of-fact about the whole thing.  It’s like comparing David Lynch to Michael Bay.

Having said that, did SM take the idea of having an overarching concept from Loona?  Quite possibly, but they’re definitely pushing it in a very different direction, in a very different style.  It feels completely different and SM’s version feels “very SM”… which is why I think it’s not going to fly with their fans as well as Loona’s concept did.  I mean, there’s not really that much to dig into, which is where the fun of this sort of stuff is for many – SM have done most of the digging for you already, to make sure you don’t misunderstand and cause a controversy, I guess.  I think most SM fans at this point think “ae-idols” and “Kwangya” is a bit silly and are just going along with it for typical k-pop reasons (support our faves etc) as opposed to being actually enthralled by it in the way Loona fans enjoy digging deep (whether there’s anything there or not, is another question).

What’s your thoughts on Arcane oppar?

Also how many hextech crystals out of 10 would you give it?

I didn’t watch the shit.

The scraps of it that I saw during League Of Legends finals definitely looked very pretty, but it also had super cliched writing like any American TV series and didn’t seem like the sort of thing I would be into.  Also hugely disappointed that they gave Jinx bigger boobs than in the game just so she’d go over better as a main character for whoever the fuck nerds this shit is aimed at.  I’m as big a fan of big boobs as the next person (and more than most) but why can’t we have main characters with small breasts occasionally too.  I stand with Kiera Knightley on this issue.

League’s focus on lore in general has always felt like a huge mistake to me.  In what actual world, would five people randomly meet up to fight five other people on some rift thing, and then do it over and over again in various combinations, where two characters could be friends one game, but on the opposites side next game, then friends again in the game after that, etc.  It makes no sense, and therefore any extra lore you hang off of that concept will make no sense either.  The amount of story padding you need just to make an idea like that make the slightest bit of narrative sense is so ridiculous that you might as well just not.  The entire concept of the game is anti-lore from the ground up.  0/10 Hextech Crystals, I’ll save mine for when they produce a Hextech skin that MRS.

Have you ever heard of Timor-Leste? There’s this video on Australia’s actions against it.
I’m not an Australian, so I was wondering how the Australian public feel about the matter? I’ve never heard Australian friends talk about it, but it’s not exactly a topic that comes up often in our conversations.

Most Australians are aware of there being issues of some kind in East Timor.  This was in the news a lot more when the transition of power happened from Indonesia, because there were some tensions between Australia and Indonesia over how that was done which got fairly high at one point.  The maritime boundary agreements, most Australians wouldn’t even know about this apart from those who follow politics very closely.  You would probably find that most Australians who aren’t part of some political activist group probably don’t have strong opinions on this, but would probably at least agree upon seeing the linked video that the Timorese are getting a raw deal here.  Having said that, basing your entire economy on oil these days is so dangerous anyway, I feel like if the Timorese can find a different path to wealth it would probably be more in their interest long-term.  What would I know though.

Hi kpopalypse! How are you? I hope you are doing good!

I have some questions about kpop idol’s endorsements.

1. Recently there’s a thing called MIV (Media Impact Value). In Blackpink Lisa’s wikipedia page, it said that MAC’s (an international-wide, extremely well-known cosmetic brand) announcement of Lisa as their global ambassador earned $1.38 million in MIV, and MAC’s announcement instagram post alone earned $506k in MIV. My question is, do MIV actually valued an accurate income for Lisa’s MAC global ambassador announcement?
2. Now with more international-wide, luxury fashion brands (Chanel, YSL, LV, Givenchy, Gucci, etc) are appointing kpop idols as global ambassadors, when there are none back when you first posted the chocolate love post (I think GD got his Chanel global ambassador gig in 2015 – 2016 ish). How much are they actually got paid for the global ambassador gig and did the luxury fashion house actually have an increase of sale because of this or is it just for marketing noise purposes (like only for making their names more known)?
3. This may be a stupid question, but if an idol is invited to the big 4 fashion week ( Paris, London, Milan, New York), or invited to stream the show and encouraging their instagram followers to do the same, does the brand who invited them paid these idols or they only got freebies?

Thank you for your time. Oh, if you still looking for a subtitute for curious cat, I come across retrospring(dot)net and heard they are pretty good.

Thank you kpopalypse!

1. I’ve never heard of this term before but it seems like something really vague.  “Celebrity X is worth dollar figure Y” might mean that they see that amount of money in their back pocket, or it might mean they’re able to generate that amount of profit for a brand, or it might mean something else.  How exactly is it being measured, if that question can’t be answered in 20 words or less, then it’s probably just some bullshit.  I don’t trust it any more than I trust “brand rankings”.
2. Yes they would get paid a lot.  Yes this type of activity is known to boost sales significantly, which is why they get paid a lot.  “I want that thing celebrity X has” is a real thing that people have and the amount of product people can move off a well-regarded endorsement is VERY significant.  I’m not above it, who plays a certain guitar model does inform my guitar purchasing decisions!  In fact celebrity guitarist endorsements are an excellent example of this phenomenon making serious bank.
3. This one I couldn’t tell you, I don’t have any insider knowledge here.  I would assume that the bigger the celebrity, the more likely that a fee was involved.  At bare minimum, a minor celeb would get freebies plus their travel expenses paid.

I will check out Retrospring, I’ve made an account here so those of you who like to throw me quick questions, feel free to come and test it with me!  The fact that it’s open source is promising.  If it works out well and doesn’t irritate me with bot spam (it hasn’t so far) I may make it the official replacement for Curious Cat/Ask.fm – let’s see how it goes.

Hello! I hope you had a Merry Christmas and will have a Happy New Year!
So I recently stumbled across a blog post of yours where you talked about a friend who used to work as a stripper, and that made me fancy the idea of performing as a dancer for gay clubs. However, there are some things I would like to know:
1) Since I have little experience in the field, how can I gain some more?
2) Once I’ve gathered the required experience, how can I approach venues?
3) How will the contract be like, and how much might I earn on average?
4) Did your friend get creative freedom on her performances from the start, or did she have to go through experience stages? (For example, performing in a group before going solo or performing choreographies assigned by someone else before getting to make her own)
5) Is there anything else I really need to know, either positive or negative?

Thanks in advance! ❤

1. Unless we’re talking about working in a top tier club in Las Vegas or some other VERY high-demand, VERY popular place where people are begging to be given a chance to grace the stage, you needn’t worry.  Dancers are difficult for most adult venues to come by and you needn’t concern yourself with being the best dancer ever as long as you can dance generally and look like the kind of person someone might want to look at while they danced.  Your fitness and general appearance is probably more important than raw dancing skill in most cases.
2. Ask the DJ, tell him or her that you are interested.  If the DJ isn’t accessible, ask the bar staff.  “Hi, I want to be a dancer here, who should I talk to about it?” will do as an opener, no need to be anything but direct.
3. It’s rare for dancers to be under a contract in the music industry sense, a more standard employer/employee agreement would be normal for that industry (although sometimes they don’t even do that much and it’s just verbal).  Because it’s work that few want to do, and it’s hard to find good dancers, earnings are usually pretty decent – although in the gay scene this might be different, I don’t know about that.  There may be ways to earn extra money, which usually involves extra services, sometimes this crosses the line to actual prostitution, but not always – depends on the venue and what they allow.  Dancers I’ve spoken to about this warn strongly against “crossing the line” with customers in this way as it can cause a whole host of issues, and not just the ones you might expect.
4. Depends what the venue wants.  Some places everything is fixed and you have little say in what you do.  Others will allow you to choose your own music and routines as long as you also perform the minimum requirements to please the crowd (which usually involves revealing a certain amount of flesh or maybe performing specific routines or acts).  The more a crowd likes you, generally the more freedom you would be allowed.  This varies from venue to venue of course.  Strippers with complete creative freedom work freelance though, where you can call the shots 100%, however in that situation the part you can’t often control is the venue itself.
5. Scope out the club ahead of time, go as a paying customer and pay special attention to how the dancers look, and how they’re being treated.  Do they look like they’re in a good environment?  How much are they earning?  Also check out the clientele, what type of people are the club attracting?  What are the expectations of the audience?  Are they respectful?  What’s security like?  If an opportunity to get a “private dance” exists, you could take it just to find out more.  Also, strippers love talking about their job, if you are able to get one in a position where they are away from venue surveillance, talk to them and you will learn a lot.

Hello Kpopalypse. How are you? I hope you’re good.
I wanted to know, have you listened to this song by Alice Longyu Gao and Alice glass?

No I haven’t.

I did just for you, while the sounds are good, I found it boring, once I got over the way it sounded, I noticed not much really happens.

I’m the person who’s been talking to you about my Hong Kong family members for a while now. Have you heard how the CCP took down the Pillar of Shame at HKU (technically, the university itself took down the sculpture, but I’m sure we all know who called the shots)? It might be relatively minor in the grand scheme of all the encroachments upon the liberties of the Hong Kongers, but this just feels symbolically like the CCP is finally not even pretending to care anymore. They’re erasing evidence of their human rights abuses, one of the final pieces of evidence that HK was part of a different system from the CCP. Now, it feels like it’s truly over, and Hong Kongers will be forced to undergo the same brainwashing that mainlanders face. According to my mother, the CCP’s suppressing the use of Cantonese, and Hong Kongers will be forced to use and learn Mandarin within the next five years. Here’s an article that’s speculating on the change, but I’d guess Hong Kongers have more updated news about their situation.
The Associated Press also has an article, but it’s not specifically on Hong Kong.

My family’s situation isn’t great. My cousins still don’t have any clear method to be able to immigrate, and some of my family members are planning to just stay in Hong Kong since they would have to give up their careers and completely restart somewhere else (that cousin’s a lawyer, so she’d need to learn a completely new system of laws and regain her qualifications, setting her back so much that it’s just not feasible; her parents will be staying with her). I’m just so worried seeing all this since I still can’t do anything.

It’s only going to get worse and worse in Hong Kong.  If you’re thinking of leaving, leave and leave FAST.  Don’t hold out for positive change, it won’t happen.  Just try and get out any way you can, and as soon as you can, take those with you who will come but don’t delay just because certain family members won’t, you’ll lose valuable time.  They have to make their choice, just as you have to make yours.  If you wait, there will come a time – very soon – where it will become almost impossible to leave and you will have missed your chance, because one of two things will very shortly happen – China will close borders, OR, China leaves borders open and there’s a mass evacuation with everyone trying to get out at once and flooding any kind of systems available to take them, meaning few will get through.  You want to make it out before either of those two things come to pass.

This has nothing to do with Kpop or the other personal questions people usually have for you, but you’re probably the person with the most formal musical education I can most easily access: what do you think about the Marble Machine?

I assume you mean this.  It’s a cool invention and the many hours of work to conceptualise and then set up something like that is astounding, but personally I don’t think it replaces the joy of playing with other musicians.  I’m also not wild about the song it produces in the viral video, and making it do a different song would require some fiddly “reprogramming”.

Oppar I have a goal of being so good at sucking dick I’ll make men’s souls temporarily leave their bodies. I want my blowjob to be so amazing people will think I’m the reincarnation of Nancy Reagan. Any tips to help me in my journey? Thank you uwu

• Start slow!  No need to put your neck or your back out, it doesn’t take much to please most guys.  Conserve your energy so you can pick up speed later if needed.
• Although they call it “sucking dick” there really isn’t any sucking involved, and applying suction can be offputting.  It’s the friction of his penis moving in and out of your mouth that will get him off, not any sucking that you do.
• Some guys like you to also incorporate your hands, some don’t.
• Playing with balls (gently) works well for most guys.  Also a much-neglected pleasure zone is the perineum, light pressure here works well for a lot of guys.
• Generally being focused and looking/sounding like you’re getting into it is helpful.  No need to go overboard or bring out the cheesy porn lines, very subtle moaning or eye contact is more than enough and will definitely mean a quicker ‘result’ in most cases.
• Everyone has a preference for how they like things to finish, so ask – if you can be accommodating here you will earn maximum points.
• On the other hand you shouldn’t feel pressured to do anything you’re not comfortable with.  Set boundaries ahead of time before things get too heated.  Two seconds before he’s about to blow is not the time to tell him that you don’t want him to dirty up the top you’re wearing because you were going to go out later tonight in it.

What will the impact of Jisoo’s drama have on blackpink?

None.

Can you please explain why you think cancel culture doesn’t work?

It tends to push the person who is being “cancelled” away from the people who would rather they reform and be better, and further towards the people who were completely fine with whatever they were being cancelled for in the first place.  Because if you’re “cancelled” it’s forever – there’s no motivation to change your behaviour, so you might as well just side with the people who hate you less.  Cancelling might make the “canceller” feel good but it has the opposite effect to helping their cause – they make the people they hate even stronger.  It’s part of why political debate is so polarised these days, everyone’s pushing everyone else to the extreme edges.  It’s also one of the big reasons why the far-right is growing stronger and stronger each year, people shunned by the mainstream start to network and collaborate, and before you know it you have a whole “scene” on your hands.  Neo-nazi organisations don’t recruit people by beating them up, they recruit people by finding young kids who have been disenfranchised, and neglected, and shunned by their peers (i.e the “cancelled”), and reaching out to them, offering them a community that nobody else will.  That’s how young people get sucked into these horrible organisations, it’s their willingness to form a bond with the ‘target’ that initially gets them in.  The friends that you don’t want because they’re not “woke” enough for you, these toxic organisations will happily take them and add them to their ranks instead.  That’s why, as unpalatable as it may seem to some, the correct way to advance progressive causes is the Daryl Davis way.  If you want someone to come over to your side, it makes more sense to build a bridge than to burn it.

1. do you think demisexuality is real or just how most women experience sexual interest?

2. as a woman with a lower speaking and singing voice (very similar to yuqi from gidle, actually!) I’m always mildly depressed about most kpop and pop in general being sung by men in the highest and squeakiest part of their range. I don’t like high pitched voices in general but I especially find it grating in men, I guess it’s misandry or something. So I did a google search to find more baritones / basses in pop music and unfortunately stumbled upon Peter Steele from Type O Negative . At first I though he was incredibly hot and then I found all his old lyrics which are bitching about people on welfare (we stan a racist 😍) and his weird Nazi phase. It seemed by the end of his life he wasn’t into Hitler anymore but obviously the damage was done. When you read articles by people close to him they seem to repeatedly vouch for him as decent and there’s an interview where he talks about his fans fucking showing up at his house and it’s obvious he wasn’t terrible because he just…was quite kind and patient with them.
anyways the question is why does so much of metal have an obsession with Nazis? I heard Pantera has some nazi/racism accusations as well. It seems weird to have this whole image of being an absolute piece of shit for no reason and then feel all tortured and sad about the fact that no one knows you’re actually nice. Am I supposed to feel bad? Apparently Steele had terrible stage fright so he had to drink a shit ton before going on stage, and in general he seemed very angsty and depressed. To me it seems if he hadn’t spent so much time doing things that caused so much backlash maybe his life would have been more pleasant and he wouldn’t have to spend so much time fighting to play concerts.

3. while most sane kpop fans would agree that kpop is manufactured for sexual appeal, I think Jae’s attitude is the confounding factor in why people attacked him. I listened to the podcast. He seems delusional about his popularity / impact especially for a 30 year old man.

and there’s the issue of him hanging out with a weirdo making racist jokes about BTS
this thread talks more about it

another thread detailing twomads racism:

obviously not all kpops have to be good people but he’s appears to be a pretty edgy person and combining that with a “sensitive” topic — people associate calling kpop manufactured with anti-asian sentiments — he’s bound to recieve backlash.

On a more minor note, fans of day6 are concerned about how his actions affect his group’s reputation.

One could argue that kpopalypse seems similarly edgy, which is true but I don’t see the arrogance/delusion about success like Jae has. And you’re not fucking up your group’s income by what you do or don’t say.

1. Never mind men or women, I think it’s just how most people experience sexual interest, right across the board.  Get any group of people together who don’t know each other and have them in close proximity to each other doing a bunch of stuff (like say, a workplace) and eventually you will have people crushing on each other over time who didn’t initially feel any attraction etc.  Giving it a name like “demisexuality” to me feels stupid, because it “non-normalises” it, it makes it sound as if this isn’t a completely normal thing for the majority of people.  Why not give the “I want to fuck you on first sight” thing a stupid name instead?
2. Metal has always concerned itself with looking at the dark side of human culture in many forms, although Nazis is actually a relatively rare topic for metal it does come up from time to time and even in some iconic metal songs but it’s usually presented as something to be feared and horrified by rather than celebrated (Slayer’s “Angel Of Death” is a good example of this).  Having said that, just like any genre of music, metal is made by humans and humans believe different things, so there are obviously going to be some people with those kind of beliefs too.  I don’t think metal has more of them than any other genre, yes there are definitely some neo-Nazi sympathisers in metal, I could find you just as many in country music or folk music or punk or even rap (yes you read that right), but if you want the genre with the most amount of people who believes racist things you have to go back to classical music, where it probably would be harder to find people who didn’t have bigoted beliefs of some kind.  Both Phil Anselmo and Pete Steele certainly have/had their issues and have said some pro-racist things (whether in sincerity or just as a means to piss people off), but are either of them really die-hard racists or do they just have a very dark sense of humour plus a worldview significantly skewed by whatever drugs they were on?  I’d probably give more benefit of the doubt to Pete, because I don’t recall him taking things “outside the music” in any way.  Phil on the other hand has gone on whole speeches during live shows about “white pride” or whatever, and yeah he does it from a “we should all be proud of who we are” kind of angle, now I get what he’s saying but that’s super easy for his audience to misconstrue (on top of being super cringe), I don’t think he’s a card-carrying racist I just think he’s an ignorant dude with a whole lot of issues who is way out of his depth as any kind of spokesperson for a group, he should probably just shut the fuck up between songs and let other band members do the interviews.  However I have more time for both of them than Eric Clapton, now there’s a fuckwit.  It’s the overrated boomer rock musicians who are the worst, not the Gen X metal guys.
3. I agree that Jae is delusional, which honestly isn’t unusual for someone in his position, in fact I would even expect it – think of the environment he’s in, he’s probably getting a lot of reinforcement of his delusion.  I don’t really care who he hangs out with though.  Insisting that he not remains friends with someone due to that other person’s racist statements – no, that’s idiotic.  By that logic, Daryl Davis shouldn’t have hung out with those KKK people.  Maybe Jae knows his friend is a bit of a racist dick and is trying to reach out to him to help him see reason and be the example of an Asian person who doesn’t reinforce the stereotypes his friend has in his head.  If Jae “cancels” his friend over his friend’s racist comments instead, what’s his friend going to do?  Probably cancel Jae right back, and then hang out with someone else who is more racist than Jae and less likely to give him grief, where he can double-down on his beliefs safely without being challenged, and become even more racist.  Cancel culture is well-intentioned but does not work.  You can’t beat hate with hate, you just breed more hate – only love conquers hate.  Simple as that.

Greetings from Russia! I was very surprised to see in your favourite lists 21/30 of my 2012 favourite tracks (I simply didn’t know about other ones) and some of ‘golden era’ songs that brought me into kpop + turned out I’m pretty good at predicting your reaction on new releases. Could you please say a word on these songs so I would understand my childhood music taste more?

Scandal are far too much in the pop direction to be any good.  I find this bland as shit just like all their songs and the melodic choices are just boring.  As I keep saying in just about every QRIMOLE, Japan does NOT do commercial pop and rock well AT ALL.  Heavier/more extreme styles are a big YES, but commercial Japanese pop and rock is just a big old pathetic failboat stuck in the Suez, preventing the flow of decent Japanese music on other ships from getting through.  There’s more than one reason why Japan never had anything approaching a “Hallyu wave” (no boring follow-up questions about this please, it’s been discussed to death here in past months).

As a bonus, here is widely known here russian pop-group Vorovayki. Their songs with a lot of use of prison slang are mostly about issues which women face in prison systems (sexual harassment, tattoos, like here). I think Han So Hee will like it.

This is kind of cool but without the context of being able to understand the lyrics it just looks like three girls singing some very dated-sounding pop music, like the Russian version of trot or something.  So I unfortunately can’t confirm if there’s any valuable advice here for Han Seo Hee.  Also, missed opportunity for some prison uniforms.

Do you have any plans of writing a Squid Game review, oppar? I’m curious what your opinion on it was, personally I enjoyed it but I found it quite predictable (not sure is this a flea though).

Nobody in Squid Game is a k-pop, so no I won’t be writing a review post, but here’s a quick recap of what I liked and didn’t like.

+ acceptable levels of extreme violence and general cruelty
+ charismatic main characters (thug guy with snake tattoo was my fave)
+ novel concept not dissimilar to my fanfictions, great story overall with a cool subtext that is definitely delivered on
+ unique visual style
+ plenty of twists and turns I didn’t see coming (even if the overall arc is fairly obvious)
+ North Korean girl MRS (sadly she’s lost a lot of weight since and doesn’t look healthy right now, hope she gets better)

– English-speaking actors are kind of a bit shit (although it does add to the surreal factor, so a plus in a way)
– takes a loooooong time to get going, all the character exposition is arguably essential but boring, didn’t start really enjoying it until about the third episode in
– watching some characters make unrealistically dumb life decisions is obviously needed for the narrative but can get a bit frustrating

Overall 4 squids out of 5

I really like Pink Fantasy, but I’m not sure if buying their stuff on Amazon will result in money going toward their company. Any recommendations on where to buy their stuff?

Not really, but this post might be of interest.

I’ve had very limited success buying k-pop from Amazon, I really don’t recommend them for that, shit takes forever to arrive and is often damaged.  This might be a quirk peculiar to the distance to Australia however.

Kpopalypse oppar, about five years ago I read your post “Dr. Strangefap, or: how I learned stop worrying and love k-pop censorship.” In this post, you point out a still from EXID’s Up & Down MV (of one of the members in a room with some legs coming through the wall, one of them pink), and then say it references some subgenre of porn. Look dude, I don’t doubt you’re right, but I just have no idea what it is. I think I have thought about this maybe once a year for the last five years, and that is five times too many. Please oppar, tell a longtime reader what subgenre of porn is being referenced.

Five years oh my god.

DM me, because I don’t want to make you feel silly in public, it seems mean, also I don’t want to ruin the post for others who may still be having fun trying to guess.

best txt song vs best bts song ?

TXT paved the way.

I’ve noticed that Dreamcatcher and Gfriend had a substantially overlapping fanbase. Do you think it’s because they shared similar musical influences, had similarly consistently high-quality musical output, or something else entirely? Also, do you think Dreamcatcher will ever go full metal? Both groups’ worst songs came from following terrible kpop trends, so I would hope Dreamcatcher could learn that, but we both know musical quality has nothing to do with popularity and album sales in the visually-dominated kpop world.

I think it’s similar styles in some respects.  Gfriend have quite a few songs where guitar is prominent in places, and they tended to stick to fast-paced songs as well.

hello kpopalypse! ive been an avid reader of yours since 2018 but this is my first time ever sending something on QRIMOLE. here i go:

1. on your kpopalypse’s top 30 of 2018, you mentioned that APRIL’s producers never seemed to do anything in halves. as someone who has no clue about anything in music, what does that mean?
2. i wanna learn an instrument but my mother tells me as a 20 year old that its better i focus on something else… ignoring her, which instrument do you suggest?
3. is there a possibility for a LOVELYZ retrospective? theyre one of those groups that disbanded than have also done quite good on most of you reviews.

thank you, from a dear caonima

1. Tracing my memory back to whatever the fuck I meant by that, I think that I was probably referring to songs like “The Blue Bird” and similar being extremely layered up.  Lots of orchestration and studio polish, not much subtlety in the arrangement.
2. Depends why you’re wanting to learn.  Purely for fun – guitar.  Because you want to study music or write music – keyboard/piano (at least at first, switch to guitar later maybe).  To annoy your parents – drums.
3. This probably won’t happen.  I don’t do retrospectives unless for very specific reasons, “because they broke up and I liked them” isn’t enough of a reason.

Hi! You’ll probably only get to see this next year, so happy new year! I remember your 2020 best of list having Wonho’s “Losing You” pretty high up, and I really appreciated your thoughts on it because it’s one of the rare ballads I’ve liked on first listen and all the listens after too. I’ve been a fan of him since his Monsta X days, so I pay attention to them both and I certainly don’t find it as good, but I was pleasantly surprised by the group releasing a decent ballad. It’s not being promoted, but it is what the album is named after, so I’d like to hear any thoughts you have on it (AKA is there anything of note here or is my taste weird/am I just being biased?)

To be clear, it’s not the best I’ve ever heard, but it’s unusual that there isn’t anything I’d call vocal wanking which is always a plus for me. I don’t feel like it’s as melodically or harmonically strong as it could be? I sing, so I hear lots of details, but I don’t have a strong understanding of theory, so I’m not sure exactly what it’s missing in that aspect. If you have any comments, good or bad, it would be cool, I’d love to learn and hear more about your thoughts about what a good ballad is like. Personally, I feel like there’s a good pace in the piano and some sense of subtlety that works out, but maybe I’m also just used to extremely boring ballads being very belt-heavy and overwrought and/or full of airy, slow-paced vocals to sound ~*emotional*~? I’m fine if this isn’t anything special btw, but most ballads are usually not my taste at all, including some of older ones from this group, so I don’t feel like it’s just bias at work here (their most recent full length album had a slow guitar song that was really great, but I don’t know if this is explicitly a “ballad” either? 

It would be kind of sad if I liked these just because other ballads tend to be so much worse, but sadly, that’s so much of what listening to most kpop or even generally what pop music is like these days.

Anyway, if you end up answering this, thanks! (And as a fan of them both, thanks for giving consistently fair notes on Wonho and Monsta X – I always think for myself before anything else, but sometimes, you provide better insight or put into words about why I like/don’t like stuff they put out, which is much appreciated.)

I have a whole post on ballads and when I like them/don’t like them and why.

Monsta X’s ballads probably appeal to you for the same reason that Yoona sometimes get ballads right, which is… (wait for it) … none of them can sing much.  When you have singers who are honestly, pretty damn poor by any objective standard (small pitch range, weak vocal power, shaky pitch accuracy), you can either Autotune them and enhance the fuck out of their vocals so they sound “good”, or you can just write a song for them that has an undemanding vocal part so they have good odds of actually being able to sing it.  Personally I prefer ballads where the vocals are not super crazy and the singer has to embrace some subtlety, and that’s what you’re hearing.  As the singers can’t lean on “vocal technique” (because they don’t have any) instead they’re leaning more on the emotional aspect of singing – trying to match the mood of their voices to the mood of the music.  Which really, is what ALL singers should do, all the time – but often highly technically trained singers forget to, or aren’t encouraged to.  With Monsta X they would definitely have been encouraged to, because that’s pretty much all they have in their singing toolbag.

The other song… maybe not strictly a ballad because of the quicker tempo but it has a light feel like a ballad.  Yoona’s “When The Wind Blows” is similar, I’d call it a ballad, even though technically it might not be, because it has a “ballad feel”.  There isn’t a strict fixed definition of what constitutes a ballad tempo-wise, there’s a bit of subjectivity here and it also sometimes depends on context of what the group usually puts out.  I mean, Slash from Guns ‘n’ Roses has called “Sweet Child O’ Mine” a “ballad” and that’s probably a rockier song than 98% of k-pop songs that have hit any list of mine over the last decade, but it’s definitely “the ballad” when taken in context with everything else on the “Appetite For Destruction” album.

Hi kpopalypse, happy new year!

I was reading the “If you have questions then read this” post, and you seem to be the right person to answer me some questions.
I’ve been obsessed with industrial music for some time now, the amount of projects that are unique, innovative and maintained the quality through the years is unbelievably high, and I think that’s because of how mutant the genre is, you know, when you’re in a rock band and you run out of good songs in the rock format, you’re screwed. But my question is, what happened to the genre? Did it die or am I just not aware of new good artists?

And about the neofolk sub genre, I like Death In June and Current 93, and I love how they change their sound a lot, but it seems that most neofolk groups are strictly acoustic bands that do the same thing over and over again, do you have any band to recommend? Btw what do you think of Sol Invictus and Rome? Rome sounds a little cheesy to me and Sol Invictus has past with the far right that makes me suspicious.

By the way I’m really into Coil, Neubauten, Severed Heads, HNAS, Nurse With Wound, Dernière Volonté, Allerseelen, Swans, etc, and I’m aware of TG, Psychic Tv, Skinny Puppy, SPK, Foetus, Der Bluiharsch, Laibach, DAF, but they usually don’t do it for me. Do you have any good artists, that slipped under my radar, to recommend?

I love your blog, thank you very much!

Neofolk continues.  Some slightly newer groups I’d recommend based on your preferences: Forseti, Of The Wand And The Moon, Sonne Hagal.

Never listened to Rome, Sol Invictus I find patchy, I only like the very occasional song.  Can confirm they were involved in the far right at a brief point in the 1980s, which they’ve since renounced.  Group leader Tony Wakeford more recently reformed his old left-wing punk band Crisis.

Hi oppar
I’m a 19 year old female who’s still a virgin and since this is a blog that doesn’t shame sexuality, here I am. Lately I feel like my orgasms have lost power, like when I first found out about masturbation at around 13 years of age I remember they were strong, used to make me shake my legs a lot and get moving a lot too. But one day I noticed they just don’t do that anymore and for some reason this is making me super anxious about having sex in the future and it kinda sucking cause of me. Is this normal? Ehat can I do to cure it? Honestly thinking of taking a break on masturbation, maybe I just grew used to the feeling of it.

I don’t recommend abstinence, but lessening the frequency of fapping might help a little, you’ll probably find that more space between faps means a more intense fap.  It’s also pretty normal to get less horny as you age, simply because what was once a new feeling now isn’t, it becomes something you learn to control, still enjoyable but it looms less large in your life.  Wouldn’t worry too much about the impact on sex, there’s usually a whole bunch of different factors that come into play that influence that particular equation, better to cross that bridge when you come to it and remember that it’s pretty normal for females to not experience orgasm during intercourse.  Don’t put pressure on yourself to be or do a certain thing, as long as you’re able to make yourself happy the details don’t matter so much.

at first listen, I thought Everglow’s Pirate and T-ara’s Number 9 sounded the same/had the same vibes. I was surprised you trashed it lol. What made it bad?

Both have a similar rhythmic feel and production style, so yes they do sound similar on some level.  “Pirate” has a chant-like chorus with no melody at all, “Number Nine” has a chorus absolutely packed with melody.  That’s the big, overarching, huge difference between the two songs, a chorus that included some sort of melodic payoff would have easily saved “Pirate”.

do you have any advice when it comes to keep on top of creating work? (not using the word content for moral reason). I’m a first year journalism major and I feel that I have to already be doing something with myself- I write for the school paper and I plan on applying for a radio show next semester, but it never feels like enough. I recently had a meltdown over it after specifically watching multiple hours of interviews of the guy who wrote ‘saw’ and convincing myself that i needed to get on top of something like that soon, despite the fact i know i can’t write fiction and i don’t have any particular passion for it. im sure the saw induced breakdowns will cease once i start getting the medical help i definitely need, but unfortunately i will still be a hormonal teenage girl after that and any tips will help. Love your blog, been reading it for way too long, and thank you!

Nobody can be or do everything.  In school I was really good at art, but I decided not to pursue it after I left, not because I didn’t enjoy it or didn’t have a passion for it, but because I just found music more immediately appealing, it meant more to me, and I couldn’t pursue both easily to the level I would have wanted, so I made a choice.  It’s good to keep busy and do the things you love, but you shouldn’t feel under pressure to be on top of everything ever because that’s not possible.  Every choice you make in life is always at the cost of another path you could have gone down instead.  It’s fine to just let some things go.

hi kpopalypse, im the person who sent you the “csjh had good songs” anon, could you please delete that and instead post whatever i’m writing out here? except for the parts i’ll be enclosing in double asterisks.

** [stuff in double asterisks removed at reader request]. **

now, here’s what prompted me to send THIS anon. why the fuck do i have such an intense attachment to some rando aussie cunt? how do i really get over my parasocial relationship to you? like, obviously, i don’t think you’d like to answer this question lmaoo, but it’s a problem i have: i just get so so so attached to rando strangers on the internet. and it isn’t just you: it’s that reddit user, it’s the bias list, it’s some seventeen fans of twitter blah blah blah… it’s pissing me off so much like i’d rather be parasocially attached to some fuckin kpop idol and scream and spazz whenever i’d see them lol

I think humans just like to attach themselves to other humans, it’s what we do, it’s part of how we operate as a species.  This need to bond is often stronger than logic and rational thought, because it’s more of an emotional need.  If the bond is severed in one place, you will bond with something else.  This is why cancel culture doesn’t work (even if it seems like it should), and neo-nazi recruiting and cult recruiting does work (even if it seems like it shouldn’t) – humans like to bond, so a strategy that values a bond between humans will always prevail over a strategy that does not.

Hi oppar. I hope you’re having a wonderful day. I’m a 22 year old girl from the USA and I’ve been reading your blog since I was just a teenager in high school. Anyway, I want to ask for your comments/advice on something that happened to me. It’s about a person. But let me try and explain from the top to the bottom as best I can. So…in August 2021, my mom and I had to put my 5 year old beagle down after he attacked and bit me on both of my forearms (it wasn’t the first time he attacked and bit somebody) for the sake of himself and others because he was aggressive and severely mentally ill due to being abused and neglected by my estranged father. It was the hardest thing I ever had to do. That dog was my son pretty much. I raised him from 9 puppy weeks to doggy adulthood when I was only 16 years old. And ironically, the dog was a gift given to me by my father and then my father destroyed him like he has destroyed everything else in his life. I have been devastated ever since my dog’s death obviously, but I’m doing better now. I hope he’s resting peacefully. His name was Kylo Ren because I really loved Star Wars in 2016. And I loved my dog so much! ❤

In the beginning days right after the attack and death happened, my already fragile mental state was sent into total rock bottom. My already clinically diagnosed depression and anxiety became so unbearably intense. I tried to fight it as hard as I could, but I ended up having to admit myself to a mental health residential facility in October 2021 because I didn’t wanna kill myself for some relief. I stayed there for two whole weeks! It was super hard, but I made it through the program. During those two weeks, I met a man. He was my counselor during my time there. I was 21 and he was 28. I chose him to be my counselor instead of the other counselor (she was an old woman) us patients could choose because I wanted to be more trusting of men since I fear them due to my “daddy issues” and other trauma I’ve experienced with men. Now, it’s been a while since I’ve discharged from that place. And as I’ve begun to remember things that happened in there, I feel like that male counselor I had has kind of psychologically damaged me in some way. I feel like he’s done the opposite of the reason I chose him to be my counselor. Whether he had any true ill-intent on his part or not, I still feel like that. 😦

He would flip-flop between acting like my counselor and then acting like my friend. And it confused the shit out of me for a while after I left and when I began to slowly remember things and when I began to recover from being in an extremely vulnerable state of being. He would tease me to where I felt like it came off as flirty teasing. He called me a crybaby. He said I was too sensitive. He gave me the piss one time because I told him to not smoke/vape around me since I was “eating” the substance he was smoking (I hate all smoking because I come from a family of addicts) during one of our sessions. He tried to justify it because we were outside then and he only put the device away after I gave him a dirty ass look. He also said he wanted to rip the head off of one of the other clients/patients and I was so scared like I wanted to run away and I kept going, “ARE YOU SERIOUS? ARE YOU SERIOUS?” That was the biggest no-no he did I think and he never apologized for it, he just changed the subject. He would tell me stuff about other clients and other staff members and would tell me not to tell anyone that he told me those things, so I felt like I had to keep secrets. Which sucked ass for me. Cuz I have extreme paranoia too.

When I told him about the times I was sexually harassed/catcalled, he told me to turn it all around and take it all as a compliment basically because that must mean “I look good” WTF. When I would start crying during some of our sessions, I felt like he would shame me for it because he would go, “Why are you crying? Why are you crying?” When he knew about all the trauma I had gone through and nobody else in the facility ever made me feel ashamed for crying a lot like I did, they would encourage it actually. He also went total TMI about his political views, like he said he was gonna vote for all Republicans and I was so freaked out. And I feel like he touched me kind of “inappropriately” one time but I can’t remember it that clearly. Before I left, we hugged each other goodbye because I had ended up trauma bonding to him after an incident occurred in which I overheard other staff members talking disrespectfully about another patient who had run away into the streets at night with suicidal tendencies. I had went to him the following morning to tell him about what I had heard and he offered me comfort by telling me to go over to him and give him a hug. And I did because I wanted some comfort at the time even though I barely tolerated him beforehand. So yeah, unfortunately that first hug ended up making me trauma bond to him smh. And during that farewell hug, he was talking to me during it and his voice was kind of muffled so I feel like his face/mouth was probably somewhere in my hair/neck/shoulder area??? I’m not entirely sure. But I know I’m not crazy!!! The first hug was okay, but I feel like the last one maybe was a bit too much on his end because he had also taken me outside away from everybody inside to say goodbye to me and me to him.

I don’t know what to make of all of this. I had a lot of confusing feelings about him for a while after I left. I thought I was “in love” with him and all that crazy shit. But now I’ve realized how much of a weirdo he was and that I would never be with a man like him, former counselor or not. Because he did and said a lot of questionable things when I was in his presence. Not just as a counselor, but as a human being. And honestly, I feel like he probably liked me way more than I actually liked him. I would act super fake around him because I’m not the type of person who likes conflict and to fight back. But I do kind of regret not switching counselors when I had the chance. And I even sometimes regret going to that place period and meeting him, but I can’t think so selfishly like that because I gained true life friends from there since I connected with a lot of my fellow sick peers.

He gave me his work email before I left the place for good so we could keep in touch. I’ve sent out a couple of messages so far, but I only got a response from him once. He said I made a difference in his life and that he was proud of me. That was nice of him, but after remembering all the stupid crap he said and did…I decided to cut of all contact by just not sending him a single thing ever again. Because I feel like he’s not worth any of my precious time. Hopefully he doesn’t say anything to me ever again. Because I would rather hear crickets. And to try to be fair, he did give me some good advice/guidance sometimes. But the bad stuff always outweighs the good stuff I think. Do YOU think I made the right choice??? I just want some commentary and maybe support. I’m not interested in “telling” on him or getting him in “trouble” or anything of that sort. I just wanna move on and forget that place and him. And talking about it with others does help me out. I do feel some resentment towards him, but I wanna be nice and forgive him and hope he’s learned from his mistakes.

I’m sorry that this was so long. Thank you for reading all of this if you made it this far. I hope I explained everything good enough hehe. :,)

Counsellors are people who we put in a special place of trust in our lives, so they have quite a lot of power that we place in their hands, we entrust them to do the right thing with it.  I think that if you feel ANY sort of trepidation or strange feelings where your counsellor isn’t behaving appropriately, just switch immediately.  I don’t think you should blame yourself for not doing this at the time, and obviously it’s not easy to make judgement calls when you’re in a poor emotional state, just saying it more for future reference and for others reading.  I of course can’t make any judgement on what this guy is really like and whether he was really being inappropriate or not, at the very least I certainly feel like he was crossing a line just by blurring friendship and counselling, but ultimately, that’s not the point anyway.  The point is that if you’re seeking counselling, for whatever reason, you’re entitled to have a counsellor with which whom you feel completely comfortable, and therefore any reason to pick a different counsellor instead is always a valid reason.  After all, some of them charge enough money!

Thoughts on this video?

Also, what was the rationale behind the most recent “no reason” girl?

Meets required standards.

Fancy asking the reason for the “no reason” sidebar girl.

Hi! My question is about a throw away joke you made in the Vfiles, the resonance episode!
“…don’t want frequencies bouncing gleefully around all over the place like Hyoyoung at a knife convention” was this just a throw away joke or did you happen to know that?
I know even before it was “officially” blown open to kpop fans in general there was the idea through your blog,aj and other tara fans I followed pointing out the general wtfness of what was going on in reality etc ect But did you actually know specifically about the slashing/physical threat part?

I didn’t know about it beforehand.  I do get industry insiders sending me tipoffs from time to time (bless them), but they’re generally not that specific and usually not centered around an individual’s dirty laundry like that.  I found out when everyone else did!  Note that I wrote that article after the incident came to light in the media, not before, hence the joke – it wasn’t an example of my super Boram ESP powers.

Are there raps in kpop that don’t interrupt the flow of the music? One reason I really liked Gfriend was that the group had no dedicated rappers, so the songs never had to randomly slow down for the token raps that are so prevalent in kpop. The awful raps in kpop have really made me dislike rap in general.

Well, it helps when they keep the same tempo.  They don’t have to slow down the beat to do a rap, it’s just a trend lately.  In the good old days raps would be inserted into songs without a stupid pointless flow-breaking beat change happening.

Odd question for you: I was trained as a vocalist for a long time so I feel like when I listen to songs I usually notice the vocals over almost everything else, but you seem to notice the music much more. Any advice on how I can shift my perspective and learn to appreciate the backing more? Sorry if this is a dumb question.

Learn an instrument.  Honestly, I find that this is the best way.  It starts to change your perspective on how you listen to music, when you’re used to listening for the sound of certain instruments.  I think a lot of people who more readily agree with my picks for top and bottom 30 are people who play instruments, I think this isn’t a coincidence.

What was it that made you stop believe in organized religion ( Sorry for the bad grammar)

When I was growing up we had a “chidren’s bible” in the house so I knew about Christianity even though I didn’t go to church (Boram was raised by Catholic nuns who were relentlessly cruel and as a result she was a strict atheist by the time I came out of the womb), but we also had history books where I learned about the old Greek, Norse and Egyptian gods too.  I was aware from a very young age that there were multiple religions, and that every society that evolved separately also evolved its own religion.  It didn’t seem to me to be logical that any one of these religions could be correct, because that means that all the other ones had to be wrong.  Why would a god only “clue in” one specific group of people?  Why is every culture convinced, with about equal zealotry, that their religion is the right one?  Christianity also seemed to have a lot of “don’t ask questions, just accept” type doctrine, which I regarded as immediately suspicious.  Having said that I definitely wanted to believe in Christianity, because it sounded cool – I mean, who wouldn’t want to go to heaven when they die?  But I couldn’t suspend the rational part of my brain long enough to actually go along with any of that.  Also I was getting shat on so much in school by that point that it was pretty clear that if there was a god he was quite content to just let shitty things happen to me, he didn’t strike down any of my bullies with lightning, not even once, so disappointing given that I specifically prayed for that a bunch of times.  By the time I was about 8 years old I was pretty sure that Christianity was just bullshit made up by people to control other people and keep them behaving.  Later on I learned about other current mainstream religions like Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism etc and they all seem to have the same systems of control under the surface, the Tooth Fairy just wears a different-coloured dress.

I was watching this video while high
 and I’m very strongly feeling that Hyuna was 100% on some type of substance. Have you seen any actual examples of idols being high (on any type of drug not just weed) on camera? It sounds like something that would never happen in kpop but i read your post about kpop and drugs sooo

I couldn’t even get through enough of that awful video to even see Hyuna.  What an awful collision of sound and image.  Maybe I was just watching the intro I dunno.

Never seen what you’re describing but then I don’t watch variety shows etc so I’m probably the wrong person to ask.

Speaking as an American, I also agree that a bunch of our customs are creepy beyond belief. Honestly, I’m of the opinion that so many of us are obsessed with “freedom” to distract ourselves from the sheer lack of free thinking around. Our country is so backwards in so many ways that we’ve got to delude ourselves into thinking we’re actually free in any way. It’s just a mantra at this point.

Do you have any recommendations for a young American who wants to see some change in her country but is just too discouraged by all that’s happening and an entire system that seems designed to keep two corrupt parties in power? It just feels like as long as my country still primarily uses plurality voting, we’ll be stuck choosing between the lesser of two evils. It’s really soured my opinion on democracy as a whole.

You probably will always be stuck with just that, but always vote anyway.  People in other countries would die (and often quite literally do die) to even have a chance to access the limited amount of freedoms and choice that you have where you live.  Democracy is far from perfect, and it’s more imperfect in some countries than others, but it’s the best thing we’ve got.  If you want to make your democracy better in the USA probably the best thing that you can do about it is push for a preferential voting system.

What exactly is 8D music, and how do people make these types of edits?

It’s just adding a little bit of echo and stereo panning to make it sound more “spacey” or something (and wrecking the tune’s original stereo balancing in the process).  Honestly a trivial process for an audio engineer.  Here’s how to do it.

I know you don’t really like Mamamoo’s music, but they recently put out a Best of Mamamoo album. I was wondering if you’d ever check it out and maybe tell us what you think of their remixed title tracks

My stack of unlistened-to k-pop albums is so huge that I could probably build a fort out of them like that charity shop in the UK did with 50 Shades books a while back.  If I do ever get started on that pile, I’m pretty sure Mamamoo’s remixes won’t be at the top of the list, especially given that I tend to hate remixes of even my very favourite artists.  This feels like a question calculated to generate maximum disinterest in me, I could only be less interested in this if you told me the remixer was a J-pop DJ who did baseball as a side-hustle.

happy 2022 oppar!

oppar if i want to start making music this year (my new year’s resolution haha), i am a total noob, what should i do first or be my order of priority here:

1. learning an instrument (and which instrument)
2. learning how to sing
3. learning music software (and what software)
4. learning how to write/compose

thank you, and happy new year! wish you the best this year oppar.

Start with 1.  See advice above for which instrument.  3 and 4 are kind of the same thing, so do that next.  No point advising you on software because once you’re ready to do that things might’ve changed.  I don’t keep up to date on software anyway.  2. isn’t important, unless you have a very strong passion for singing do it last.

oh oppar, i am sorry i forgot to add in my question about a total noob trying to learn making music:

can u point me to reference materials for beginners oppar? doesn’t matter if i have to spend. and can i approach you (or recommend someone i can approach if you’re busy) if i have veryyy noob questions? thanks again oppar!

When I was learning all the reference material sucked.  I’m pretty sure it doesn’t anymore, there’s probably forums and places where you can learn the basics.  But if you couldn’t be bothered there’s also my music theory series.

if Amber is gay (and as fellow butch lesbian, i think its safe to say she is), wouldn’t it be a plus for ryce or steel wool or sm or whoever tf is managing her to just be honest about it? I mean, she would pretty quickly become a top 5 most famous idol and it would create unimaginable publicity (+interest in her music). I guess maybe amber wants to stay in the closet, but its not like everyone hasn’t already assumed it. it just seems like such a lucrative business opportunity, especially since she’s edging away towards the western music industry anyway (and she’s past the peak of her kpop fame)

I only ever got hails of criticism for assuming Amber was gay, as she’s implied she’s straight in the rare cases it comes up in interviews, however as a butch lesbian you are detecting the dog-whistle quite clearly that I was pretty sure I wasn’t imagining.  I agree she should just come out with it.  The fact that such a potentially powerful role model never had anything to say about the issue beyond “yeah of course I love gays nudge nudge wink wink” and still to this day has never made a clearly defined statement on the issue, has always been a disappointment.  I suspect that now she’s not reliant on Korean fame it might finally come out when the f(x) memory fades some more for current k-pop fans who increasingly won’t know who they were, but I agree – what a missed opportunity for SM to actually be “the future of culture technology”.

how to be like annie?

Visit Kpopalypse.com, repeat.

 

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That’s all for this month’s QRIMOLE!  This series will return next month!  In the meantime remember to think POSITIVE thoughts!

Oh, and do you have a question that you’d like to see answered in the next episode of QRIMOLE?  If so, use the question box below, or if no box appears, click the Qri on the sidebar to open the box as a separate webpage!  Kpopalypse will return!