Wanna Get To Know Me

Humble thanks from us here at The Future is Idol to the massive amount of readers out there, from all over the world, that joined us during the last couple of days. Hopefully you will find your way back to us again soon and wait with anticipation for new, bolder and better posts.

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Hugs, kisses, K-pop and queer.

The Future is Idol – L

BOOM BOOM BOOM like it like it – a 4MINUTE fanbash in Stockholm

Stockholm, Sunday 25th of May 2014, election day for the European parliament amongst other.

Steaming summer outside and steaming anticipation inside the concert venue (and an increasingly hot humidity due to broken A/C). We, a group of ten friends that met up at my place a couple of hours earlier to have some drinks, listen to music and watch MVs to get in the right mode (4MINUTE-mode), were finally there.

It was a rather surreal feeling riding the Stockholm Metro, to get off and walk down the sloping street towards the concert venue in a city so familiar, towards something not so familiar in Stockholm at all. To stand in line for K-pop in Seoul or Paris I have done. But this is Stockholm, not such a usual thing…

We were kind of late but so was the show as well. The line moved quickly and suddenly we were inside. I have been to this place many times before, for clubs and concerts. To be here now with the agenda to see one of my favourite K-pop acts felt kinda strange. As me and my friends made way through the packed, hot concert hall to find the best spot in front of the stage I could still not actually understand what we were about to experience. Not until the lights were turned off and the music, a remix version of Whats Your Name, blasted through us all I started realizing that 4MINUTE was actually about to perform in Stockholm that evening. This is the remix versions they performed:

I didn’t want to have any expectations at all for this event. Also, I have not been that in to K-pop at all lately. My interest have been fading as I have gotten other things to think about and the K-pop scene of lately has felt a little bit… blank. The outlook of getting really disappointed by this historical event hung over me as a dark cloud many weeks in advance.

There was absolutely no reason for worry though.

They gave it all.

After a similar showcase in Barelona a couple of nights earlier, the five members of 4MINUTE entered the stage looking super-relaxed and like they really enjoyed it.  It was an instant atmosphere of party that lasted through out the evening. There is of course a reason for this being one of my favourite groups. They are super cool and could pass for hard as stone. Cute is not what primarily sells them and sometimes they almost have an angry feel to their music. But with no language in common with the audience, the group made their best efforts communicating anyways and they felt really warm. Som lines and words in English, an interpreter on stage during the breaks and a few words in Swedish (Sohyun made the crowd go crazy as she shouted TJENA! (hi!) over and over again). It felt like these five women were quite moved with the responses they got from Stockholm. The constant sing alongs, roars and atmosphere that came from of a crowd consisting of women and men in different ages from not only Sweden but actually from all over Europe could not be mistaken for anything else but love. As the members asked if there were people from other countries than Sweden present they got Norway, Finland, Denmark, Poland and Germany and more as reply. It then felt like they might have been able to fill one or two shows more in Europe somewhere, not just Barcelona and Stockholm.

As earlier said, all five of the members put on an excellent show but actually Hyuna stood out a bit with her super-energy and focus, together with Sohyun who was extremly happy and shouted words in English and Swedish over and over again as she constantly interacted with the audience. Performing hits like Muzik, Mirror Mirror, Change, Huh and Hot Issue it sometimes felt like the floor would collapse due to the jumping crowd. Next to me during the concert stood a guy in my age (3o-ish) and looked absolutley mesmerized most of the time. Like it was the best day of his life. And I was there with him. Not strange at all those feelings and reactions, but quite logic. The group handed out water bottles, flirted, threw glow in the dark braclets far out in the audience and answered questions. The temperature was constantly rising (didn’t care at all about this though and I don’t think anyone else did either) at the venue and after repeatingly explaining how hot it was the members eventually started pouring water on each other and on the crowd. It felt like there were no boundaries for what would be allowed, and that is quite a refreshing feeling comming from a South Korean girl group, as you always expect everything around to be very restrained.

4MINUTE performed most of their hits and single releases. Here’s the set-list from the showcase (updated version AND please comment if more corrections should be done)

Whats Your Name (DJ remix ver.)

Watcha Doin Today

Muzik

Mirror Mirror

Wanna Get To Know Me

Change

24/7

Huh

Pretend

I’m OK

Come In

I’ll Teach You

Wait a Minute

Is It Poppin’ (remix)

I Love It + DJ remix

Heart To Heart

Hot Issue

What’s Your Name

As you see, there was no Volume Up nor any I My Me Mine in the set-list and that was of course a bit disappointing, but on the other hand I wanted them to go on for another hour… Although they sang a piece of it acapella during their chat with the audience.

I was anticipating the worst for this evening, just in case. But ended up happier then I thought possible. Clearly, this group is no joke. Talented, charismatic, sweet and extremely cool.

So was it all perfect? Well nothing is and there could have been better light on stage, the stage could have been bigger and sometimes the group and stage gave a messy feeling and the coreography did not present itslef perfectly during parts of the concert. But added up these are just small things in comparison.

And yes of course I bought a lightstick. Expensive but what the hell, fuckin 4MINUTE doesn’t come to Sweden every day. People might have stared at the sweaty me during the Metro-ride home and I wanted to tell them all about the brilliant evening I just had. No one asked though, so I sat there. Silent but happy.

Such awesome, and as I have written before, epic on the scale like seeing Patti Smith or Morrissey for the first time.

 

The Future is Idol – L

 

Huge thanks to Julyssa at Kpop Nonstop for the arranged concert and sending me the set-list.

4MINUTE in Stockholm

I guess they are already here by now. On of the coolest K-pop groups, here in my city. 4MINUTE In Stockholm.

They were never my favourite group, but from the beginning of my K-pop fandom, I kind of trusted them to deliver something good, briliant and hilarious with every relase. Quality-cool K-pop-not ever to be ashamed of. The latest release was absolutely briliant, toilet-queer-sassy-Mv and all:

And their 2013 release, ‘이름이 뭐예요? is one of my most played K-pop tracks ever.

The 4MINUTE showcase will take place tomorrow Sunday 25 of May at Debaser Medis concert venue at Medborgarplatsen, Södermalm Stockholm. and is arranged by Kpop Nonstop.

This is seriously one of the coolest things happening in years to tell you the truth. And yes I compare this with epic concert moments like seeing Patti Smith and Morrissey for the first time. Who would have guessed back in 2009 that this would happen?

Me and my friends will meet up at my place(after voting in the European Parliament elections to make the world better and shutting racists out of the parliament),listen to music , watch MVs and have a drink to get in the right mode early Sunday afternoon. And I made a YouTube playlist with 4MINUTE as a preparation for TOMORROW.

So happy, so cool.

The Future is Idol – Lars

 

Happy Birthday to a friend on the other side of the world

It’s the birthday of one of my best friends. She was one of the first to introduce me to K-pop and for that I’m forever grateful. One day, now quite a few years ago, she posted a recently released MV on my Facebook wall, and I fell madly and deeply in love with it, the group in it and a lot of other things within the K-pop scene/world. This is the epic MV:

Since then we have experienced so much together, connected both to K-pop and to life in general. She is one of the smartest and coolest people I know. She is at the moment a resident in Seoul so I can’t be with her for this day of celebration. Elin, here’s another epic oldie for you:

Happy birthday and I love you! This changed everything.

The Future is Idol – Lars

Our articles about K-pop

Got the May issue of Yoboseyo, the magazine of the (South)Korean society in Sweden, in my mail box the other day!

We had an article about the modern K-drama, it’s structure, different genres and influence on society published in that issue. Dancing On Our Own published one at the same time, about K-pop as a music genre. It was kind of strange to see our own words printed like that, our thoughts and knowledge somewhere else then at the blog, but a lot of fun!

The articles are in Swedish and not available online at the moment but we might upload another version, and in english, of ours at some point soon.

 

 

/The Future is Idol

Stockholm

My co-writer Mis of this blog sent me the picture of Key dressed in a t-shirt that says Cheap Monday Stockholm

Soon Mis will be over here at my apartment and we will get together for the first time in over a month. I’m making kimchi fried rice and serving Taittinger.

So happy!

*proud citizen of Stockholm*

/The Future is Idol

Poster dream

It was sent from LA to Washington DC, which kind of took for ever. Then reposted by my cousin there since I couldn’t find any company that would deliver this poster outside of the US, but then sent back to her because it was to big. She reposted it again with a heigher fee, and I have now been waiting for more then two months for this poster to arrive here in Stockholm. Finally it came.

This is the poster from the 4th album by Lee Hyori and it has been one of my favourite pics since it was released. Iv’e been wanting it for a very long time now. I have some problems with my fandom when it comes to stuff like posters. There is no way in hell that I ever will put up an ordinary idol group poster, even if I love the group. Maybe it’s my age, maybe me being a male fan or me just not being a fan of the poster idea. But from time to time you can find posters that look more like a fashion editorial and suddenly it is possible to put your idols on the wall. This is that kind of poster. I just have to frame it first.

Big thanks to my cousin Karin for helping me out in America.

/The Future is Idol

 

(of some reason they also sent me an Alex of Classiquai poster, maybe I will give it to one of the readers)

Tonight we ruled the dancefloor

This evening of Saturday the  3rd of December, we ruled the dancefloor at a party in a suburb of Stockholm with this song:

We also ruled the dancefloor with “My First Kiss” by Kesha. All credits to Key for that one.

/The Future is Idol – the best of evenings.

Seoul-Stockholm – film festival and more this week.

This week is THE week for everyone interested in South Korea and residing in Stockholm region. It starts on Thursday 8th of September at 18.00 hours with the opening of exhibition SEOUL SHOTS at gallery and shop THOMAS OCH KNIVEN in central Stockholm.

SEOUL SHOTS is a project made out of ten lives, ten cameras and ten days. Location,  Seoul. The aim with this project is to grasp the pulse of the asian metropolis of Seoul. Created by Johannes Palmroos, founder of the Korean film festival in Stockholm.

On Saturday 10th this week, the Korean film festival Seoul-Stockholm kicks of at Cinema Theatre Zita at Birger Jarlsgatan.

Five presumably great Korean movies, released within this year. Starting with Second Half at 15.30 Saturday 10th.

for complete program, press here.

/The Future is Idol