A happy early birthday present to Girls’ Generation leader, Taeyeon from her fans.
How do you celebrate your love for your favorite idol member? Jewelry, flowers, chocolate? In Asia, it’s well known that the fan culture is a bit on the extreme side. So when you’re celebrating a popular leader’s upcoming 25th birthday – you’ve got to go out with a big bang. An image surfaced on an online community forum which featured a billboard of Taeyeon on a public bus in Seoul. The billboard was a congratulatory message (“Congratulations on Taeyeon′s 25th birthday. 20130309. We congratulated Taeyeon′s 25th spring. Happy Taeyone Day.”) for Taeyeon’s upcoming birthday (it’s on March 9th), which was bought by fans.
Today’s top cyberstalking social media posts of the day are as follows:
1. This first image is of the legendary DJ DOC (@doc0102) posing with some of the lovely ladies of Girls Generation (@girlsgeneration) who were on his radio show promoting their new single “I Got a Boy” from their fourth full length album.
I took a dream vacation last month. Not to some tropical hideaway surrounded by crystal clear waters. Not to a romantic European capital overflowing with crumbling palaces and fine wine. No, I went on a shopping vacation. To Korea.
Shopping in Myeongdong, an old part of town revitalized with everything from nouveau Korean street food (french fry-covered corndog and french fries on a stick, anyone?) to cutting edge indie boutiques to Seoul's flagship Uniqlo store. Photo from flickriver.com.
For me, Seoul is the place to go to shop. Tokyo – too expensive. Singapore – too western. Hong Kong – too inconsistent. While Seoul may not be the bargain it used to be, the quality of goods and quantity of goods make it a shopper’s dream. So when my husband told me he was going on a once-in-a-lifetime Pebble Beach weekend with the boys, I took that as my cue to plan a once-in-a-lifetime-solely-to-shop-without-the-hubby trip with my mom.
Check out our coverage of SMTOWN 2012 – video edition! Please check out our photos here!
Want to revisit memories of SMTOWN? Please check out our photo gallery!
Please check out videos from the concert/press conference here!
2012 is the year for K-Pop! At least, it seems so with three of Korea’s top girl groups all planning releases this year. The 9-member girl group that already has millions of fans around the world, Girl’s Generation, releases its 2011 hit “The Boys” with a special digital remix EP today in the US and Europe. The highly anticipated album is up for grabs today. Their December 20th release earned a Top 5 slot on the Billboard K-Pop Hot 100 Chart and features the talents of Teddy Riley, Snoop Dogg, and Lil Playy.
(c) Crystal Shei
I’m not going to beat around the bush, so let me introduce to you music technology expert, inventor and producer Mike Gao. The 26-year-old debuted his solo album Sun Shadows last month. His iPhone application Vocal Beater, which allows musicians to record beatboxing and instantly send themselves MIDI files, has been a success story in the market. The Southern Californian is redefining music, naturally breaking Asian stereotypes, and ultimately doing what he loves. Did I mention that he also loves K-pop group Girls Generation? Anyways, here is what the Chinese American has to say about his life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The girls of f(x).
K-Pop fans, where you at?? Check out MTV-K for its SM Town 2010 exclusive backstage interview with f(x). If that’ s not enough for you, go to the MTV-K Facebook page to watch an exclusive interview with SHINee from SM Town LA 2010. If you Like their Facebook page, you’ ll get to see what the boys talked about and get access to more about these K-Pop stars.
There is even a chance to win the SM Town sweepstakes at www.mtvk.com/smtownsweeps/ for an autographed copy of Girls Generation, Run Devil Run; BoA, Hurricane Venus; Super Junior, Bonamana; SHINee, Lucifer; and f(x), Nu Abo.
The young starlets of the Korean girl band, GIRLS GENERATION, or SNSD, or more precisely, 소녀시대, have been my recent motivation to lose weight, look cute, and …lose weight.
SNSD's legs got me on the ellipticals
My mantra is hanging in bold print next to my bed – “Dianne, You will achieve the SNSD Body!” Has it been working? No, but that’s another story for another time.
While on my old stationary bike one day, I was typing away on my laptop (who said anything about actually cycling on a bike?) -and I learned that these girls would get to strut their stuff –in LA!
I had to go!
On Saturday, September 5th at the Staples Center, the SMTOWN LIVE ’10 World Tour Concert was a major success with k-pop lovers, Korean American and moreover Asian American teens and families! The SMTOWN LIVE ‘10 Concert is presented by one of South Korea’s most prominent artist’s management agencies, SM Entertainment. The LA concert is a part of SM Entertainment’s world tour project which will begin in Seoul, then continue to LA, Tokyo, Shanghai, and other major Asian cities.
SM has been attempting to bring Asia’s best performers to the global stage, and moreover the United States for many years now. The concert has already been imprinted as Asia’s leading concert brand thanks to their successful tour in 2008. Singers like multilingual star, BoA, have grown to become a legendary icon all over Southeast and East Asia due to her popularity at SMLIVE. Her single, “I Did it For Love” even aired on American radio, but unfortunately died after a couple of months. In fact, many artists represented by SM are multilingual, if not bilingual. The company has been and is working towards creating “global” artists who can represent Asia as a whole. SM Entertainment has been highly successful in creating popular girl and boy bands during the last twenty years and continues to hold great power over the Korean and Asian music industries.
The four hour-long concert was a fun event for the whole family to enjoy. I attended the event with my sister and cousin and had the time of my life. The line-up included all of SM’s greatest including my favorites: SHINee (a young teeny-bopper boy band), SuperJunior (the sexy boy band), Lee Yeon Hee (actress turned singer), my new favorite- TRAX (a Korean rock-and-roll hottie), f(X) (SM’s newest debuting girl artist- shout out to my girl Luna!), the romantic KangTa (lovely rhythm and blues/ ballad singer), Zhang Li Yin (another lovely KangTa-look-alike-ballad singer), of course SNSD (the barbies of Korea) and many other SM artists.
The concert definitely drew out diehard K-pop fans in America and proved to be worth the ticket price. The lighting was spectacular and the performances were full of energy and what looked like countless hours of practice. The show also was a treat for fans as the artists attempted to speak to them! The celebrities had all practiced a few English phrases, I’m assuming by the same la ghetto coach, because they repeated, “WHATSSS UPPPP LAAAAA!” only about….100 times. And sprinkled some “Yo’s” and a few “Yep’s” here and there.
I was also pleasantly surprised by the number of non-Korean fans. Many of these fans were Vietnamese and Chinese Americans. The crowd ranged from all different ethnicities, and in a way, it was refreshing to see that the white girl next to me wanted to be desperately Korean.
Cool.
Many of the performances were led by the two most popular pop groups, SuperJunior and SNSD. The diverse crowds waved light sticks, signs, and screamed whenever they pranced on stage. But perhaps the most anticipated performer of the night was BoA. BoA, who told the audience that this year marks her already 10 year anniversary with SM Entertainment, showcased a very mature yet outrageously Lady Gaga-esque performance.
SMLIVE was personally, such a great journey down memory lane for me as I got to see all of the musicians I loved and listened to during my 14 months of studying abroad in Korea in person. Every song reminded me of a memory I created and shared in Seoul and it was marvelous to see others rock out to those tunes as well. Overall, the event was a relaxing and upbeat show for the whole family but unfortunately not enough to showcase Asia’s greatest in hopes to be picked up by mainstream American music producers and the glitz of Hollywood. But luckily, they will always have the support of Asian Americans, Asian expats, and k-pop lovers around the world as well as boundless opportunities to sink their teeths into American pop culture as we enter in this globalized era. And while we wait for those golden opportunities, I will be practicing those SNSD dance moves.
And this time, it won’t even be entirely to lose weight.
