[Day 3 Alex]

I had to think a lot for this one. A LOT.
There are so many solo acts in Korea that I love and I really wanted to focus on a singer that debuted as a solo artist from the beginning, but I love this guy's voice too much.

Alex Chu.

<미쳐보려 해도 / Can't Be Crazy - Alex>


Day 3 // Your favourite solo Korean artist

Alex debuted in 2004 as a member of DJ Clazzi's project group Clazziquai Project. Fun fact: Horan wasn't an original member until their official debut. Alex's sister Christina Chu was friends with Clazzi and the brother/sister pair sang in Clazzi's songs until Christina left to the States for her career. Alex stayed and Horan was introduced. Christina still features in a couple of their songs, and she also featured in a couple of tracks from Clazzi's recent album Infant.

Alex was known for his smooth voice and loving yet masculine charm through his appearance on the first season of We Got Married. Although many people called him out for being "느끼해" (which can be interpreted to being an extremely cheesy romantic), you couldn't really help but to fall in love with him.

<Ping - Clazziquai Project>

Wuddup world it's a kpop blog

Kpop is my guilty pleasure.

Considering that I am Korean, I was a bit late on catching on to the kpop scene. To be fair though, I didn't grow up with a lot of Korean kids around me. I never went to a big Korean church, which any Korean immigrant knows is the number one way to make Korean friends. All of my schools had next to nothing of a Korean (or East-Asian in general) population, so I didn't meet many fobs until I got to high school.

[clicking on the captions will take you to a music video from the album. They get better, I promise.]

SeeYa - Scent of a Woman (2006)

Epik High - Swan Songs (2005)

SG Wannabe - The 3rd Masterpiece (2006)

That being said, I did watch a couple of Korean dramas with my mom during middle school, but I didn't like them very much because they were like super dramatic soaps infused with a bit of comedy. What I did like were the ballads that they used in their soundtrack, which was basically where I started my interest in Korean music. I managed to get a hold of some drama OSTs (official sound track), and from there I was introduced to Clazziquai Project, Epik High, SeeYa, SG Wannabe, and Brown Eyed Girls. In high school, there was a sudden increase in the East-Asian population around me and my new Chinese friends were asking me if I liked Big Bang and Epik High. That basically sparked the explosion of kpop domination in my world. Because of my advantage of being able to understand Korean, I understood songs, dramas and variety shows without having to wait for subtitles (a service that took a  lot more time to provide back then). I was slowly able to reconnect with my Korean side through the Korean entertainment industry.

Big Bang's spread in their Hot Issue EP booklet (2007)

From about Grade 12 until now I've grown just a tiny bit weary of the whole thing. I stopped jumping on all of the new groups pretty much after 2PM because I couldn't deal with all of these 5+ member groups that all sang and danced in perfect synch. I stuck with my bias groups and gave a chance to the groups that were recommend to me by multiple people. I've definitely slowed down my drama consumption since high school (which was more out of responsibility than anything), but I still like to pop by Dramabeans to keep myself updated.

Alex - Just Like Me (2011)

Big Bang's Alive (2012)

Clazzi - Infant album (2012)

Tablo - Fevers End (2011)

2NE1 - 2nd Mini Album (2011)

Winterplay - Touché Mon Amour (2010)

That being said, I still can't let go of Korean music, which is why I've started this blog. I want to share thoughts and favourites from the Korean entertainment industry in general. I like to laugh at Engrish and I love following a lot of the fashion that explodes out of that scene (Eiffel in Seoul is a pretty good blog for that). 

So tell me, how did you start listening to Korean music?

[all images from Bugs, a Korean music site]