They’ve always been reknown for military precision, but these more recent performances have demonstrated that the synchronization effect owed mostly to matching outfits. Clearly, they’re tired, and not quite ready to be performing.Īs for SNSD…well, they tried something different, at least. Looking at their faces, though, one can’t help but get the feeling that perhaps the management team rushed this. The choreography is energetic, but fairly simple, even by girl group standards. Unfortunately, Lim seems to have stepped up to her recently vacated plate of “can’t sing to save her life.” There’s no real vocal challenge present, no harmonization, no nothing. To give Sohee a little credit, she’s much improved from her “Nobody” days, when I cringed every time she stepped up to the mic. But then I got a little suspicious and thought…hmm, let’s pop on over to those MR removed videos and see if backtrack was responsible for their decent performances. YeEun, Sunye, and Yubin, were as usual fabulous. My first impression of the “Be My Baby” comeback performances was that actually, Sohee and Hye Lim didn’t sound half bad. Is that a justified accusation? Well, let’s allow the performances to speak for themselves. SNSD and Wonder Girls, like all other idol groups out there, have been accused at some point of being unable to sing. The verdict on the lead singles? Both were letdowns to some degree, but Wonder Girls takes the lead for vocal performance. But then that grating chorus kicks off, and one has to sigh and shake their fists at the high and mighty creative minds at SM. Why? They had the potential for a really great lead single on their hands, and the verses were pretty fabulous. Not a single member of SNSD was trained for especially for rapping, and yet they insisted on shoehorning in something like “Hollaback Girl” on helium. The downfall of the song was the questionable vocal performance, and the subpar rapping. There’s a couple stripped-down, beat and music only versions making rounds on YouTube that are pretty hot, you gotta admit. “The Boys,” like “Be My Baby,” isn’t exactly a bad song. That leaves one with a pleasant, but unmemorable track.Īs for SNSD, they fell victim to the very thing that Wonder Girls so wisely dodged: the vocoder effect. Miss A and 2PM have both had multiple singles missing any kind of high point to the song. The more I listen to work by JYP’s groups, the more I get the feeling that it’s a common problem in his production house. The thing is, it’s missing a sense of climax. Yubin, although still firmly in the idol rapper box, has a unique voice, and I’d hate to see her fierce little rap turned into robotic nonsense. For that, I have to give Wonder Girls mad props. To their credit, though, the producers resisted doing something that precious few groups have seemed to be able to resist doing lately: throwing in the T-Pain-esque vocoder effect, commonly referred to as just plain old autotune. The vocals are slick as ever thanks to that inescapable tool, Autotune, and there’s a bit of an echo effect going on that sounds a little cheap. The first thing that struck me, though, was their vocals. Well, sure, once you hear that claim, it’s kind of hard to un-hear the holiday spirit. To kick things off, I want to address the complaints making rounds that “Be My Baby” just sounds too Christmas-y. However, “Be My Baby” was clearly intended to be the song that would be their big re-entrance splash in the industry, so that’s what I’ll be judging. Apparently, they’ve got a multiple song promotion strategy in the works, and should have another MV/round of performances out in the very near future. Now that SNSD has shown a bit of interest in dipping their toes into the US industry’s waters, perhaps it even merits a critical look at the attempts of both to garner some interest within Western audiences.Īs most of you already know, Wonder Girls isn’t done promoting quite yet. They’re still promoting close enough to each other, though, that it merits a comparison and a contrast between their respective lead singles and performances. There’s a space of a few weeks between their promotions cycles that’s keeping SNSD and Wonder Girls from competing head on for those shiny music show trophies. It’s like the unstoppable force of the K-pop industry meeting the immovable object of it: SM‘s pet group and JYP‘s pet group colliding.Īll right, so they’re not quite colliding. I’m sure the idea crossed your mind once or twice, especially considering the Teddy Riley twitter diss aimed at Wonder Girls that’s been hitting the blog headlines.
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