Omijacha

So YG is now already starting big media play and promotions for the new "Treasure13" boy group.  Lee Hi is completely forgotten again, as usual.  About once each year, YHS mumbles something about some future comeback for Lee Hi and then never says anything again for the rest of the year.  Then the next year, it's just the same thing...mumble something and then....nothing.

She may as well not even be at YG anymore.  The company is acting like she doesn't exist.  Her 3-year hiatus between 2013 and 2016 was ridiculous.  Now her second long hiatus has passed that.  She's in her fourth year of hiatus now and still no solid news or schedule or anything regarding a comeback.  But I'm sure YG will promote the new boy group with everything.  Makes me wonder what kind of crappy contract terms she got with YG.  How is it possible that the company can do nothing to promote her for more than 6 years (one 3-year hiatus and another 3-year plus hiatus) out of a 10-year contract period and there are no consequences for the company?

So YG promised 2 comebacks for her this year...I'm totally doubting it. I just wanna hear her sing again!! 

Yeah....YG and his "promises".  He also promised her a comeback in September 2017, and then decided to instead completely ignore her so that he could waste 10 million dollars on producing a pointless 4-month TV show starring himself that totally fell into a ratings black hole.

When Lee Hi and Suhyun did "I'm Different" as the Hi-Suhyun unit, YG promised much more activity for Hi-Suhyun if the song turned out to be a hit.  The song was a BIG HIT...and YG never mentioned Hi-Suhyun ever again.

Yang Hyun Suk is about as reliable as  a drunken carnival clown who also happens to be a pathological liar who fell on his head as a baby and has been plagued with memory problems his entire life.  His current contribution to the success of any YG-affiliated group can be summed up as "I told Teddy to do something."  Other than telling Teddy to work on stuff, YG apparently spends all his time running weird side businesses that have nothing to do with music or entertainment.

When will Lee Hi's contract expire? I am getting really mad at YG for ruining Lee Hi!!!!

 

Sent from my ASUS_X00QD using OneHallyu mobile app

It's so depressing.  I've been increasingly mad at YG for years.  He's done more to sabotage her career than to help it.  When she first left Kpop Star, she was getting "love calls" from everywhere (IU, Lee Moon Sae and many others wanted to collaborate with her).  I'm sure that OST music producers were ready to jump over each other to get her to do OSTs for their dramas.  Her fanbase was huge and very active.  Then YG stuck her in a dark corner for three years.  If Tablo/Epik High hadn't stepped in after the first 3-year hiatus, she probably wouldn't even have gotten a second album. (YG wasn't doing anything at all.)  Now it's already almost 3 years (next month) since her Seoulite album came out, so she's been on her second 3-year hiatus.  Of course it may be even longer than 3 years.  YG isn't even hinting that he's going to do anything at all to promote her in the near future (or ever).

Remember how in 2017 we were all expecting her third album in the fall? Then YG decided to waste 10 million dollars and four months on a pointless TV show (starring him) instead.  Then remember how in 2018 people were wondering whether in 2018 the order of comebacks would be BlackPink then Lee Hi or Lee Hi then BlackPink?  Well, BlackPink happened (and is continuing), but Lee Hi got completely shut out again.  (YG wouldn't even let her one OST that she was able to sneak in be released for downloading and, of course, did less than nothing to promote it.)

I'm beyond mad now.  Lee Hi would have been better off going to a company controlled by her worst enemy.  Oh wait...that's exactly what she did.  I've given up on YG.  I don't expect anything from him anymore.  I don't even expect him to behave like a halfway decent human being.  I'm just hoping that Lee Hi will be able to have some kind of singing career after she leaves that idiotic company.  The only thing he cares about now is making new idol groups, which he will then mismanage, exploit and throw away after just a few years.  He gave me a creepy feeling when he was a Kpop Star judge.  But I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.  Now I know why he gave off such a creepy vibe....It's because he's a creep.

YG is doing a great job of destroying Lee Hi's fan base.  2 years of zero promotional effort, zero attention from YG and now Lee Hi's official onehallyu thread doesn't even get any comments when she finally releases a fantastic song.   

Almost a year ago, she also recorded a song for a TV show.  The song was very popular and the TV show viewers were begging to be able to download it.  But YG wouldn't give approval for it to be released.

The only attention Lee Hi gets is from outsiders (the TV show and now the Bohemian Rhapsody movie promoters).  YG has no interest in anything other than his new idol groups and side businesses.  Sad to see Lee Hi's potential being so badly wasted.  YG is totally a crap company for any group or artists, other than the new idol groups that YG manufactured.  That's why everyone else is leaving.  Psy, Katie, Epik High, Hanna Jang, Gummy, Minzy, etc.,..  and I think the rest will be gone soon (Lee Hi, CL, Dara).

I guess that's what YG wants.  It looks like YG has just decided to focus only on its own manufactured idol groups...and especially only the rap idols within those groups. 

Music vs. idol worship. I like good music (subjective I know). Some good music can be found in the Kpop area. But it seems like the whole business is being taken over by the idol factory concept. I know in the past there have always been the standard-issue idol groups. You know, a group of 3 to 9 (sometimes 12) girls or boys, who get pushed out there for about 3 to 5 years and then fade away into nothing (with a few exceptions) and are almost indistinguishable from other idol groups who came out of one of the idol group factories during the same era. But that formula was kind of one compartment of the popular music scene and there was lots of room for performers whose focus was on music. (Of course some idol groups were pretty good at music too, but too many are there just to sell photos and merchandise and be fantasy objects for teen-agers.)

Unfortunately, it seems like the idol group business model is pushing everything and everyone else out. It seems like the big companies only care about pushing out as many idol groups as possible, milking them for whatever they can while paying them as little as they can and then getting rid of them before they become big enough to negotiate for better deals. Meanwhile, the music focused performers are getting harder to find.

Just to echo one of the most popular unpopular opinions:

The bad-ass, gangstah theme in Kpop has become such an overused cliché that it makes other overused clichés jealous. It really gets ridiculous when you realize that the vast majority of the idols "stylin" as hard-core gangstahs from the hood actually spent most of their pre-idol life going to regular sububurban schools and wearing school uniforms. Many of them actually are from very well-off families. So what's the deal? Why are they all trying to look and act like they grew up in South Central and Compton and have always carried fully loaded glocks around everywhere they go?

And what's up with the dumpster diver fashion being promoted as the latest, greatest thing. Everything has to be ripped up, faded, mismatched and worn together like it was whatever someone randomly pulled out of a box of discarded clothes they found in a dumpster...and that style is worn by so many idols and presented as though it's the hottest, coolest thing since beanie propellers. And idol fans eat it up. "Hey, if [insert name of idol here] is wearing it, it must be cool...and of course the emperor isn't naked! Only bad people think that the emperor is naked. The exquisite excellence of the emperor's attire can only be seen by people of high quality."

this wasn't a look

 

OMG!  I need to schedule an appointment with a hypnotist to get that image out of my head.  (Funny thing is this was probably the manager's idea:  "Hey, do this.  The girls will eat it up!!")

A lot of of idols who get plastic surgery don't really need it and end up ruining their faces. For example bom, uee, namjoo, wendy, taeyeon, eunha etc Wendy and taeyeon are still pretty but they looked way better before the PS. 

That's one of the things that bugs me the most about the Kpop/Kdrama industry.  There is so much useless and, worse, harmful plastic surgery.  It makes me suspect that there is some kind of deal between the managers and a plastic surgery association to use/abuse idols to promote plastic surgery as being some routine and ordinary thing like getting a manicure.  (And don't get me started on the abuse and overuse of botox.)

Some people may not remember Chae Rim, but many years ago she was rapidly becoming a top star and was very, very popular for her cute, natural look.  Then one year she came back after having some ridiculous plastic surgery and her career just tanked.  You could easily imagine all of her fans all around the country slapping their foreheads and screaming "why??? why??? why???"

Dang it!  I'm starting to get all those 3-year hiatus feels again.  Silly me. 

I was so sure that YG wouldn't pull another one of those on Lee Hi fans. 

I mean, even just the one 3-year hiatus was insanity. But here we are again.  

I guess I'll just have to wait until Lee Hi leaves YG and hope that some company is smart enough to: (1) let her do regular OSTs, (2) produce one or more albums per year for her; (3) get her on TV shows regularly (not just during the 2 or 3 weeks that she's promoting an album, once every 3 years); (4) when the general public is clamoring for a song that she did (almost accidentally) in a popular drama, actually make that song available for downloading instead of pretending that it doesn't exist; (5) let her collaborate with other artists more often, etc., etc.

YG's like:  "Oh, Lee Hi?  Yeah, I know her.  Unique voice.  Beautiful voice.  Amazing talent for bringing out the full range of emotions in a song.  She could easily be an OST monster....but I don't really want that to happen, she might become super popular, and we all know that's ridiculous because she's a girl.   My plans for Lee Hi?  I guess I'll do something.  No rush.  It's only been 2 years since her last album...and she had that one album 3 years before that, so no rush.  And, most importantly, she's just a girl, so....definitely no need to make much effort for her.  We only keep the girls around because once in a while it's nice to have them do something to support the boys."

Q:  What about Lee Hi?

YHS Answer:  She has officially started recording.

"She has officially started recording"?????

What does that even mean?  YHS is the master of saying nothing while pretending to say something.

When did she "officially" start recording?  Yesterday?  Last week? 2 years ago? 

If she has only recently "officially" started recording, does that mean that everything else that she has done during the past 2 years (including the G Soul collaboration) was unofficial and therefore doesn't count for anything?

Is this why Lee Hi sings "I want to be official"?

So when YG announced 10 months ago that Lee Hi was going to have a comeback in September 2017 (9 months ago), was that based on anything at all?

For everyone else that he mentioned in the interview, there are definite things being mentioned.  For Lee Hi, he just makes meaningless, vague nonsense comments again, as usual.

Idk, but I think the song wasn't for the OST but actually to promote Hayi new song....I mean it's part of her new album promotion, but for some reason the comeback didn't happened and YG and the drama production forgot to remove the song from the BGM list.

 

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We can only speculate about things like that because YG hasn't explained anything.  But even if it was originally intended to go the way you suggest here, there is no excuse for YG to "forget" to do something basic like this.  In such case, what YG should have done (starting at least a couple of months ago, when it should already have been absolutely clear that Lee Hi wasn't going to have a comeback that coincided with the appearance on Flower Ending), is at least arrange for the release of a single, with a nice M/V to go with it or something like that.  

I guess it's good promotion for Lee Hi anyway.  But it seems like YG failed at being prepared to use the opportunity in the way that any reasonably competent management company would have done in a similar situation.  How is it that Ailee's and IU's management companies are able to constantly, regularly and effectively get the most out of such opportunities, but YG is always dropping the ball?  Of course, there is the fact that Lee Hi is just a lowly female solo and, as  such, ranks below female idol groups in priority at YG and far, far below male idols.  So I guess YG doesn't really care one way or the other.  They made a minimal effort for Lee Hi by allowing her to appear for a few seconds on a TV show.  As far as YG is concerned, that's more than enough effort this year.  That's probably all they care to do for her for another couple of years.  So what if the general public is begging for her song to be released?  Why should YG care about anything like that when she's just a female solo artist?

 

^

 

OH_HiHeels:

 

Official answer from the drama This Flower Ending about Lee Hi's song: it's not an OST of the drama and it's not yet released, they can't say anything abt it. [ ... ]

 

 

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Note: I removed the last sentence and will not post subsequent thoughts tweets by the user.

 

Personal thoughts and reminder -->

 

 

I choose to remain neutral and will not be involved in any pettiness.

 

Of course, feel free to express your opinion and/or be involved with the user's conversation.

 

It doesn't seem petty to accurately report the last sentence.  According to the last sentence, it appears that the "partner companies" that they are referring to probably include YG.  (Who else would it be?)  And the drama can't release the music because it's a decision made by the "partner companies".

Of course this raises a couple of questions: (1) Do they plan to include it in the official OST for the second season?  (2)  If not, why wouldn't YG make sure that it would be included in this season's OST?  Unless it's going to be a big part of the next season, there will never be a better time to release it than now, while the general public is looking for it and it is at peak relevance. 

I guess we'll have to wait and see.  My first impulse is always to give the benefit of the doubt to the decision makers who are directly involved and to assume that they're making rational decisions.  But since YG is probably the main decision maker for this song, it's just as likely that YG simply couldn't be bothered to take the minimal extra effort required to arrange for Lee Hi's song to be included in the OST release for the drama.

FLYHAYI @FLYHAYI

Instagram:

 

 

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Yeah, you have a point. Unless a lot of Hice Creams signal a message to YGE (i.e. announce a planned boycott) to get the company to get its act together -- which fans of Lee Hi's labelmates iKON and Winner did just that in the past --, it seems futile to throw anger and frustration at a computer screen. I was in the same position as you with the anger and frustration. With the way YGE currently operates it's best to treat any (comeback) news with cautious optimism, and check any updates now and then -- regardless how frequently they are checked. 

 

[Edit] Removed spoiler tags

True.  Unfortunately, YG has not invested much in Lee Hi and doesn't seem to be particularly committed to her career. By contrast, he invested an eeeeenormous amount of time and money just on pre-debut promotions alone for iKon and Winner, including weekly TV broadcasts of iKon and Winner reality shows like WIN and Mix & Match, tons of media play and so on.  They got more investment from YG before they debuted than Lee Hi has gotten in her entire career at YG.  I'm afraid a boycott by Lee Hi fans could end up hurting her more than it does YG. Winner and iKon fans knew that YG had invested too much in the new boy groups to just ignore the building anger among the boy group fans.

So...I think occasional rants are justified, even if they're only on the computer screen.  Who knows?  Maybe someone at YG in a position to have some influence will somehow get the message if similar rants are appearing on lots of computer screens and see how much ill will and negative feelings their substandard management policies are generating...  If not, I at least have been able to vent off some steam.  But don't worry.  I think I've vented enough for a while.  It just builds up every 2 or 3 weeks and I feel like I have to vent again after seeing another month go by of Lee Hi not getting even a small fraction of the support she deserves.  I'll probably have another "rant day" coming up about 3 weeks from now, when it becomes clear that she's been forgotten and shoved aside again and no comeback is going to happen in 2017.  I'll be happy to be wrong about that and I hope you'll be able tell me I'm too much of a pessimist.;o)

@ Epik High's "We've Done Something Wonderful" Concert:

 

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Yeah, but don't believe every word of every news the company (the music side) says and treat them with cautious optimism. As delays mount (probably for a good non-public reason), I stopped directing my anger and frustration a long time ago to because it was too taxing and stressful. I will believe the company 100% when products actually come out (i.e. MV, start of the promotions, etc.)

 

Also while the CEO YHS -- Yes, he is a ***hole, or pretends to be one -- seems to/may have some fault with the delayed comeback, I wouldn't direct all the hate towards him. This is not a one person handling the comeback.

 

 

If there are good reasons, I don't have any problem with that.  But, based on what I've observed over the past several years,often the only real reason is that YHS couldn't be bothered to give approval because his focus was somewhere else.  And everyone knows that nothing happens for a comeback until YHS gives his official approval for it. 

But perhaps my biggest complaint is the lack of respect shown for fans.  YHS/YG has a bad habit of just carelessly announcing that [   ] is going to happen or [    ] is being planned for a certain time...and then fails completely to follow through with the plan or the announced event and no explanation is ever given.  (I could easily list a dozen or so examples just off the top of my head, but I don't think I need to because everyone knows already.)

I fully understand that life can be messy and sometimes plans have to be changed (but not as often as happens at YG).  But if YHS/YG had a decent amount of respect for fans and a normal level of conscientiousness, he or a company spokesperson would always take the time to update fans on a regular basis.  He would make an effort to keep plans on track if possible..  If plans had to be changed, a courteous explanation would be given so that fans aren't just left in the dark wondering WTF is going on and they will feel respected and have a desire to basically stand by and wait for the comeback. 

When there is no follow through on an announcement and no explanations or updates are given, it's really demoralizing for fans and sucks the enthusiasm out of them.  If the company makes an initial announcement about a comeback being planned for a certain time, the fans will usually be excited and start actively looking for teasers and generally be gearing up to support the artist's comeback.  When nothing happens and no explanation is given, the fans can end up feeling like they're being taken for granted and disrespected.  When a similar pattern occurs repeatedly, many fans just give up and stop checking to see whether anything is happening, particularly if they have busy lives in the real world.  YG is basically giving the finger to fans everytime he does something like this.  When he doesn't say anything or give any updates to the fans after announcing something and then not following through, It's like he's saying:  "Yeah, I know I said [    ], but screw you, fans!  I don't have to give you any explanation and I don't care what you think.

I think the artists themselves care very deeply about their fans and would like to update them on how things are going and give real explanations when plans are changed, but as far as I can tell YG doesn't allow them to do so and they would probably get in trouble if they did--especially if the main reason for delays and cancellations is that YG can't be bothered to lift a finger for them and is spending all of his time being the star of his own reality TV show.

I know people have short memories these days.  But somehow, I'm still remembering that YG announced a Lee Hi comeback for September of this year.  That of course did not happen and...in classic YG style...YG never provided any follow-up explanation about it.  But YG did more recently say that a Lee Hi comeback would happen before the end of this year.  Well, now it looks like November is out of the question (unless YG does a crazy rush job of it without adequate pre-comeback promotion).  It also looks like November is just being wasted altogether, since YHS is obviously so busy with his own TV appearances that he doesn't have time (or any interest) to use the month for music releases by any YG artists.  

I guess there's still some hope for December.  But I'm just feeling like we're being punked again by YG.  As things are going, the YG company is beginning to look mainly like nothing more than a big reality show STARRING YANG HYUN SUK.  Everyone else is just there as supporting cast and "extras" in the YANG HYUN SUK reality show.  Everything is increasingly all about spotlighting Yang Hyun Suk as the "great producer" and as the "great businessman" and as the "great talent scout" and as the "great talent developer" and so on...  But he actually doesn't seem to spend much time doing much for the artists who are under contract with YG.

I wonder what happened to her "September comeback".  It was announced right?  I wasn't just imagining it, right? (And seeing that this thread is sub-titled "Comeback in September," I feel reassured that it was not all in my head.)

But now that YG is going full-tilt boogie with Bobby and Sechs Kies for September, it doesn't look like anything is going to happen for Lee Hi in September, unless YG is planning to give her a 2-day promotion cycle and then put her on hiatus again for another couple of years.

I imagine Lee Hi has had something like this communicated to her by YG about 10 dozen times since she's been under contract with YG:

YG:  "Oh, yeah... Hi Hayi...You still here?  Almost forgot.  Anyway, you still working on your album?  Everything going good? Great!  You know how we told you that you would have your comeback this month?  Well, let's just put that on hold for a while.  Why?  Well something came up and we're going to have to delay your comeback.  Again?  What's that you say?  Don't be silly.  This isn't the 100th time that we've lied to you and delayed your comeback.  It's only the 50th time at most --  actually, let me look at my records...uh...uh...oh... okay, yeah...according to my records we've only lied to you and delayed your comeback 59 times.  That's not even close to 100 times..  Why are we delaying it, you ask?  Well, several of the boys want to put something out this month and you know the rules.  The boys always come first.  Don't worry...sometime during the next 2 or 3 years there will be a couple of weeks when it won't be convenient for us to schedule anything for the boys and we'll give you a really great comeback then."

It does look like she's still working on the album maybe, so it's better not to rush it if she's needing a bit more time to get it the way she wants it.  But I'm worried that this may turn out to just be a repeat of early 2014 when YG was making noises like she was going to have a comeback and there were photos that looked like she was working on MVs and stuff...and then...nothing ... because YG decided to just keep her in the dungeon and ignore her in order to spend the next two years concentrating on launching the two new boy groups.

 

170724 Lee Hi Instagram:

 

W @ sogallant

 

fingerheart

 

It would be great if they come out with a fantastic collaboration.  I guess we'll have to wait and see.   I can imagine their voices blending really well...

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Sigh...

 

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I hope it will be a really cool event...and I hope people will upload photos and videos.

MAC gives Lee Hi a fansign in Korea, something her own company has not done since her debut...

Good comment.  I've been smacking my head repeatedly for the past 5 years at seeing how lazy and uninterested YG has been with regard to doing anything to show interest in Lee Hi or her fans.  Outsiders can see her talent and potential. YG seems to see her only as someone who can be used once in a blue moon to help promote Kpop Star or a boy group. YG seems to think that solo + female + non-idol = no need to invest any time, effort or money in promotions (other than very basic promotions for a few weeks once every three years or so).

I hope her connection with MAC will be really successful.  It would be great if Lee Moon Sae and some of the others who tried to get past YG's wall to collaborate with her in the past will try again.  Maybe this time she'll be able to tell YG to go stuff himself if he tries to stop it.

Ha ha!  I guess I should celebrate because my post finally resulted in a new page.  This thread has been stuck on page 616 for at least 1 whole month.

YG does so very, very little to give her any kind of publicity or promotions.  It's probably a constant struggle and fight for her to even be "allowed" by YG to take occasional offers to appear on some shows and collaborate with other artists.  It doesn't look like YG is putting in any effort for her at all.

I'm still disgusted by the YG Life (official YG website) website manager.

I just went through a list of more than 1,000 "news" items about YG people that have been posted on that site during the past one year.  Can you guess how many were about Lee Hi?  Answer:  Zero. Nada. Zip. Bupkis. 0. Nothing.

Everyone else who has debuted had multiple news items about them.  Bang Yedam, who hasn't even debuted yet had a couple of news items about him.  Some of the news items about the other artists were things like:  [   ] meets her friend.  Or Here's a picture of [   ] in the woods. Stuff like that.  If those kinds of things qualify as "news" items for YG Life, you'd think it would be really easy to include at least a couple of things for Lee Hi every month.  But for some reason, the YG Life webmaster could not find even one "news" item for Lee Hi to include in more than 1 year. 

I thought, well, they often put up "happy birthday" messages for YG artists on their birthdays, so I'll check that.  Nope.  Nothing at all for Lee Hi even on her birthday.  No news about any concert appearances.  No news about collaborating with Code Kunst.  No news about her Dok2 collaboration.  No news about her Infinite Challenge performance.  No photos of her.  No nothing at all.  Even when her album was released more than a year ago, right in the middle of her promotional period, she actually got only a small number of news items on the official YG Life site --  much less than several artists who weren't even releasing any music at that time. 

It's beyond ridiculous.  It's disgustingly stupid.  She could probably win the Nobel Peace Prize, save 100 babies from a burning orphanage and come up with a safe and 100% effective cure for cancer -- all in the same day -- and the YG Life website manager would still completely ignore her and pretend like she doesn't exist.

Hayi on King of Masked Singer

 

 

 

[Official upload]

 

Hula Girl' VS 'Samba Girl' 1round - That sea will stop me

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

*she's won the first round

She performed really well.  I wish I could have been in the audience to hear it live. 

Her voice is so distinctive.  Probably everyone in the audience knows it's her (unless they've never listened to any of her songs).

I hope she'll make it to the top.  But I haven't really watched the show much in the past, so I don't know how it works.  If everyone already knows who she is...I guess that could be a disadvantage for her.

Hello! I'm not sure if I ever came and introduced myself in this thread as I tend to just stick to updates in YG fam thread. I love Hayi's voice and music and I'm excited to see what else she does this year.

 

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I hope we'll get some good news soon.  She seems to have disappeared from YG's radar for most of this year and it's hard to find any mention of her on YG Life and places like that.  If it weren't for the low-key, unpromoted collaborations with Code Kunst and Dok2, we wouldn't have heard any new songs from her at all following the Moon Lovers OST songs last year.

I thought she was supposed to be doing a new TV show with Dara and Suhyun.  But I haven't heard anything following the initial reports about that a while back.

Ha-ahjummas and Ha-ahjussis is sooo cute  

I love it.

 

But yeah, there are always way over the top fans ruining the good occasion. Especially, since I personally never though that Jung Seung Hwan and Hayi could have the chemistry in their voices. When they shared the stage for BREATHE,  I immediately thought of Joon Jung Young and Seo Yeung Eun's duet on Sympathy....but in reverse. LOL.

 

I maintain Sympathy, JJY and Seo Yeung Eun is the best duet in KPOP in the last five years. Even more than Some. 

 

Hayi's deep voice like JJY anchored the depth of sadness in the song and JSH's open pain-like voice similar to yeung-eun's represents the color of the song.

 

DAMN it was too good!!

ITA.  I loved their collaboration.  I hope they'll do some more in the future.  I think it's the contrast in their vocal tones that makes it sound so good.

(I ended up editing my previous post into an essay (lol) because it triggered a lot of other thoughts about the "Shorties" and others.)

Yeah I thought that was quite weird as well at first. But then when I saw the TV broadcast on SBS, it kinda made sense.

 

On occasions they shot the audience, there were a lot of mothers (and fathers) taking their kids to that concert. And these ahjumma and ahjussi LOVED him even more than any Kpop Star contestants in any season ever.

 

No other contestants in concert could even come close to the popularity in that age group than Jung Seung Hwan. So, I don't know, I'm speculating here, but that could be the reason. LOL.

Both AKMU (Akdong Musicians) and Lee Hi (Hayi) were extremely popular with that same age group in their respective seasons. (And that fan support from Kpop Star was a big reason why Lee Hi's debut song sat on top of all of the major charts for almost an entire month.  It was only after YG put her on ice for 3 years that a lot of those older fans moved on and lost touch.)  A lot of people now don't realize how popular Lee Hi and AKMU were in seasons 1 and 2, respectively, because Kpop Star producers deleted all of the original performance videos from those seasons.  Some were reuploaded later on on Naver and YouTube, but the originals (on the official Daum Kpop Star site) with their millions of views and multiple thousands of likes and so on were all deleted.  They later re-uploaded a few of them on the official Naver site, but they of course now only have a few thousand views because they were put up 5 years late. lol

They even had a nickname for all the ahjummas and ahjussis who were big-time HA-yi fans:  "Ha-ahjummas" and "Ha-ahjussis".  But even if the show producers wanted to give them more stage time, YG probably wouldn't let them have much more stage time than they got anyway.  I would love to have seen Hayi sing some of her great, but unpromoted songs like "Passing By" (which she wrote) or "One-Sided Love" or "Missing You", etc., etc.  But from what I can tell YG almost always makes her perform only the well-known title songs...and since "Breathe" is her most recent one, she did that...as a collaboration with Jung Seung Hwan of course. LOL

Many of Jung Seung Hwan's ahjumma fans from Kpop Star do seem to be particularly aggressive in their support for him -- often to the point of being weirdly hostile to anyone whom they perceive as being any kind of "rival" to him.

I enjoyed watching/listening to their collaboration and loved their harmonies.  And there were a lot of good comments complimenting both of them on their performance. 

But there was also that aggressive/hostile contingent of Jung Seung Hwan fans who just had to take the opportunity to declare him as being better than Hayi and how his version of Breathe was so much better and how he showed how much he was the better singer and all that nonsense.  They didn't even take into account the fact that the arrangement for the collaboration was intentionally done to put Hayi in the position of setting up Jung Seung Hwan to make a dramatic entrance and get the maximum spotlight.  When I saw all their digs and insults against Hayi, I was like "Sheesh!  Just enjoy the performance.  Why do you have to turn it into a stupid competition and be so pointlessly offensive?"  But they were like that in Season 4 too and reamed out Katie Kim at every opportunity.

So, I guess you're right.  It kind of did make sense for the producers to turn it into a "Jung Seung Hwan & Friends" show.  He definitely was one of the biggest sensations and crowd pleasers in the most recent seasons.  Meanwhile, YG seems to have sent Katie Kim down a black hole.  The Shorties (Jjari Mong Ddang) in S3 were hugely popular. But they got downplayed into oblivion by the producers toward the end of that season and split up after the season was over.  (It was funny that they used the Shorties' arrangement of "Don't Leave Me" for the finale song and even some of the Shorties' choreography, but never made any mention of the Shorties and didn't invite any of the Shorties members to participate in the show.)

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Lol now even kpopstar is over so we wont even get her mandatory appearance on it anymore. at least she came once a year on tv because of it. Still she has been doing so much better than before. Get it Beauty, upcoming HiSuDa, festivals, etc. although I feel like Dara might have a hand on her guestings on the show. Bless her for that. Hayi also looks very happy nowadays so I can't help thinking there is something good planned for her ( I know expectations should be kept low but here's to hoping!).

 

Hayi looks hella gorgeous nowadays and I think she knows it too so I wouldn't worry much about that. Hope she isn't pressured to lose weight, she is perfect now. 

 

& Katie Kim, I'm always so conflicted about her. I like her but I don't.   I still feel she shouldn't have chosen yg. YG doesn't even mention about her debut at all. I feel like he is scared to debut her because of obvious similarities with his only female solo. Maybe that's why he is onboard with Hayi's change in style of music so that they will be able to be distinguished properly. I could be wrong but it's just a guess.

Yes, it's hard to say what's going to happen with Katie Kim.  Recently, there was a big Kpop Star concert (kind of a big event to commemorate the end of the show this year, after six seasons).  Lee Hi was there and got a small amount of stage time (maybe about 10 minutes total, including a duet with Jung Seunghwan).  AKMU, Jimin and Ayeon were there and all of the winners and most of the top 2 or top 3 of the various seasons participated. 

BUT...Katie Kim was nowhere to be seen in the big Kpop Star concert.  I'm starting to wonder if she's having some health problems or something.   Last time she was on TV she looked like she was literally just skin and bones.  I know YG is always pushing everyone -- especially the girls -- to lose weight, even when they're actually at a healthy weight.  For a sensitive girl who may already have some kind of weight complex, that kind of pressure could easily push her into unhealthy eating disorders.  Just speculation on my part and I hope she's okay.  BUT it really does not make any sense that the winner of season 4 would not be included in some way in the big, grand finale Kpop Star concert, when the winners from all other seasons are there.  It just seems like something weird is going on with Katie Kim and... of course ... YG isn't telling us anything.

Even more weird, the season 4 runner-up (Jung Seunghwan) had so much stage time that the concert was more like "Jung Seunghwan & Friends" or something like that.  Someone put up a video that consisted of only the stages that Jung Seunghwan was in and it was almost an entire hour of nothing but Jung Seunghwan solo and collaboration performances.  I like Jung Seunghwan and loved his collaboration with Lee Hi.  But the imbalance in the allocations of stage time is a bit mind-blowing.  How/why did the runner-up from season 4 get an hour of stage time, while everyone else got only around 5 or 10 minutes?  Didn't make much sense to me.  Maybe Antenna is planning to promote him very intensively this year and negotiated with Kpop Star to get this degree of prominence for him.

I was a bit disappointed that YG is still forcing Lee Hi to always do the same handful of songs (only the title songs from her album) everytime she performs in public.  It would have been great to hear her do "Passing By" or "Special" or some of the other grossly underpromoted, but great songs that she has in her discography.  I'm always unimpressed with YHS/YG's management. It's kind of frustrating because YG does some things very well and those things create a lot of potential...but then the company just fails to see the potential and lets it slip away time after time.