All right, new Dramabeans game! Based on several suggestions made in my recent song repost thread, I’m trying out the idea of profiling some indie/underrated Korean musicians outside the sphere of general kpop music, with songs and background information and such as. I don’t know how often I’ll do these, but hopefully I can manage a semi-regular system.
But how to make it more fun? Add FREE STUFF, of course.
So today I’m picking one of my favorite indie artists, Oldfish, and throwing in a FREE GIVEAWAY. I’m giving away FOUR FREE CDs of the Acoustic Movement album. You can listen to a few tracks below the cut.
The rules?
Leave a comment. Be sure to leave your email address (won’t be visible to the public) so I can contact winners. You can comment as many times as you like, but you’ll only be entered once to win.
I’ll post up the winners next Friday (is a week too long?), and keep an easy-peasy link/notice up at the right sidebar.
Been so busy with work and such that I’m totally behind on the news. At this point I think I know more about the Korean entertainment sphere than my local news. This must be rectified. (Or must it?)
I wish I could freeze time. Remember that ’80s TV show Out of This World, where half-alien teenager Evie could freeze time by touching her index fingers together? I used to do that ALL THE TIME, desperately hoping that if I wished hard enough, it could happen. See, that’s what happens when you’re taught the American dream (”try hard enough and you can achieve anything!”) since practically birth. Somebody should have clarified that magical woo-woo items didn’t apply.
SONG OF THE DAY
Aimee Mann - “One.” By far my favorite rendition of this song. [ Download ]
How can you not love this couple? Okay, they’re not perfect — but they do have really cute chemistry. Maybe it’s my particular love of guys with goofy senses of humor, but Jae Bin is such a great combination of immature and mature, silliness and gravity, confidence and insecurity. I’m sure he’d be annoying in real life, if I were the object of his attentions — although that right there might just make up for it — because his methods of courtship are still very much stuck in fifth grade. But that’s part of the charm, since he’s such an overconfident, charming movie star when we first meet him.
Taking up the time slot previously occupied by Who Are You?, MBC’s next big series is gearing up for its broadcast: Spotlight, starring Sohn Yejin in her return to television (she was last seen on TV in 2006’s Alone in Love, after which she acted in three movies: Open City, Nak-rang Club, and My Wife Got Married). The cast was at the press conference on May 8 to talk about the upcoming drama.
Directed by Kim Do Hoon and written by Lee Ki Won, the new Wednesday-Thursday drama centers around the world of television news, with each of the four leads playing news reporters at one broadcast station. Sohn Yejin is a newb reporter who’s just joined the station after beating out fierce competition, while male lead Ji Jin Hee plays a local news reporter already at the station (he’s sure got the standard news-anchor helmet hair!). Rounding out the cast are Jin Gu as a junior reporter who’d gone to university with Sohn’s character, and her rival Jo Yoon Hee, who’s moved from the politics department; their eyes are fixed on an anchor spot as the ultimate goal.
I think the series may get initial On Air comparisons merely by virtue of revolving around television, but I don’t think it’ll share too many similarities (at least, I hope not). Actually, from the description, it really sounds more like a reworking of All About Eve — but can they improve on a kdrama classic? (And is it weird calling something classic when it’s just eight years old?) The series premieres its first episode on May 14.
Brownie Speaks - “Late Afternoon.” Brownie Speaks is a new groove-electronica group that sounds a lot like Casker and Fanny Fink. Melikes. [ Download ]
On May 7, Epik High rapper Mithra Jin issued a public apology on variety show Goldfish for rude remarks made toward Min Kyung Hoon of the ballad group Buzz.
The rapper had hosted a radio show on music portal site Melon, “Mithra Jin’s Music Date,” in a special New Year’s broadcast back in January, after which he was criticized for insulting other artists. Mithra Jin explained that he’d been a little looser than his usual style that night, and should have been more careful when he said:
“The Nuts’ Ji Hyun Woo and singer of 1988 [old-fashioned] ballads Min Kyung Joon… The ones who don’t bow [in greeting] properly are all 1984′ers. You’d think their necks were in a cast.”
Tablo clarified, saying the press had misreported the statements. I’d say they really did, because the first article I read made Mithra Jin out to be rude and abrasive, but a second report printed the full quote, which is much less incendiary:
“The Nuts’ Ji Hyun Woo and singer of 1988 ballads Min Kyung Joon. Why are these kids born in the Year of the Rat so tall? They’re at least 184cm — the kids who don’t bow are all 84′ers. You’d think their necks were in a cast.”
(It’s a little convoluted, but it was meant as a play on words, with 184 cm => born 1984, Year of Rat => 2008 is Rat Year => New Year’s radio broadcast.)
But, Tablo conceded that although the comments toward Ji Hyun Woo weren’t that bad, Mithra Jin had been a bit unfair to Min Kyung Hoon, and DJ Tukutz even extended his own apology as well.
The show put Mithra Jin on the phone with Min Kyung Hoon, and although Min was unable to answer because he was in the middle of his own TV appearance, Mithra Jin apologized, saying, “I made some rude remarks about you in the past, and I want to take this opportunity to apologize directly. I’d like if we could have a drink sometime in the future and talk.”
Bit of a side rant:
I swear, Korean media really needs to get its act together. I’ve always been kind of wary of the press, but sometimes it’s hard to tell just how much liberty the reporters are taking in telling a story. As you can tell above, the simple omission of a sentence can drastically alter the tone of a statement. I’ve read at least four different articles all reporting this same story, and each source has “quoted” Mithra Jin differently. Western press has strict rules on quotations — anything that wasn’t explicitly stated must reside outside the quotation marks or be set off by brackets, so there’s no confusion as to what was exactly stated. But Korean media almost always paraphrases — within quotes, outside quotes, willy-nilly. The same “quote” can have slight wording variations in every source that chooses to quote it. It’s ridiculous. It’s like there are no standards for professional reporting — and perhaps there aren’t.
