for you guys who don't know about wonder girls, i'm sure you have heard of their hit single 'nobody' which goes something like 'i want nobody nobody but you'. if you still not heard of them, you can check them out on wikipedia. they are considered one of the top tier girl group in south korea and is currently on hiatus.
so... besides sunmi who left the group in 2010 to pursue her studies, yeeun is the 2nd member of wonder girls to turn solo singer. vocal-wise, she is definitely one of the stronger ones in the group. as the lead vocalists, she carried some of the more difficult parts of the song. that said, she was never the most eye-catching member in wonder girls. in my opinion, she doesn't dance that well, isn't that attractive and doesn't have the charms as compared to the many kpop idols out there. her obvious strength seems to be in songwriting, but could it be that there aren't many prominent female idol-songwriter?
the music
music is a piece of art, to me, its really hard to judge a music to its technical details. if i hear it, i like it and it speaks to me... that is a good piece of music to me. there are pretty diverging views on yeeun's album. truthfully, i only like 'iron girl' among all the tracks. i'm not feeling her title track 'ain't nobody'. it was a mess and has a raw-ness to it which i didn't like.
the performance
the performance is as equally important as the music. with a good piece of music but poor delivery will not capture people's attention. yeeun is not much of a performer even during her time in wonder girls. your eyes doesn't automatically go to her when you watch a performance. since she chose to perform on a stage, i would expect her to appeal to the audience's sense of sight, and not just sense of hearing.
there are many ways to make a performance worth watching. it could either be the music being sooooooooo good, interesting costume choices, elaborate set or amazing dances, for yeeun, i think she tried to impress with her dance and stage set.
there were many comments saying her stage was a joke to watch, which i sort of agree. it was funny seeing her going all possessed and being everywhere on stage. she was literally everywhere, moving from one end of the stage to another... which was too much and too distracting from her music. i have seen other singers doing something similar, but it didn't come out as funny as what she did. she seems to be trying too hard to impress. slow it down girl.
the results
the commercial success of a kpop album is dependable upon its 1) physical sales, 2) digital sales, 3) streaming frequency. physical sales prove the amount of die-hard fan support you have. digital sales and streaming is a sign of the mass-appeal of the song.
after 4 weeks, yeeun only sold about 2,400 physical copies, which is astonishingly low for an idol whose definition is having legions of die-hard fans. only topp dogg and dal shabet have releases this year that sold less than yeeun. other idol-turned-solos like gain, sunmi, jiyeon and hyomin fared much better. the only consolation is that wonder girls' album tend to fare poorly in physical sales, so it didn't really came as a surprise to me.
compared to physical sales, wonder girls has been a powerhouse in digital sales, with many chart-dominating hits. even sunmi's 2 solos were topping charts like nobody's business. looking at yeeun's title track, ain't nobody, i can't really say that it's a total flop. 'ain't nobody' and 'iron girl' did rank within top 50 in the first day on bugs (has the 2nd largest market share). bugs and soribada were the two major charts that yeeun's songs fared better in. it wasn't the same over at melon, which has the biggest market share. it was already out of top 50 within a week of release. she was on the fringe of top 10 on melon's real-time chart for the best part of the time. other than that, she was mostly outside of top 10. digitally, i would say she did not do as well as expected.
beyond commercial success, did she manage to prove herself and satisfy herself? i would say yes. she got the attention she deserved in the media. as one of the least popular member in wonder girls, she was never able to break out from other members' shadows (e.g. sunye who had better vocals than her, sohee who had more charms than her, yubin who does sexy better than her, sunmi who defines korean beauty better than her). turning into a singer-songwriter gives people a glimpse of her talent in that aspect. though her skills are still very raw now, but at least people are aware. the only problem is, besides proving herself, she needs to prove that the music she creates can sell and relate to many people and not just herself.
overall
i have been following comments on her music and album and was quite irritated by her stans who tried to put down anyone who said her album/performance wasn't good. comments like "you only listen to junk music", "this is contemporary dance which only artistic people will understand" and "she release this album not for the money, but to show herself" etc., doesn't make me change my mind one bit.
without any former definition of what constitutes a successful album, the only thing we have are chart rankings. if people like the songs, they will download or buy the album, and that helps in the chart rankings. going by this logic, not many seem to like her songs and this is further proven by comments left on her news articles. it is funny how her stans are suddenly claiming to be highly artistic people and shaming others who do not share the same opinion as them. anything can be an art these days.
i dont think any singer will say they release music for the money. but releasing a music by losing a lot of money is a different thing. her company needs to account to its shareholders and her losing the money earned by other artistes in the company is just... not appropriate. it was a good try, but she could head some of the business-analyst advise and package her album in a more appealing manner.
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