I can’t quite remember the quote from Haruki Murakami’s South of the Border, West of the Sun, but I remember at the climax the character mused, “I was so sure that the place was so magical. But it was only Mexico.”
And that was me with East Asian pop. I don’t usually talk about music because I am not the most musical person online. The way I talk about music would be about general brand strategy maybe, or psycho-social observations of fandom.
Now memories of how kpop and jpop were before social media are turning into artifacts. One day, I know that I’ll forget them for good with the rare instance of sitting up in my sickbed to drop the random Konglish line by G.O.D.
So these are the songs in the languages I could not quite master. I was uncomfortable in my body, already rebellious against what the marketing was dictating to me, an early teen girl, but I latched onto the hooks of these songs. They got me racing upstairs after school to turn on the TV. They were what kept me company as I cranked out school papers. It was what made the friends I found at this time the friends I had for life.
Listen, enjoy, laugh even. The world got bigger when we turned up the music to this one.
Playlist:
1. Honey by L’arc~en~Ciel
2. we are the future by H.O.T.
3. Perfect Man by Shinhwa
4. Automatic by Utada Hikaru
5. the place you belong by g.o.d.
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