QRIMOLE – September 2023

It’s time for QRIMOLE, the series where readers ask Kpopalypse questions about anything and everything! Let’s take a look at this month’s mailbag!

While I know Gangkiz flopped spectacularly during their time, years have passed and the industry is bigger now, so what’s stopping big companies from debuting groups with older members? I single out big companies because anything the Big 4 debuts has a 99% guaranteed chance of being a hit no matter who it is singing the song or how old they are, so this insistence of debuting literal children over and over is puzzling to me. Seeing these zoomers doing Y2K nostalgia is just cringe, why not get people who actually were alive during the early 2000s?

There are plenty of idols who are older than 25. Yes, 25 is still young but it’s geriatric age for kpop stans + there’s those misogynistic memes about women older than 25 and shit so let’s say “older than 25” would be the starting age. These idols are willing to keep performing, they have experience on the stage and on the screen so a company wouldn’t even have to blow millions training them and drilling all the insane idol behavior rules, they could assemble a group and debut them right away. That survival show The Unit showed that there’s a lot of potential when it comes to groups like these and Loona is having all these post-disbandment subunits. Twice is expanding globally and having more mature concepts rather than shrinking, as people initially expected of a group past their seventh year. There is clearly a market for young adults and 30 year old idols in kpop so what the fuck?

I’m very cynical and jaded about the industry after years of reading your blog and conspiracy theories about Jefferey Epstein, so my mind says “the reason is because of pedophilia, simple as that” but is it really just this or is there an even more sinister reason out there?

also I know you’re tired of getting questions about them but yes, NewJeans motivated me to write this post even though I’ve had this on my mind for a long time. The age of the members has turned off so many people. Moreover, it interferes with the concepts because they’re are just way too young to sell the music and the artsy fartsy shit and I think they legimately do not understand the real meaning of the things they’re made to wear, sing and perform in front of the camera. I have the awful feeling that this, too, is part of the point and the art team gets off on that “innocence” aspect.

The reasons for the focus on youth are in fact fairly bland and don’t have a whole lot to do with Epstein’s island. Firstly, younger performers will adhere to Korean youth-fetishising beauty standards longer. Secondly, younger audiences like younger performers and so debuting performers young allows the audience to grow “with” the group, it makes the parasocial bond stronger. It’s easy to look at older idols succeed and say “well, there’s a market for older idols” – but most older idols didn’t enter the business while old, they started much younger and their fans grew up with them, they had time to build that base. It’s actually the same for performers outside of pop too. Sure Mick Jagger is old as shit but he didn’t start old. Etc. Thirdly, the commercial end of idol k-pop may or may not have a minimum age limit but it defintiely has a maximum one – after a certain amount of years it becomes harder to do the dances and stay in peak physical condition etc. Companies invest a lot of time and money into training their idols, so if they start them younger, they’ve got more time to make a return on their investment before the idols start to struggle to do all the backflips and shit.

hi, my husband is a big metal /hardcore guy and I’m curious about how much your tastes align. He likes this song, which is by a group that’s apparently somewhat continuous among metal fans.

I’ve exposed him to some K-pop and while he’s put off by the presentation of it (fair), he likes songs by Fx, T-ara and Kara (mostly wanna, lol. )

Wow, yuck. I like his k-pop taste but I don’t like his metal taste. I’ve not heard this band before but the song sounds wishy-washy and characterless to my ear, like a heavier My Bloody Valentine but in a bad way. Also I don’t like the visual presentation of it at all, give me some k-pop girls any day. Surely if he’s a metalhead he likes better groups than this? I’d hesitate to even call this metal at all because the dull, washed-out guitar sounds don’t really have a lot in common with metal riffing. Are you sure he even gave you the right video?

hi oppar,
if you’re ever going to continue fashion class again would you consider covering androgynous fashion? with idols such as moonbyul, jeongyeon, dami, etc. us lesbians would look forward to it!

Will consider! Although what even qualifies as androgynous is a question. I’m sure I’ll make about 462 politically incorrect missteps with such a post. Which probably means it’s worth doing just to annoy others.

Hi there! Sorry if you’ve shared this before, but do you have a favorite resource or set of resources (book, website, youtube channel) on production terminology in general? I’m thinking of like, different types of synths/waveforms, guitar effects pedals, etc. If not, would love to see more of that content here, loved the signal flow post!

No, which is why I write my own music theory stuff, as I’m really not seeing much of this content anywhere else described the way I would describe it. Music theory post will have more of this type of content though, because music theory as it relates to k-pop is all about aspects like this and not so much about dots on pages.

How much money do you think a kpop version of Live AID raising money for the environment could make? And who would be in it? Obviously Hyuna, Sunmi, BoA, Taeyeon, JYP, IU, etc
The thing is that its difficult to isolate the most popular member of each group when there are so many groups with so many members… Also I wonder if kpop companies would ever agree to it unless they could make loads of money… Although Everglow did make that UNICEF song (which was pretty good) and famous groups sign up for Kingdom and Queendom each year…
What do you think?

Given that the original Live Aid was a colossal and willfully ignorant waste of time that did more harm than good, I hope that a similar event in Korea never comes to fruition. Of course if the k-pop world could make money off it, and look good doing it, they might do something like this anyway (most likely in the form of a ‘benefit’ after some kind of climate-related natural disaster), but I doubt the environment would be helped more than if everyone just stayed home and didn’t increase their carbon footprints by organising a big-ass concert. I’ve seen quite a few benefit concerts in my time and been invited to participate in quite a few, in my experience very rarely does anyone actually benefit other than the organisers. If you want to give to a charity, forget the concert and just fucking give to a charity, there’s already plenty of them with their hand out.

why did u name it qrimole. im very confused here

Explained (somewhat) here.

Hey cunt, got an Aussie here as well. AusPol is basically white room torture in that everyone becomes so bland and uninteresting you can’t help but notice their imperfections. You ever think that MPs are just hilariously out of their depth in running a country and that the APS are basically the technocrat Kings and Queens that are doing a surprisingly good job?

Anyway, that shit was just an icebreaker. I want to ask if I’m reading too deep into the music video for ‘Noir’ by Sunmi the same way Orbits read too deep into the Loonaverse. I reckon its the same as ‘Likey’ syndrome, where a social media commentary is hiding a deeper thing. Where ‘Likey would hide a criticism about idol life, I think ‘Noir’ is actually about self harm and the debate around the ‘attention seeking’ angle.

I’ll start with this, what she’s describing straight up isn’t what really happens with social media. People do end up becoming faker versions of themselves and doing shit for attention, but I think many influencers that live that type of attention lifestyle are happy in their hedonist world. ‘Fuck you’ money does give you the tools for happiness (therapy, yoga, and all that shit), it’s just that idols are the exception given that even the rich ones are under almost slave-y contracts.

I feel like Sunmi is one of the more open about not just mental health, but proper mental DISORDERS, in the industry. I almost see her as taking the mantle of Sulli, but its understandable if she wouldn’t want to take a risk in that direction too far. The type of mental state that would make you think about self harm is definitely not common, and no amount of ‘SOCIAL MEDIA IS HARMFUL’ commentary can window dress that underlying mental issue.

Those shots where she is at the hospital, when she pulls a gun to head, when she plays around with knives, I think its definitely code that S Korean media pretty deliberately overlooked. Its definitely a dogwhistle in your definition. She’s trying to mock that perception of ‘its all done for attention’ by saying ‘attention about WHAT’, and that is a striking mental health address that little other kpop song or videos come close to (besides maybe Goblin). Nobody on twitter or reddit or forums or media or anywhere have mentioned the link between this video and what is possibly the most accurate depiction of self harm that her creative directors would build as a more PG-friendly social media commentary.

But what’s your take on this? Should I just accept Occam’s razor (e.g. with Loonaverse lore) or read into this as deeply as I can since this video could easily have been one of the most significant in the industry had Sunmi have been much more popular and more direct? Is there maybe a similar chord it would strike in you? It’s a pretty video either way, and she looks fucking amazing too.

I think there’s more validity in reading into this than the Loonaverse. It’s clear if nothing else that “Noir” isn’t just aesthetics. It could be interpreted as a comment on the race for attention on social media driving people to do more and more extreme and dangerous things, but that doesn’t seem to be all it’s saying. It also could be describing a process of alienation, where the projected image doesn’t match with the reality of how someone is feeling (be that mental illness, or just feeling disconnected, or something else), which could be a comment on social media, or just on life for that matter, the process of having to put up a front and what that does to a person. Also the insecurity that goes along with that, about being concerned that without all the ‘danger’ and ‘pose’ people might lose interest, or someone might consider themselves of low value. Like a lot of Sunmi’s videos, the concept is very sharply realised and there’s definitely nothing random about it, it’s nothing like the Loona stuff where it’s being deliberately ambiguous.

This might be a stupid question, but what does “This album/song didn’t age well.” actually mean? I used to think it was used to describe music that isn’t trendy but still good. But now I’m also seeing people use it to describe works they don’t fuck with anymore. (To give a K-pop example, I saw a Reddit post stating that Pink Tape by f(x) didn’t age well because some songs were not hitting as much as they did the first time.)

Generally (because the usage is often bastardised) it means that it’s something that really sounded exciting and fresh when it came out, but with the passage of time and familiarity, doesn’t have that much appeal beyond its original novelty factor. I personally wouldn’t put “Pink Tape” in that category. 

Hi kpopalypse, here’s a relationship issue that isn’t romantic!
In 2020 my grandad came down with some weird fungal infection and never recovered fully, so they now live a slower life in a retirement community. Neither of them have dementia or anything like that, but my grandad is much frailer than he used to be. He also used to be a pretty funny guy and talkative but he’s really quiet and glum.

After seeing these changes, I honestly felt really guilty about not visiting them more before my grandad got ill. This past year I’ve been trying to go out and see them every other month or so. To me I feel like I’d really regret not seeing them if I didn’t.

The issue is that my grandmother is starting to annoy me. Now that my grandad is depressed and sick she has to do all the talking and socializing that he did. And it’s really obvious she’s becoming really bitter about having to take care of him and it’s a bitterness that’s spreading to all her interactions.

We went out to eat recently and she kept complaining about the waiter even though he didn’t do anything wrong, he was honestly a super nice guy. In one particularly embarrassing moment she leaned over to my grandad and “whispered” to him asking if he saw what was on the guy’s tattoo sleeve while he was like, a foot away and could obviously hear her. He thankfully ignored it.

She also comments on people’s weight a lot in a judgemental manner, even her own friends. She once mentioned that I looked less “portly” than I used to.

She’s really often really condescending towards my grandfather and it makes me feel sad and awkward. Like when she leaves the room he’ll light up and talk to me but when she comes back he kinda retreats into himself and she’ll go on.

It’s not like a clear cut case where she’s like an evil woman either. She always texts/calls me about how my classes are going, sends me pocket change, and will often cook for me when I come over.
Like I said, I think she’s just bitter about the way things turned out. I do want to to keep visiting them but on the other hand it’s sometimes exhausting dealing with my grandmother’s comments.
What would you do kpopalypse? Should I directly tell my grandmother how I feel? Just see them less often?

If it were me I’d just wait until the next time an incident happened that seemed unreasonable (sounds like you won’t have to wait long), and then just talk to your grandmother about it, then and there. Like if she was rude to a waiter, apologise to the waiter in front of her, then after the waiter is gone ask her what she did that for. Or if she says something insulting to you directly just ask her why she said that and why she thinks it’s appropriate. Who knows, maybe she has a reason, perhaps she’s a reader here and she picked up all her nasty behaviour from me, but more likely you might get some sort of dialogue, maybe. It’s important to listen though, don’t ask in an accusing way just to put her down or make her feel small or prove a point, ask without anger or accusation, as if you actually really want to find out what’s behind it. Worth a shot.

Hi, twenty nine, soon to be thirty year old caonima here. I had the awful idea of looking up old classmates from school on linkedin just to see what they were up to and it only solidified the longstanding feeling that there’s something fundamentally wrong with me. Two years ago I was diagnosed with autism (with an IQ of 130 apparently, which is quite useless as I lack emotional and interpersonal intelligence and IQ tests are just about how good you are at being a nerd memorizing information, not about how smart you really are), and a lot of things about me and my life made sense, but even before being diagnosed I had always felt like there’s a barrier separating me, a non-functional weirdo, from the rest of society.

The only people I have ever felt at home with are other autistic people, communists, queers, or complete outsider weirdos who make weird music and art, which in theory should be comforting, but no matter how many groups I join and how many people I interact with, I can’t stop feeling like a total loser and I really do struggle a lot looking at other people’s achievements while I remain stuck at home living with my parents.

It is also, because of my condition, difficult to get and hold jobs. Most autistic people are underemployed and they tend to commit suicide at 37 years or something, I’m not too eager to look up statistics right now especially as I’m only 7 years away from reaching that specific age, but anyways I have higher education degrees because I am a nerd and I thrive in environments when I’m specifically instructed on what to do, but I am obviously underemployed too and my work history consists of odd jobs here and there with long gaps from the times I was too suicidal to function and go outside. I am aware that being able to rest during a mental health crisis without worrying about being homeless is a huge privilege, and that only makes me feel even more like a leech, or a parasite. I know most people have no choice but to work and work and work. Meanwhile I’ve had academic opportunities and leisure and feel like I’ve wasted it all because I simply don’t know what to do or how to participate in larger society.

I’ve gone to therapy for years and tried medications etc etc and I found out that the thing I like to do the most is draw, create, arts and crafts. I don’t want notoriety or success, I don’t want a corporate job, I really just want something simple you mentioned a long time ago in your posts: a job I can tolerate and that allows me enough free time to devote myself to drawing and painting and modelling random shit with clay. I like stability and routines. I just want to be an artist. But I have a hard time believing in my own skills. I actually avoid drawing sometimes because I think I suck at it. Or I get stuck on a tiny detail and that derails the entire piece or whatever I’m working at.

My therapists have told me there’s an inherent contradiction in me, as I am willing to admit that I am a weirdo and I thrive in weirdness, but at the same time I feel ashamed of being myself and I try very hard to fit in “normal society” even though I clearly don’t do and I never will.

How do I solve this contradiction? Any life advice? How do I start believing in my skills? How do I stop feeling like a leech? my family actually does appreciate me and they want me to thrive, but I still feel mega awful. My therapists just tell me that I should get a work from home job with minimal public interaction and that a lot of autists have jobs like that and it works well for them. I’m working (heh) on finding one. Despite all the depressing shit I’ve said, I am optimistic about the future. I know I have skills, I just need certain accomodations and some things are a bit more difficult to do as compared to regular people.
But on the meanwhile, can you offer any motivation, please?

Sincerely,
Autistic caonima

Firstly, if you want to do art, do it. Don’t worry about if it’s any good or not. There’s critics who are paid to worry about that shit. Just do it and keep doing it, and try not to George Lucas it. Do it til it’s done, then move on and try to make the next one better, and keep going, you’ll learn and improve as you go. Some people spend a long time trying to find out what they truly enjoy in life – luckily for you, you know it AND you’re in a position where you can do it. So that’s great! Embrace it.

Also embrace being weird. You’re not normal and you know it, so stop worrying about trying to fit in, because you won’t – and really, who even wants to? There’s no pot of gold waiting for normal people. The truth is that many ‘normal’ people feel so constrained by society’s expectations of normality (because while some fit ‘normality’ better than others, nobody completely fits it because it’s literally impossible) that they struggle to find any fun in their life and they start to lose their passion for it. Don’t compare yourself to others (and for god’s sake ignore their highly-curtailed social media) and just do you. Surrounding yourself with other people who also don’t fit in is a good thing, you’ll find some great friends there probably, but at the end of the day all you have is yourself in your brain and you have to be happy with that, and there’s no reason not to be.

Society is kind of bullshit anyway and if you’re participating in it and feeling somewhat out of place like you don’t really belong, then that’s really just an indicator that you’re intelligent and more socially aware than you might think. It’s not a fault at your end.

i am leaving my parent’s house to go study for my undergraduate degree which is like 5 hours away by train. these past three years i haven’t really gone out a lot or made new friends because i was preparing for all these entrance exams.

i am really scared to leave my home. i have this very big fear of growing up and having to become my own person. i am scared of my parents dying which is very irrational i know, but i dont want to lose them now or ever. i think i am very afraid of change. i fret over appointments weeks in advance. i get tensed when people text me. i don’t deal with things but rather just cry all the time. i am going to have share a room with five people and i am not very good at sharing at all.

i am really afraid of failing that i don’t even try half the time. i feel like i have no ambitions or goals in life. and i feel ungrateful because i am an above average student.

do you have any advice? i just feel really alone.

Sharing a room with five people is actually exactly the sort of thing I’d recommend. It’ll gradually help you deal with others (won’t be easy at first, but it gets easier with time) and also talking to others will give you a sense of perspective that you might be losing your grip on a little due to so much isolation. It’ll help with loneliness too, not completely, but certainly a little. Being resistant to change is a very normal thing, very few people embrace constant change in their lives, but society is what it is, constantly changing. You’ll probably never be an extrovert or anything so don’t put pressure on yourself to be that, wanting to be on your own and control your surroundings is totally okay, but it’s also good to be able to let that go when you need to, because life will have a way of throwing curveballs that require you to step out of your comfort zone, and learning how to do that is important. I felt similar when I was younger, very out of my depth with things that should seem simple, but you get better by doing. Exposure therapy works, giving yourself limited exposure to things which discomfort you and increasing the dose will give you some new life skills.

0325 by stray kids is soo familiar and good but i cant put my finger on it. it’s dnb

Yeah I don’t know what you like about it specifically. I think it’s a bit meh. Not really drum and bass sound though. Oh well.

I came across a bit of a phenomena recently and I was wondering if I could ask for your musical knowledge input? I saw a TikTok from someone who was a girl group Stan who exclusively liked nct and no other boy group. And in the comments there were a lot of other people who were similar, girl groups Stans who specifically liked SM boy groups. And really, it made me realise that as a mostly girl group Stan, I have a lot of interest in SM boy groups. My favourite has always been Shinee, but nct’s music interests me a lot, and Super Junior as much as I reluctantly admit has some fun bops. I will definitely listen to boy group music and have some songs I like, but no other boy groups have really caught my attention as much as SM seems to do with their boy groups musically wise. Is there something about the way they make their bg music that is more gg inclined? Personally, I’m not sure but a lot of bg music tends to be more.. simplistic and shouty and not really as interesting to my ear. Perhaps it’s the more experimental nature of SM’s music generally? Any discussion on music theory always interests me as I have 0 knowledge for something I’m so involved in. Thanks!

I think it’s the experimental thing. SM tend to take a lot of musical chances with their boy groups, pushing the sound in different directions. Sure, a lot of their experiments don’t work, but just the fact that they’re bothering to experiment at all sets them apart a little. For every NCT song that I like there’s probably three to five that I think are dogshit, but at least they tried. Not sure where gender comes into play though.

Seeing as though you like kpop and metal like myself, what do you think of madmans esprit? imo their latest album was pretty good

Generally I’ve never liked them, as I’m not a fan of Korean metal groups who model themselves on Japan’s visual kei style. However thanks to your question I checked out their more recent stuff and I was pleasantly surprised. I agree that the new material is better because it’s moving away from that tireseome generic visual kei sound into something a little different. Not blowing me away just yet but I’ll keep my eye on them.

My dad made me go to this concert with a bunch of stinky old people bands from the 1960s in the U.S., none of which were involved with the cool genres like doo-wop or even the Motown stuff I heard as a kid and don’t really mind now, but seeing the concert I started paying attention to how the performers were acting on stage. Voice syncing wise I thought some of the vocals I heard didn’t correspond with the shapes the singers’ mouths were making but I was also bored out of my mind and I could’ve just hallucinated it (tragically they weren’t using Shure Super 55’s), but when one of the boy bands came up, they all were holding electric guitars and some of their songs had guitar noises in them. Despite the guitar noises being heard on the speakers, I didn’t see their guitars plugged into any sound equipment, but it appeared as if the members were strumming along as if they were playing the guitars themselves. Is there such thing as wireless 60s style electric guitars and excessive cynicism, or could the people in the band have just been miming?
Also quick question two: Have you ever been on a roller coaster or theme park in Australia? Just for cross-cultural educational purposes thank you kindly

Good chance they were miming. A lot of stinky old bands are so old and crusty that they can’t play that well anymore so they use backing tracks for all their shit. There are such things as wireless guitar systems though, but they still need to be plugged into the actual guitar.

I’ve been on a roller coaster maybe only once or twice, hated it. I don’t do well with heights, and I don’t really like theme parks much either, everything’s pretty overpriced. If I want to be sick no need to pay for it, I’ll just start a fight until someone punches me in the stomach.

did you hear that the new thing in the kpop vocal analysis-sphere on tiktok is vocal tiers? with #vocaltiers having 96.9M views on tiktok, it may be time to pull ailee’s vocal fan camp out of retirement…

Maybe, but I feel like I said all that needed to be said. K-pop fans always looking for a way to give their bias points, if only they knew how much faking was going on…

I’d like to take up playing the guitar (for the first time in 6 years) and singing. I don’t really have the money or time for lessons right now, but I know there’s a fuckton of free lessons online. However:
1) How do I recognize the difference between a good lesson and a bad one?
2) I’m worried that since I won’t have a teacher, there won’t be anyone to spot mistakes and tell me how to fix them. How can I do that myself?
3) Do I have to practice 2 hours a day minimum? I genuinely don’t much free time, can I take it slower or would that be very ineffective?
4) I’m so shy that hearing myself play generates the same feeling as farting loudly in public.The apartment walls being paper thin and my parents going “omg that was so good” at me literally just strumming just made me more embarrassed (I was also super shit and knew). Same with singing. I’ve been this way my whole life. How do I beat the phobia once and for all?

1. Ultimately even a bad lesson is better than no lesson, but a good teacher in my opinion is more of a ‘guide’, someone who inspires you to teach yourself, because ultimately even with a teacher you’re still teaching yourself at the end of the day. The same applies to any lesson. Bad lessons tell you not much. Mediocre lessons tell you what to do. Good lessons tell you how to do what you do.
2. With some difficulty, researching what you think you might be fucking up can help. YouTUbe is good for that. If all else fails send me a video of your playing.
3. It’s important to practice daily, but if you can’t do two hours per day, don’t. Frequency is more important than length. 5 minutes per day is better than two hours once per week.
4. Just keep doing at it, and eventually the novelty will wear off for your parents and they’ll just start getting annoyed.

i have a concern

hello mr kpopalypse, i’m 18f and freaking out that i might be a disgusting person. i’ve recently started uni studies and realised that all the guys (18-23) in my course and absolutely awful, some with full beards, or super muscular and stocky, and they’re all just so *masculine* in an adult way, like drinking and clubbing and talking about stocks, that makes me not attracted to them. i have some friends who are 15 and i’m very attracted to them (more boyish, youthful, nerdy but awkward and nice) and freaking the fuck out because they’re minors??? am i a nonce??

You’re probably just not exposed to that many different types of people. If the only people you meet are minors, and people who like the stock market… well, that’s very slim pickings, and I wouldn’t feel under pressure to make any kind of choice there. More viable options will come along if you wait.

Hi oppar! I’m the person who wrote a year ago or more complaining about shitty sound engineering when going to local gigs. This is another question about sound engineering, but in a different way.

One of the bands is still together and chugging along. This band uploaded a podcast recently talking about their experience performing in one of the largest geek/anime events here in the city. The tl;dr is:

The band was initially approached by a brand who wanted to sponsor a live performance from them at this geek event. The band were offered a “technical rider” outlining all the equipment available to them. The rider had a lot of equipment, of very high quality and good brands, so the band agreed and signed the deal.

Everything seemed fine until they went to do the soundcheck at the event (4 hours before the actual performance), only to find out they had been given a fake rider: a lot of necessary stuff was missing and the so called high quality equipment was indeed from the brands outlined in the list, but it was very old and/or malfunctioning. It also turned out the people in charge of the equipment had no idea of how to actually operate and control it, let alone install/connect it, so the band ran out of time to do the soundcheck and were hushed away from the stage so the first act could perform. The same people in charge assured the band that they would take care of the band’s instruments while the first act was onstage… you can guess what happened next, when the band was allowed to enter backstage again they discovered stuff had been stolen from them.

At this point the band was seriously considering not performing at all because they didn’t even have monitor speakers, but they decided to go through with it at the end despite everything because they had hired two camerapeople to film them and they’re used to playing in awful stages anyways, and the performance went okay, I actually can’t even notice anything odd in the videos recorded but… was that the right choice? not refusing? some members of the band broke down after going backstage, others were just furious.

Are fake riders common in the industry, especially among struggling underground bands? the part with the equipment guys not actually knowing how to make it function was unbelievable to me (it almost seemed like they had been subcontracted because they had to make phone calls to ask how to connect/turn on the stuff)
What would you advice to a group in a similar situation, to avoid being tricked again? Bring friends just to guard the instruments?
As someone who can’t even play the guitar, hearing this whole story was shocking and I just had to share it.

Firstly – musician’s insurance. If you’re a touring artist, investigate this and don’t skimp on it. Shit does get stolen when on tour sometimes. Insurance can cost a bit but losing a room full of valuable gear can cost a lot more.

As for hiring a backline only to find out that it sucks – the best solution here is to do your research, and this should be done many months before the show. Ask other bands on your tier level who do tours on the same circuits about what backline companies they use and what experiences they’ve had with them. Don’t just pick someone random, you’ll find that in every city that has major tours go through it, there’s one or two big backline companies that specialise in looking after artists’ needs in this area. Find out who they are and what their reputations are, which shouldn’t be hard as people in bands love to tell stories about when things go wrong!

Was going ahead with the show anyway the right decision? Probably yes. It’s often better to struggle along and make do with a less than ideal situation rather than cancel a show and risk all the bad things that go along with that (loss of reputation and goodwill with the audience, lost income, refunded tickets etc). Anything that can keep the show rolling is usually good, even if it’s not an ideal scenario. Profit margins on tours can sometimes be slim and one night when you’re not performing when you should have been is money straight off the top. The one big exception I’d make here is for safety-standards type stuff, because no amount of lost income is worth more than someone’s life if there’s a fatal accident.

Not a question but just saying I am looking forward to try to not have gay sex with Yves 6, now that the girls have broken free of BBC the lore can to real interesting places, do not let us down!

Chuu is looking forward to it also! I promised streamer Tolomeo that there’s be an episode 6, to tie in with the Star Wars films of course (we won’t be doing an episode 7 with an emo version of Elon Musk) so expect it fondly.

Not exactly a question, but a request. For fun, you should numerically rank Korean Twice title tracks based on your favorite to least favorite. Just curious to see the intermediate rankings. #oppa

I won’t do this simply because then QRIMOLE will be flooded with requests exactly like this for every group ever, it’ll open the floodgates to a huge amount of very boring questions! If something isn’t on the best or worst list then it was too average to really care about much or assign a ranking to.

Hiya! Just wondering if you have a favorite “album-closing” track, for k-pop or any other particular genre (one that suits the rest of the album well, is really good standalone, etc.). Thank you!

The last song on any Cocteau Twins album is always the best one plus a really good ‘closer’, they definitely mastered the art of the ‘album closer’ more than any other group I can think of (although other artists on their label 4AD such as Throwing Muses/Belly/Dead Can Dance etc also generally have good closers, seems to be a real thing just with that company).

A guy I like has begun following and liking posts of my much hotter female friends. They’re either taken or were never into him, so my friendships can stay intact, but clearly this is a sign I should move on from the guy himself – so what on earth do I even do to start?

Half of the struggle I feel is simply because I haven’t had anyone else express any interest in me throughout my young life and this dude was the first where I thought it might happen.
I’m probably average-looking at best but I see people of all attractiveness levels in relationships around me, and I take care to maintain dress well and be hygienic, so I don’t think it’s my looks holding me back here but idk what is really.

Looks is never the whole story with attractiveness when dealing with people in the real world. So there’s no point picking on your physical appearance. Mental attitude is actually way more important and that’s what holds most people of any type back from finding what they want. Confidence will definitely get you to many places. Mind you there’s some people who just won’t click with you no matter what and you can’t really force it, you just need to have that confidence that you’ll find the next one who’s right for you. This is part of ‘abundance mindset’.

This might be a silly question, but is there such a thing as being too involved with k-pop? I’m going to be the secretary for the k-pop dance club at my college, but I’ve also been thinking about starting a k-pop radio show with my college’s radio station, just like you. I wouldn’t call myself an obsessed fan. I don’t really ‘stan’ any groups, but I really adore k-pop music and choreography. I’ve always wanted to dip my toes into radio, but I don’t have any other ideas for what kind of show I should do (each show has to have a theme or genre). What do you think?

Why not do it, after all, I did. Can you get ‘too involved’? Not a silly question. I guess you can, my advice would just be to pick and choose the things you want to get involved in carefully in order to maximise what you get out of it. For instance I really got deeply into writing (obviously) and radio, but I never really got involved with fandoms, organising events, or club DJing, because those things didn’t appeal much to me. That’s how I managed to not get burned out on it – I just found the aspects of it that fit the best for me and focused on those. So I’d say yes try all the things but don’t make large committments straight off the bat, just dip your toe in and check in with yourself and make sure you’re actually enjoying it first.

Hi, I was the one who recently posted about wanting to meet my long time online friend and going crazy about it, dressing up and stuff. This is the week later update:

The update is, I fucking hate him now. He deserves to rot in hell. I don’t want anything to do with him anymore, he’s a shitrag who severely needs mental help and a lifetime bail in some sort of mid tier psychiatric hospital. A fucking schizo with no real personality other than being desperate for any amount of passionless humour that can be substituted with weed and alcohol.

You know what he did to me? We were just chatting and having a lovely time then I mention something completely innocuous about his personal life that he’s mentioned once or twice before, and he goes completely nuts and calls me a stalker, having completely forgotten that I wasn’t a stalker, he literally mentioned this private detail of his a few months ago, and now he’s blaming me for everything else gone wrong. I hate him. I don’t want to ever meet him, and I’m glad that my new flat in the new country is far away enough from his house that we’ll most likely never ever cross paths in the future. I already have good enough friends, I don’t need him and his psychotic, unhinged ramblings in my life, calling me unwanted and cruel names.

The sad part is, I think he’s gotten some of our mutual online friends to block me, too. I haven’t received any communication with them AT ALL in the past few days. I think I’m more hurt about that than about him going off his rocker. I reached out to two of them, and they haven’t responded to any of my messages.

I’m fucking done with that mess. He went on tangents about me knowing his “past” or some shit, and that I was a terrible person for something that was already made PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE between us. I literally only just brought it up in conversation because I wanted to talk to him about it in a friendly manner (“are you okay, that seemed serious?” kind of thing) and his puny chemical addled brain just couldn’t handle the idea of being talked to without also victimising himself over completely normal and personable circumstances and he blew a gasket.

Done with him. I don’t want to be harassed by this kind of toxic behaviour and friendship. And I won’t continue pursuing contact with those mutual friends I tried to reach out to, because I’d rather just let this fade away and continue with my life. And if I tell people what actually happened, he might lose his/our friends, and I’m pretty sure he’s enough of an awkward fucktard to actually knife himself if that happened. Deep down, I still treasure our relationship (even if he doesn’t anymore), and I don’t want others to hurt him the way he already hurts himself.

Anyway, I guess this is what I get for keeping high expectations.

Well that’s a bummer that things didn’t work out, what a shame that things turned out so fucked, sorry to hear about this. But on the other hand, at least now you know what you’re dealing with and you don’t need to pour any more of your energy down a hole. Having certainty is still a net positive outcome for you, even if that certainty is “I never want to see this cunt again”. This is all one big reason why I advocate meeting people face to face before making any big commitments. These people who get married online before they even meet – don’t do that shit. Meeting face to face doesn’t always change everything – but sometimes it really does, and you never know which way it’s going to go until you do.

not sure how linkable insta reels are on here but did you know Sunny quit kpop and became a small time streamer? her twitch is here, you’re welcome.

Noted, thank you! Speaking of which, JAV of the month for August is TSDS-46066, yes this is relevant, maybe.

This situation may have changed by the time I ask the question since there’s another month until QRIMOLE, but I think the answer may be useful anyway.

I have a girlfriend who I love very much. I recently moved states to continue my education, and she moved with me for two reasons: 1) she loves me as well and wants to be with me, and 2) she doesn’t feel like there’s “much left for her” in the other city. She’s lived there almost 10 years now and feels like she knows it pretty well, and seems very unenthused at the prospect of moving back. So while there’s a chance she’ll be with me just temporarily and go back to the city where we met to take care of business, there’s also a chance she’ll stay here.

We’ve both been struggling somewhat. I have had depression almost all of my life (since elementary school,) which I only recently got medication for. Medication helps somewhat but it has a lot of unpleasant side effects. I had a lot of suicidal thoughts right before I moved here and for the first week of being here because i was worried I’d struggle to make friends, and it felt like I was right. However, recently I bounced back extremely quickly and became “fine” again, I suspect because of the medication making me more resilient than I was previously. (I’ve also been reaching out to mental health professionals and have an appointment with a psychiatrist, but these things take a while in the United States to set up.)

My girlfriend has a lot of chronic physical problems which cause her pain and inability to focus, exacerbated when she does a specific thing. She also has had mental health problems since her teens (bipolar mainly.) She’s been doing a lot more of X thing since she moved here, I suspect due to stress and lack of familiarity with new routines. She has a job here and was taking classes to fill the time, but has been falling behind in the classes (considering dropping them) and finds her job unfulfilling. She recently told me that she feels like killing herself almost daily. I wasn’t really aware of the extent to which she was depressed, but it did help explain why she seemed really distant and not that excited to see me when I finally moved to the city. Normally she’s much more outgoing and bold than me and I lean on her a bit to help me come out of my shell and to try new things, and I got upset that she didn’t seem to enjoy spending time with me and became a lot less affectionate (like she told me she’s not comfortable with me touching her any more.) I also became kind of panicky when she told me about her suicidal thoughts because it came out of nowhere and my sister has tried to kill herself twice. She’s assured me that when she does “thing X” she doesn’t mean most of what she says, and feeling suicidal doesn’t mean she’ll actually do anything because it feels like the “easy way out.”

I’ve been familiar with her wanting to die in bad moments before and so am okay at blocking out my stress about it, but I don’t think I’ve seen her this depressed for this long. She also got upset with me for talking about my depression and suicidal thoughts to her over the phone, relying on her, because when she opened up about how bad she’d been feeling I freaked out and basically said I’m not equipped to support things that heavy at random intervals. I’ve reframed my thoughts to go from “she wants your emotional support RIGHT NOW” to “she’s venting and wants you to forget about what she said,” which is more accurate. Because me freaking out won’t help her.

Essentially, I’m doing better now but I feel a bit resentful because I didn’t know how badly she was doing here and my expectations for her helping with my social life were too high. I also worry about her well-being—I don’t know how to help her feel better. She’s better at making me feel better than I am at making her feel better. I feel some responsibility since I brought her here but having her happiness depend on me is probably too much pressure. I’ve done what I can to support her practically (found a job listing she’d probably like and be qualified to apply for, looking for things to support her physically close by, going out to get her things when she’s in too much pain to do it herself) but it doesn’t feel like it changes much.

Anyway, I figured since you’d had partners with mental health problems before you might have help on this.

Having had extensive unfortunate experience in this area, firstly, I’ll say this: the fact she’s opening up to you about suicidal thoughts is a good thing. Kepp her talking about it. It’s when she stops talking about it and starts acting like everything is fine now, that is when you should worry. Look out for this red flag.

Other than this, just know that you can’t expect yourself to do it all. You have mental health issues also and you need to look after yourself, there’s no point falling down a hole because you’re holding someone else’s hand. But that doesn’t mean you should let go either. What I’m saying is, you need some support probably, so you can look after yourself, and you also need to get her some support too because she can’t just throw all her emotional eggs in one basket and give that to you. Certainly you should both seek a doctor’s advice about the suicidal thoughts ASAP as well as the relationship issues in general. On top of that, the best thing you can do for her in my opinion is to encourage her to enjoy life, not by poking her with a stick and saying “cheer up” but by inviting her to try new things and do fun stuff she enjoys. What does she really like to do? Is she creative in any way, or does she have any goals she’d like to work towards? Or if not, what little things can you do for her that you haven’t done lately because this emotional health stuff has been overwhelming you both. Also try and get her meeting new people if possible, she could probably use some friends right now. Of course you’re there for her too, but having strong friendship connections outside the relationship will probably help both of you. Preferably people who aren’t toxic energy vampires but people who can contribute positively. Good luck.

favourite starbucks item?

I don’t do Starbucks, and I don’t even know what constitutes at “Starbucks item” other than coffee types, I guess? In fact Starbucks are hugely unpopular where I live, but I don’t like coffee in general. I’ve never even physically walked into a Starbucks, I don’t even know if there’s one in my city or not.

man i wish gay people were real that would be so cool

Last time I was fucked by a fake gay person it felt great.

CONFIDENTIAL:

[entire post deleted, because the asker marked it all as confidential]

Gosh I can’t do much with this. Moving on.

(Reference video:

tl;dr it’s basically about how keeping a low online profile and as a result, being ‘mysterious’ is successful)

So I watched this video recently and I was wondering if a strategy like this would ever work in an industry like K-pop that thrives on consumerism and parasocial relationships.

I used to think that -with the exception of f(x) at times- if a group didn’t have a comeback in more than 9 months, it might be over for them. To be more clear, rapid comebacks made sense to me in terms of offering new concepts, aesthetics, etc. every time. Because then you wouldn’t get bored too easily and if you didn’t like one of them, there is always the next one to try.

And idk if it’s because I’m “older” now but every time I see a group coming back with 6 singles at once, I feel dreadful lol. I have a hard time keeping up with the content thrown at me and I’m starting to get tired of the fast pace of K-pop more and more each day.

I’m guessing you don’t feel the same way as I assume that you are a casual listener to me, nothing wrong with that. Just wanted to know your thoughts and idk – any advice on staying in the loop? Cheers!

In idol pop companies have worked out that generally speaking the more content the better. Hence so many releases so quickly, a rush of “special videos” to tide fans over between actual feature tracks, and so on. It’s hard to keep a parasocial relationship going when you’re not constantly throwing out content for people to parasocially relate to.

Korean artists not in the idol field release content slower. Jvcki Wai, Puer Kim, Love x Stereo, all good examples of Korean artists who release at their own pace and don’t bombard fans with shit every other week, because they’re not competing in the idol realm, the parasocial aspect isn’t so important.

So with the latest Blackpink bullshit that is Blackpink: The Game, I’ve been feeling a little down. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that BP will never again hold the magic for me that they did when I first discovered them, and consequently discovered k-pop. Have you ever liked a group or an artist (of any genre) only to be completely disappointed in how they turned out?

Musical letdowns: Celtic Frost and “Cold Lake”, Swans and “The Burning World” plus most of their post-Jarboe reformation stuff, Pharcyde going full R&B, Lauryn Hill going full gospel, Michael Franti’s musical trajectory in general after Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy, Ice Cube after The Predator, most rappers for that matter after the 90s when ‘not having an actual rap beat but just weak as piss snare hi-hats and subs’ became a thing, I could probably go on for a long time with this list but these spring to mind.

Hello Mister Kpopalypse Sir

(i don’t think my best mate reads these qrimoles, but if they do, they’re gonna find this post so fucking funny and mildly concerning)

So I have a very odd friendship with this guy I’ve known for a long time. He’s the longest friend I’ve had (4 years, which is very long for me because I move a lot and therefore don’t retain friends that well), and we met through online stuff which then moved to other online discord chats and DMs and whatever. Point is, we’re good friends, close in age, but it’s always been an online video-call or texting based friendship.

Unexpectedly, I’m going to move to a new country, in the same city that he lives in in about a month from now. I knew the move was coming but I hadn’t actualised the reality of it and being able to meet him in person until recently. And now I’m freaking the fuck out.

In fact, I’ve been so obsessive over the idea of meeting him in person that I’ve begun planning out which outfit I’m going to wear when we meet, down to the exact weather type, accessories, make-up, and perfume. I do kind of have a crush on him that I don’t know is reciprocated, because he does his best to distance himself from committing to anything “online” based in romance. I think I’m slowly going insane because yesterday I nearly broke down in tears between choosing which two jackets to wear with this one specific turtleneck and which necklace brought out my eyes more.

And I’ve lost about 4 kilograms in the past month whilst preparing to look my best for our eventual meeting and I want to lose about 5 kilograms more. I’m really really obsessed and I’m not sure if it’s veering towards unhealthy or not, because he’s never said anything about liking someone’s specific appearance or not. I just want the first eye contact to be bombastic and to take his breath away because this crush may be getting out of control when I know that he’s single and currently looking for a girlfriend.

Is this too much? I’m also losing weight for myself so I can feel better in my own body, not just for him, but he surely is some good motivation. Literally I cannot stop thinking about this one pinnacle moment even though it might not live up to expectations or whatever. I’ve saved all his pictures to my phone and looked up memes online whilst thinking about him or for the sole purpose of sharing them with him and imagined what it would be like if he said this one thing and the way I might laugh back, etc. And I don’t even know if he’s interested. He might not be. I can’t really ask because I don’t want to scare him away. He’s also not my romantic or physical type but I can’t stop daydreaming about this stupid crush?

Okay that’s enough for now. Thoughts?

Well you should definitely go ahead with the meeting, just to see how it pans out. As another caonima showed above, meeting someone can honestly change everything you think you know about the relationship. So go in with an open mind but also a lot of caution. You’ll certainly resolve it in one direction or another so it’s bound to be a positive result no matter what happens as long as you just exercise the normal caution when meeting online folks.

Do you think the quality of kpop has gone down? If so, why?

No, n/a.

In my end of year lists I tend to talk about the quality of each year on average at the start of the list.

Which K-pop girls, past and present, would do well in the Miss MAXIM contest?

I actually have no idea what the criteria are!

Not a question: I saw on the junkie’s site your comment on the American NCT “sasaeng” and I think yes she is someone you should interview.
Also not a question: i read in the kpop news about fifty-fifty’s food situation………..people should read your books.
Thank you!

Not an answer: has anyone ever interviewed a sasaeng before? I’d read such an interview with great interest if it existed, but I don’t think a single one exists. Someone should do one, and since I specialise into diving headfirst into areas that other people tend to be too afraid to go because they’re scared of ruining their reputations, it might as well be me. BUT of course it’s unlikely to happen because the sasaeng has to want to talk to me first and… well, why would she. There’s nothing in it for her, clearly (certainly not ‘attention’, I mean I’m not in NCT and neither are my readers). So it’s probably not going to happen.

Yes they should read my books, which brings me to…

SPOILERIFFIC NOVEL QUESTIONS (AND RELATED)

Probably skip these if you haven’t read the books yet and plan to, unless you really dig spoilers of course.

Annyeonghaseyo Oppar,
This might be a dumb question but am I unconsciously racist if I tend to bias idols who are the same ethnicity as me? I’m Chinese (not born in China) and I noticed that I tend to bias Chinese/Taiwanese idols if there are any in a group. This isn’t always the case of course, Tzuyu exists but Jeongyeon has always been my bias.
It’s kind of like Shu in your new novel who picked that one idol boy for being Chinese (but hey at least Shu isn’t my bias haha)

I think Hana would think you are racist, but most other people probably wouldn’t. I think people do have a natural tendency to be drawn towards features that are similar to those they grew up being around.

I’ve just finished reading Love Light. I enjoyed it but I felt it ended too soon! How many books are you planning in total?

There will be at least one more book in the Shin Hana series, maybe two. Just depends on how much I feel like I want to cram in there. The first two books definitely covered off several things I wanted to talk about regarding the training system (“Show Me Love”), and nugu groups (“Love Light”). The third book will cover what Halcyon’s life looks like as a certified B-list group…

Not a question, but finished book 2 and I’m just requesting more Shu content. She rocks. If anything bad happens to her in book 3 you will hear from me.

Not giving away important plot developments, but there will be plenty of Shu in book three!

I loved your new book! Some thoughts/questions:

-I like how you portray that each member of Halcyon gets attention from someone, which is pretty accurate to what the industry tries to do (and that Ora is a lot more polite with her approach than most guys are.)

-The way Youngsook is treated is depressing. Probably if Halcyon was real you’d bias her or something (or maybe Hana for the caonima attitude,) but it makes me worry that other “healthy” idols are also being forced to go malnourished behind the scenes.

-I also liked the touch of how groups tend to bond more if they’re suffering together (i.e. Pearlfive looking out for that one member) vs. squabbles for less intense stuff

-THE SHINSADONG BANGBUS APPEARS HELL YEAH

-I was kind of hoping there’d be a cameo of some lesser-known kpop site which likes Halcyon’s songs but unfortunately they’re too nugu for anyone to care, except the blogger of course.

-Shu seems based off of Chuu (at least personality-wise) and Caitlin based off of any idol who knows exactly what she’s doing. Hani was my first thought.

-My girlfriend also tends to be nice to strangers at clubs and get free drugs from them (this is not sarcastic, slowly you’ll help reveal the true nature of Caitlin personalities)

-Is people in the industry dying violently real? I don’t remember there being public gory deaths of kpop businesspeople.

-I like how it ends with Hana sort of “owning” her identity after overcoming a lot of the struggles wit the industry.

Ora’s a very important character. Gotta set a good example for all the kids out there who are far too young to read my trashy books but will anyway.

You should absolutely worry about the fate of ‘healthy’ idols for exactly the reasons you stated. Yes I would stan Youngsook in real life just to prove a point. Why do people think I’m very vocal in my support of certain other thiccer idols… it’s not all about me being a pervert…

Mysterious and unexplained/unsolved deaths of arguably very ‘deserving’ individuals in the k-pop world isn’t very common, but it has happened.

The story goes into grim areas by necessity but I don’t want people to come away from the books feeling like they’ve endured a horrible time, every story needs some light along with the shade. I get the ‘lighter side’ in there partly through adding humour but also through plot developments, there’s a story about the k-pop world that’s being told which is clearly very bleak and negative because it has to be, because that’s the point, but there’s also a story about the personal world of Hana and those around her as they fight to exist in that world and that’s a more aspirational story because they develop and grow positively in the process of experiencing and overcoming hardships. These progressions are very slow and gradual over multiple books to the point where they may even be hard to notice at times (because people develop and grow slowly in the real world too, quick character development simply wouldn’t feel realistic) but they’re important positive developments. Caitlin assisting Hana to express herself and confront and be honest about certain aspects of her identity is certainly a fun bit of writing but it’s also a very important part of the coming-of-age story, it only took about 185,000 words worth of buildup…

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That’s all for this episode of QRIMOLE! This series will return next month! In the meantime remember to use the truss rod in the midstock!

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!