[DISCUSSION] After School 2014 Korean Comeback

Well, I am very proud of the results in which After School are producing in Japan thus far. After School has desitively release music which would differ themselves from other K-pop groups in Japan. I guess I can thank Avex and Shinichi Osawa for finally helping After School make a name for themselves in Japan. However I hope for this years' Korean comeback would be as successful as their Japanese one. I really hope Pledis would produce similar music to their counterpart in Japan, I believe the Europop, House, Electronic influences would make After School stand out from the crowd in Korea. Love Beat and Dressing Room were absolutely flawless, if they could promote a song similar to those tracks this year in Korea, it would be awesome! I really hope the song has a strong Europop influence, this would bring something musicallly new to Korea, I believe. Even though I love their unique concepts—I am hoping for ballet next—I believe they should concentrate on the music more for the next few singles or hopefully an album this year as they have been lacking in attracting new fans in the music department. I wish they could have 2 comeback this year, but maybe not—as Seventeen will be debuting this year, as well as Nu'est and Hello Venus' comebacks—but, I think the success of their upcoming Korean comebacck may determine the second comeback. What do my fellow Playgirlz and Playboyz think?

@Serena.Chan, After School already made a name for themselves in Japan back in 2012 when they got so popular they had their own concert tours. I wish they were that popular in Korea:( I am very grateful for the success Avex(even though I have strong negative feelings for Avex), the Japanese promotions and Japanese Playgirlz/Playboyz have brought to After School but I don't want Korean versions of their Japanese works. There are very big difference between their Japanese and Korean works and I prefer the Japanese stuff remain only in their Japanese promotions. I like Europop/Eurodance, House and Electricpop (mostly from Cascada) and I agree that it would make After School stand out but I don't want Shinichi Osawa producing After School Korean songs. I think Brave Brothers do a way better job producing songs for Pledis artists. I would like to see After School comeback with something from the period of 2009 to 2011 but nothing melancholic. I think Pledis tried but didn't quite get there with After School's First Love comeback.

I reeeeeaaaaally don't want another Brave Brother's track for their comeback. Maybe for another track on their next mini album or full length album, but they definitely need something stronger than what he has produced for them (not that I think he's bad; just not completely suited for them). I agree that a Europop song would be good for them since that's usually what their greatest comebacks were. However, I like that they continue to try new performance ideas/concepts since they are a premiere performance group. I'm not sure how well a ballet concept would go with how they performed on PGS lol, but a hip hop concept would something awesome to try like they're performance back in the idol dance off between them and SNSD when AS danced to lil mama and Chris Brown. Perhaps even a Stomp concept with using random objects as part of their performance; this would definitely give Eyoung a chance to shine and their vocal skills would be able to be shown against the strong beats with minimal filler sound. Maybe a hip hop/stomp concept? That's really sounding good to me now ahahaha.

HelloImPatch wrote:I reeeeeaaaaally don't want another Brave Brother's track for their comeback. Maybe for another track on their next mini album or full length album, but they definitely need something stronger than what he has produced for them (not that I think he's bad; just not completely suited for them). I agree that a Europop song would be good for them since that's usually what their greatest comebacks were. However, I like that they continue to try new performance ideas/concepts since they are a premiere performance group. I'm not sure how well a ballet concept would go with how they performed on PGS lol, but a hip hop concept would something awesome to try like they're performance back in the idol dance off between them and SNSD when AS danced to lil mama and Chris Brown. Perhaps even a Stomp concept with using random objects as part of their performance; this would definitely give Eyoung a chance to shine and their vocal skills would be able to be shown against the strong beats with minimal filler sound. Maybe a hip hop/stomp concept? That's really sounding good to me now ahahaha.

I am really liking the idea of the hip hop/stomp concept. It sounds really cool and fun. That would be really interesting to watch and it would be going back to their roots a bit.

Personally, I do like the Brave Brother releases that AS has had but in terms of it being their single, I would rather they go with someone else. BB produces for so many other artists out there, that everything sounds really similar to one another. That's what happened with First Love and Sistar19's song Gone Not Around Any Longer..I loved First Love and the girls added their own spice to it, but it would be good for them to branch out and work with new and different people so they stay fresh and above what everyone else is like (they got that kinda handled, performance wise, but the sound is really important too)

In terms of concept, I wouldn't mind seeing a Bang! era type feeling song, or BOY even. The girls have expressed wanting to do a fun song and not wanting to do such a serious song though,so a Diva like-song is great too. Maybe even a real rock concept, that would be cool. Lol the possibilities are endless because we know AS can do them all like pros. I just want them to comeback more often and release catchy songs for us.

Dang dem long essays. I just want a melo song to listen to  

PlayboyzAdam wrote: After School already made a name for themselves in Japan back in 2012 when they got so popular they had their own concert tours. I wish they were that popular in Korea:(

I wouldn't suggest they are that popular based on the fact they have held concerts. It is relatively easy to hold concerts in Japan (especially since they are handles by Avex), even for small groups, as Japanese audience love going to concerts of all kinds. Koreans generally are not the concert going kind, except for really big acts. Still I am happy they have managed to keep afloat in Japan, despite never achieving the success of their first single, Bang. I think its more impressive the amount of CF deals they have gotten since debuting in Japan.

I think the next AS comeback might be around early May? Hoping for April but no doubt Orange Caramel will need some time in between promos.

Ya know when I saw this picture:

I was convinced that First Love was gonna be hip-hop or yeah maybe stomp. I know a lot of fans want them to go back to the Ah!/Diva days, while others say it's impossible without Kahi or Bekah. BUT this is AS we're talkin about - they can do anything! I say let them give it a try, especially since nowadays k-pop girl group concepts can pretty much be categorized into "sexy" or "cute". I can see AS pulling off a better Jeon Won Diary/I Got a Boy/Is It Poppin'. It could be exactly what AS needs to get back into the public's mindset.

The current line-up could still pull off the following Hip-Hop derivated genres or basic genres that were also part of Hip-Hop beginnings:

Janet-ish concept. It would totally fit their vocals, all of them, even Uee and Juyeon. It would also fit the standards of dancing. If they did Janet Old School (more New Jack Swing based, which has been already revived by SHINee because they had one of the fathers of that genre producing for them), the moves would be more drastic, popped, even some locking, and the steps would be smooth but fast.

If they did more late 1990's Janet, it would be more Pop-ish, still smooth but quick steps, more smooth moves, less popping and hardly locking. More waving. The vocals would still fit.

If they did early 2000's-nowadays Janet, it would be more contemporary R&B-ish, the dance moves closer to the late 1990's but with a funkier flavour on the sound. Vocals would still fit.

Another one could be crunk. But crunk's been mostly evolutioned to something similar to UK's slowest grime. The type of sound Chris Brown has developed as a producer (yes, we know he's a douchebag but he's still rellevant in terms of music and production). The thing is Big Bang members have already tried that out. I rather see them try to do a softer version of Old School Ciara/Lil John's crunk.

Old School revival Hip-Hop/R&B. Mostly what Kanye did back on the mid-2000's with rescueing the sampling of old records, especially old Rhytm'n'Blues records. Not all their vocals would fit thought.

Real old school hip-hop. Which isn't the 1990's but the late 1970's and the early-mid 1980's. That wouldn't be too far from what Shinichi Osawa has done for them in Japan, as the use of electronic samplers and such would be as primal as those. Simple base, old-school vocals on it. I am not keen on that for them, thought. But breakdancing and old-school hip-hop moves like real locking would be, indeed, a challenge.

New School 1990's R&B. Old school meets New School. Not completely primal, not exactly New Jack Swing... if you'd ever listened to TLC's first album, then that would be exactly that. The thing is, it may be not the sound people want to listen to nowadays.

1990's R&B would be too obvious. Japan still does that a lot.

Disco. 1970's disco, or maybe what J.LO did with Play, could still work for them both, vocally and on the dance-floor. And I don't mean the Roly Poly type. That was good, mostly the retro remix they had, but I mean more funky type of disco, Studio54 and Saturday Night Fever (BeeGees) type of disco. Though T-ara's album name called for John Travolta, the sound was more early 1980's than SNF.

I don't necessarily need them to do a Hip-Hop based concept, though. But those are ones of the genres I think they could consider if so. The thing is Brave Brothers is not always equally good with his productions, so not sure if he'd commit to making the best track for them.

HelloImPatch wrote:I reeeeeaaaaally don't want another Brave Brother's track for their comeback.

pls no more 'brAAVE sOUnd watermarks and no more tracks featuring chakun and maboos


Anyone else heard babe JungAh say she wants do do hiphop? Well I think she did but I'm not sure about it with the current lineup. My personal opinion is that they still have a lot of climbing to do before they get up the swag mountain. As for raps, I think Kaeun is as decent as it can get. I also have a thing for Raina the rapping hamster. If possible I'd like them to keep Lizzy, Nana and Uee away from rapping lines. Lizzy's squeaky-ish voice doesn't really fit in to me. She did a good job in the Japanese version on Bang!(considering she has good konglish) and in Funny Hunny, but they weren't quite hiphop and besides she cracks a lot on stage what if she's rapping and her voice runs out uh-oh. I never really saw Nana as a rapper but hey maybe it's just lack of opportunity if you think about it, maybe she can surprise us. But I'd rather not. As for Uee... babe pls why get the big lines if you're gonna lip-sync them anyway >_>

Personally I'd like them to show off some dancing skills. With no poles or props. I mean, they didn't win every single MBC Star Dance Battle for nothing... I want them to prove and rub in everyone's faces that they can still be good dancers without Kahi to walk them on her leash. That being said: R&B/HipHop(contradicting myself but yolo) is my choice.

Spoiler:

wowous wrote:pls no more 'brAAVE sOUnd watermarks and no more tracks featuring chakun and maboos

I've gotten use to the brave sound watermarks over the years and now it's quite comforting for me to hear it. I agree no more tracks featuring chakun and maboos.

wowous wrote:Anyone else heard babe JungAh say she wants do do hiphop? Well I think she did but I'm not sure about it with the current lineup.

I remember them all saying in an interview that they want to try hip hop for their next comeback but I'm not sure about Jung Ah saying it by herself.

wowous wrote:My personal opinion is that they still have a lot of climbing to do before they get up the swag mountain.

Considering that both Kahi and Bekah are gone part of me agrees with you. However there's another part of me saying not to under estimate After School.

wowous wrote:If possible I'd like them to keep Lizzy, Nana and Uee away from rapping lines. I never really saw Nana as a rapper but hey maybe it's just lack of opportunity if you think about it, maybe she can surprise us.

If we're talking about hip hop concepts then I generally agree with you. But I think Lizzy, Nana and UEE have shown they can rap in various songs e.g. Lizzy in Funny Hunny(like you've mentioned), UEE and Nana in Time's Up. Nana totally surprise me with her rap in My Lips Warm Like Coffee. She did an awesome job with her rap and by the way she moved to the beat you can tell she connected with her lines very well. I thought Nana did an awesome job with Bekah's rap in BoY and her voice was very pleasant to listen to but while Bekah sounded like a women, Nana sounded like a girl. IMO it sounded like kid Nana was trying to be grown up Bekah which always makes me laugh when I hear Nana's BoY rap. I think Nana is definitely a rapper but I don't know if Nana's voice suites hip hop raps and I guess it depends on the rap.

wowous wrote:Personally I'd like them to show off some dancing skills. With no poles or props.

Me too, also I want them to focus more on their vocal skills. There are members with weak vocals abilities that can use this opportunity to improve more.

We need some BOPS from After School!!!
They should stop this ballad/slow type of songs because they don't have the voices for that.
We need more upbeat sounds but without some weird engrish or dumb dupsteps in it.
I mean, is it really that hard to do Pledis???

i think the most important thing for their comeback is that they could perform 2 songs than just one.

it seems to be what others groups have been doing now... that could attract more ppl and could show their diversity.
i liked it when they did BOY and when i fall.
like one song is more about dancing and the other is vocal focused.
so even with uee's schedule perhaps she could handle the dance and the vocal focused song they could just sit there and sing.

and i also liked it better with first love comeback because they finally got a different outfit. before that they all wear a uniform or hats that looked too similar and is hard for new fans to tell them apart, especially those who had few lines.

i hope they could at least make similar lines distribution like first love so each member have their time to shine. and more better if they could give some chorus part to other members like lizzy and kaeun. just like in shampoo where lizzy raina kahi and jungah all sang a bit of chorus. and hopefully jupal and eyoung could get more verse...

rainbowdash wrote:i think the most important thing for their comeback is that they could perform 2 songs than just one.

I would like to see that too.

rainbowdash wrote:i hope they could at least make similar lines distribution like first love so each member have their time to shine. and more better if they could give some chorus part to other members like lizzy and kaeun. just like in shampoo where lizzy raina kahi and jungah all sang a bit of chorus. and hopefully jupal and eyoung could get more verse...

The line distribution in First Love isn't anywhere near equal Lizzy, UEE, Juyeon and E-young barely got any lines and as usual Raina has the most. Here's a line distribution analysis I did a while back which I've copied from this topic,

PlayboyzAdam wrote:"actually during the first 1 minute only 4 members got solo parts and Nana's part was about twice as long as the others. I've just did a line distribution analysis on the song and here are some interesting facts. LOL, they spend a significant amount of time singing Nana's name(about 30% of the actual song). Raina has the most sole time(34 seconds), Jung Ah has the seconds most solo time(28 seconds), Nana has about 22 seconds of solo lines, Kaeun has about 15 seconds and Lizzy, UEE, Juyeon have about 10 to 11 seconds."

EDIT: I accidentally left E-young out of what I just said but she only had about 11 seconds of lines in First Love.

I have no problems with the line distribution being like that as long as the song sounds good. After School members aren't going to shine from having more lines in a song and it's not practical/very hard to give equal lines to members. Lines should be distributed to members that can best sing them. Raina is an example that demonstrates my point. Raina holds a significant portion lines in songs (second to Kahi in my opinion and some songs Raina has more lines than Kahi) but Raina is still one of the most under rated members. I'm pretty sure that even in Orange Caramel where Raina gets more attention than in After School, Raina is still the least popular member.

Pledis has pretty much gone to shit lately. I mean, the fact that not even any of their other groups have been having any comeback lately is just beyond ridiculous. No comeback by NU'EST, Hello Venus, Kahi or Son Dam Bi while AS is busy doing other things or preparing for a possible comeback? Dont even get me started on this Seventeen that was supposed to debut almost a year ago, I gave up having any interest on that anymore.

Pledis really needs to step up their game. While I think it is great that AS really work on each comeback, Pledis needs to realize that an "amazing concept" does not always equal to "popularity." I feel like since "What's Your Name?" 4minute has been so consistent in Korea. AS NEEDS to do at least one comeback with (be as it may) a "special concept" and then a comeback that same year (a couple of months after) with a digital single a la Diva.

They need to stop putting them on this pedestal of ALWAYS needing to have a "special concept" because I feel like this is damaging their popularity and their livelihood in the music industry. I feel like everything with "First Love" was such a mess. Not only the fact that the song itself was supposed to be released in November 2012 (which would have made SO much more sense given that it was a ballad) but the fact that they waited until almost the last minute to record the music video and didnt even have Lizzy in half of it, then the performances themselves (without the pole dancing) was just completely boring to watch.

I LOVED "First Love" I think its a great song with a great dance, but it came out at the wrong time. Hell, Chocolat's song last year "Black Tinkerbell" was AMAZING in comparison, I feel like "First Love" just got lost in all of the other comebacks that happened in June last year, not to mention that the photography of "First Love" didnt match the song concept AT ALL...

Maybe they have learned from this and its the reason why we've not heard anything about a supposed comeback...

mitsuhoney wrote:Pledis has pretty much gone to shit lately. I mean, the fact that not even any of their other groups have been having any comeback lately is just beyond ridiculous. No comeback by NU'EST, Hello Venus, Kahi or Son Dam Bi while AS is busy doing other things or preparing for a possible comeback? Dont even get me started on this Seventeen that was supposed to debut almost a year ago, I gave up having any interest on that anymore.

Pledis has very limited resources(apparently After School dorms don't even have couches...or any other furniture to sit on from my memory of what I heard in ep1 of Roommate). It's easy for to fans to h8 on Pledis but they don't know what's their situation like. Actually it looks like they've got too much artists for them to be able to effectively promote.

mitsuhoney wrote:I feel like everything with "First Love" was such a mess. Not only the fact that the song itself was supposed to be released in November 2012 (which would have made SO much more sense given that it was a ballad) but the fact that they waited until almost the last minute to record the music video and didnt even have Lizzy in half of it, then the performances themselves (without the pole dancing) was just completely boring to watch.

I think what they've achieved with First Love was awesome. Shows what hard work can achieve but I guess the inspiration is only there for the people that can appreciated it. Lizzy was in the MV for less than 5 seconds because she was injured  so it can't be helped. I think the Gayo Daejun First Love performances were awesome but I do agree that the other First Love performances without the poles were boring.

mitsuhoney wrote:I LOVED "First Love" I think its a great song with a great dance, but it came out at the wrong time. Hell, Chocolat's song last year "Black Tinkerbell" was AMAZING in comparison, I feel like "First Love" just got lost in all of the other comebacks that happened in June last year, not to mention that the photography of "First Love" didnt match the song concept AT ALL...

Black Tinkerbell was boring. Obviously is a matter of opinion. I thought the choreography of First Love matched the song. What do fans like you expect from music videos, interpretive dancing?

mitsuhoney wrote:Maybe they have learned from this and its the reason why we've not heard anything about a supposed comeback...

@mitsuhoney, or maybe they're just not sure when they'll be ready for a comeback. I'm not sure what any of what you've said has anything to do with After School not announcing a comeback date.

Sorry but everything you said did not really defend your opposite opinions of me, please try harder before you pinpoint every single opinion that I have and ridicule it.

mitsuhoney wrote:

Pledis really needs to step up their game. While I think it is great that AS really work on each comeback, Pledis needs to realize that an "amazing concept" does not always equal to "popularity." I feel like since "What's Your Name?" 4minute has been so consistent in Korea. AS NEEDS to do at least one comeback with (be as it may) a "special concept" and then a comeback that same year (a couple of months after) with a digital single a la Diva.
.

i pretty much agree on this, its not like i dont follow other pledis artists but their lack of apperance make me erm almost forget them? they really need more comebacks to stay relevant.

i feel that AS has become slightly too focused on performance with Bang and First Love. I was actually glad that when they performed other version of first love in 2014 without the poles so the girls wont be too exhausted, and honestly it became a lil too repetitive to have props everytime...like they are like in between a singing group and a dancing group.

well i guess pledis found the japanese market more profitable but at the same time im amazed that there was no dress to kill mv...

mitsuhoney wrote:Sorry but everything you said did not really defend your opposite opinions of me, please try harder before you pinpoint every single opinion that I have and ridicule it.

@mitsuhoney, you've taken what I've said too personally. I'm not trying to defend my opinions of you nor have I express my opinions about you. The idea of these discussions is to shared ideas not to agree on everything everyone says. If you don't agree with the things I've said, that's fined just respond to them like what I've done with your comments but don't expect everyone to agree with you. I personally don't mind being wrong(embarrassing as it maybe) as long as I get corrected later so I actually do learn. What I'm trying to do is open your mind to other ideas and opinions, nothing I've said was directed at you...expect when I said "What do fans like you expect from music videos, interpretive dancing?". That was actually direct at you and every other fan that's been saying what does pole dancing have anything to do with first love. While you're at it please tell me what does the mime dance in Magic Girl have anything to do with the song.

i just want a comeback that can bring more spotlight to jungah,juyeon,eyoung and kaeun cause i'm already so sssick of other members especially OC.... i want these 4 members to be center of attention not the already popular member...(tired of oc)  

I would like to see a sub group comeback composed of the original 2009 member line up and maybe UEE and Orange Caramel, E-young and Kaeun do promotions as a sub unit at the same time.