So, here was the original plan…

We had busted our butts to get Music Monday finished an entire day early. It involved a total lack of sleep and a copious amount of coffee, but we were doing it so that we could have a glorious WANK with our friends in Ansan (you might remember them from our Wonder Girls “Be My Baby” review. Since traveling to Ansan would take up a little bit of our time and we’d have to bring Spudgy, we thought we’d need an extra day to get home, edit, and have the WANK up for Wednesday. After finishing Music Monday a day early, we arrived in Ansan and decided to go out for dinner in celebration! YAAAAAAAYYYYY!!!

So, after some yummy Dak Galbi and bottles of soju, we went over to D-Day (in downtown Ansan), which is one of the coolest…bars? Clubs? I don’t know what it would be considered, but it’s a really cool place. Basically, you sit down with your friends at your own personal table in this huge area. You eat and drink and talk, kind of like a restaurant, just one that is very poorly lit. Anyhow, what makes this place special is that every 45 minutes or so, the music changes to danceable music, and it becomes a super amazing dance party time, and everyone gets up and dances in the aisles! There is no designated dance floor! We had an awesome time hopping around like awkward foreigners (seriously, we were like the only 4 foreigners there in a room that had close to 200 people) and making new Korean friends. When we requested T-ara’s “Roly Poly” Simon and I were cheered on with our T-ara dance skills. Ah yes dancing, the international language.

What is really interesting about Korean clubs, is that sometimes everyone will dance freestyle, but then once in a while a WHOLE TON of people get up and do an organized line dance…which totally blew our minds since we had no idea what was going on.

Martina Busted her Ankle

So how did Martina end up on crutches? Although she would love to say it was from doing something heroic or extreme, Martina was simply jumping around while dancing to a super peppy song and she landed on someone’s foot as they were squeezing behind her, and her ankle just rolled out and she hit the ground hard. However, she got right back up and got back to dancing. Probably because of the adrenaline (*cough* partially because of the soju) she didn’t feel how badly she had damaged her foot. Next morning, though, was a different story. With no more music, no more fun, no more distractions, cold, hard pain kicked in, and she knew she had done something nasty to her foot. Ooooh ankle, you so nasty!

We brought her to the hospital in Ansan to get it checked. She was extremely happy she had packed her matching purple Taeyang socks because normally Martina just wears any two socks she finds. The X-rays don’t show a clear fracture, but they said they couldn’t be sure without an MRI. So they put this splint/half cast on Martina and told her to keep it elevated and rested. Since we don’t have health insurance here in Korea, the whole process of us going in, getting X-rays, doctor check ups, and a splint, all cost 340,000 won. Not too bad, I think. Also, having a brief Korean conversation with the super awesome nurse that was helping her, Martina was delighted to be called 누나 noona for the first time. She was like, seriously excited and began singing SHINee…NOOOOONA YOU’RE MMMVVVVVVPPPP!!! She is far too chipper for an injured person…love you snuggle berry!

Bad news is we can’t really go out adventuring for our WANKs now, because Martina is barely mobile. The best we can do is to have mini-WANKs, in which we go to a restaurant in the area and show you some of the food. We’re going to call it the Food Adventure Program aka F.A.P. We initially thought of calling it the Fun and Productive Food Adventure Program For Awesome People, but that would be too long of a name. So we’re keeping it shorter. Also, Martina might be sitting down for Kpop Music Mondays, which sucks, because she should be jumping around, as it looks like Big Bang’s “Blue” is going to win. Ah well! At least it’s not an icy snowy crutch-deathtrap outside, and in a couple weeks Martina will have buff upper arms! YES!

For the original post on WANK – Korean Hospitals!, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

YESSSSSS!!!!!!! FINALLY!!!! Exo-K! We’ve wanted to talk about this song since it came out. It’s so bloody amazing, and if you haven’t heard it yet, listen to it in the video below. Then listen to it again and again, on loop, cuz it’s that awesome

Uhhh! That was such an awesome song, even if there’s a lot of weird stuff happening with SM, EXO, and this song. First off, this isn’t considered EXO’s debut single, even if it’s the song they’ve debuted with. It’s just a song, a taste of what their music is like, supposedly, and thus should be considered a “Prologue” or whatever. It’s also not all of EXO, but just two members. Also, this is just the Korean version of the song, while there’s a version in Mandarin as well, hence the names Exo-K for this song, and Exo-M for the other song. Also, after this song was released, many more teasers have been released for the band, for some odd reason, even though we’ve already got a “Prologue” of what their music is like. We’d understand if each of the teasers were supposed to introduce different members of the band (which, in our opinion, has eight members too many), but supposedly most of the teasers are of just Kai.

I don’t know. I want to say that I just don’t care about how ridiculous this whole situation is, and laugh off how bad the marketing for this has been, but – well – this song is so damned good that we have no choice but to pay attention to it. And hopefully we can just pay attention to that: good music by good singers mismanaged by their company. And I hope SM diehards aren’t going to get too upset about this. I’m sure some people can agree with what we’re saying here. We like EXO. Their first song: awesome. Just don’t like the marketing strategy for them, which just gets us more annoyed at the marketing team than at EXO themselves.

So, now that that’s off our chest: umm. Who likes…stuff? Stuff’s cool. This video was cool in some respects, not cool in others. Love that they’re not in silly rooms for most of the video. The whole Indiana Jones-esque feel to the video was really cool, and makes it look really fun, almost like they were out WANKing with each other. Ha!

Anyhow, that’s it for this week. We usually link to albums for you to buy if you like the song, but EXO still hasn’t released an album, so best we can do is just link to the song on iTunes. Otherwise, check out this week’s bloopers, in which Spudgy demands bananas. What a spoiled dog!

Oh! And for those of you who might, for some reason, want our cheesy remake of the Exo-K “What is Love” loop, here it is! We didn’t embellish it at all. Just got the basic DUM DUDU DUM DUM part down

For the original post on EXO What is Love: Kpop Music Mondays, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

1) The Koxx “12:00″

Let’s start by saying that we totally want to hang out with these guys. We found out about them via an MTV article about them, and we fell in love with their stuff instantly. Bought their album on iTunes, watched a bunch of their videos, and knew that we’d have to talk about them for K Crunch. This song, 12:00, is a lot different than another one of our favourite songs by them, Troublemaker, but both songs are rock your socks awesome. Side note: we sometimes go dancing at the club they’re playing at in the Troublemaker video: Club FF.

2) Casker “New World”

Ok, this is a new song, while the Koxx is a bit older. Wow! Totally love this group as well. We really like cute sounding songs, and this is right up our alley. Gosh! The singer’s voice is so sweet! Anyhow, Casker’s been around for a while, and this song isn’t one that’s off their own album, but it for a soundtrack put together by Pastel Music (which the Koxx will also feature in). Read more about it over at Korean Indie

3) Loro’s “Let’s Dance”

We find it cool when we have some kind of connection to a band that we listen to. We actually saw the Cello player in an event a while ago. She wasn’t playing the Cello back then. She was jamming away at a keyboard, but she was still awesome. Anyhow, that was a random story. More importantly, even though this song is really long (comparable to the three other songs on this list COMBINED) we’re totally digging the atmospheric, epic rock sound of this song. It’s very different from the other two songs we mentioned thus far on the list, and hopefully you’ll like it as much as we do. If you are, read more about them over at Korean Indie (by the way, yes, we like linking to Korean Indie. They’re good people and are doing a great job of covering the Indie scene here.

4) Monodiary “Memories of a Song”

Last on our list comes courtesy of a video request and – allow us to say this again – thank you Ginny (I hope that’s how you spell your name) for introducing us to this band. We didn’t actually know of Monodiary before. Ah! Feels like we should be ashamed. But isn’t that always the case with Indie artists? We find that whenever we have conversations with people about Indie bands, we’ll list off like, 7, before we finally hit on one that we both know. So maybe we shouldn’t feel so bad about not knowing Monodiary? Anyhow, this is another cute song, akin to Casker’s “New World,” so check it out if you’re in a happy, skippy, cutey state of mind

For the original post on K Crunch Indie: Koxx, Casker, Loro’s, and Monodiary, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

Welcome back to the Kpop Charts update, where we keep you up to date with the newest Kpop Videos, and where we also give you the chance to vote for them for Music Mondays. This week’s list is predominantly…girly. If you like a video on the list, click on the link above the video to go to its voting page

1) Ailee – “Heaven”

Ok, so this is the first we’ve ever heard of this girl, and we felt kinda ashamed and out of the loop. When this video came out, we got a flood of people on our Facebook wall asking for us to review it, and we were all like “really? Who is this person?” Supposedly she has a big internet following. So we added her video to the charts, and boy, a lot of votes came in for her. And, hell, also a lot of views! That video’s creeping up on a million views already! Whoa! And rightfully so: this girl is a great singer. Consider us fans of her music. Not fan of the video, sure, but the music is spot on!

2) EXID – “Whoz That Girl”

Now, this is a video that we haven’t really seen the nicest comments for on YouTube, and, well, we kinda agree with the verdict, but for different reasons. People don’t seem to be impressed with EXID’s sound and image. Rather than commenting on that, we’re just upset with the video. Maybe something in the lyrics suggests that this guy deserves this kind of treatment, but, hell, unless he eats babies, I can’t imagine what he did that was so wrong that would merit the girls making him lose any trace of sanity, and then potentially murder people with his car. What the snap? What a silly message!

3) Spica – “Russian Roulette”

Russian Roulette is supposed to be dangerous, right? I didn’t really feel any danger while watching the video, though. Did anyone else find it highly predictable? After the first girl pulled the trigger and nothing happened, we knew that every other time someone held a gun up to their head that they wouldn’t die, unless it was close to the end of the video. Ah! I think we’re just a bit too English Lit nerdy: we don’t like easily predicting videos. We felt that same way with T-ara’s Cry Cry, and it bothers us just as much here.

4) Chocolat – One More Day

Chocolat is a group that we’re a bit torn about. Their songs are ok, and we don’t really fault them for their music, but their marketing is so bizarre. We heard for ever and ever about their bi-racialness. Cool, we thought, but then they sing in Korea. How does that really make them any different from a Korean group? I don’t know. It doesn’t really seem relevant at all, and just seems like an attempt to get people’s attention. Bah! And now the dance to this video: uhhh. We’re ok with sexy dancing sometimes, so long as it’s not too awkward, and this dance was kinda sexy as well…but some of the members are 14, aren’t they? That’s gross, guise. Really. I’d rather not see children sexualized. Maybe other people are ok with it, or don’t view this as too sexy, but we feel a bit uncomfortable with this video.

For the original post on Kpopcharts Update: Ailee, Spica, EXID, Chocolat, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

Welcome back to our non-alcoholic K-Crunch Cocktail playlist for the week of February 16th 2012. Although beware, you might get drunk off of the sexy haiiiiii fumes coming from TVXQ’s Mirotic!!! *ahem* That was a bad joke. I am aware of this. I, Martina, promise never to make such bad jokes again…or do I? Anyways, today’s Cocktail mix is very sentimental, casting us back to our first few months living in Korea. I had just discovered Korean dramas with Boys Over Flowers with GOOOOOOO JUN PYOOOOOOOOOO, and I was still in that awkward new-to-Korean-boys phase where I mistook Jaejoong (TVXQ) and Jihoo (BOF) for women. Good times. I’m way over that now, I swear! Enjoy this happy and fizzy cocktail!

1. Mirotic TVXQ

Ah yes, Mirotic. Our theory, it’s a combination of “miro” which means maze in Korean, and “erotic” because…they’re all tied up and held captive in a maze. Yup, that sounds about right. I actually spent a good deal of time explaining to my students that “I’ve got you under my skin” was not profanity. Why? Because Mirotic was deemed inappropriate and banned because of that line. What do you think? Does that line hold some kind of hidden sexual agenda that we’re unaware of? Whatever, it’s one of the most awesome songs EVAAAARR!!!!!!!! And what about that chin rap dance? COME ON!

2. Bike – Peppertones

One of our Korean friends introduced us to this group, and we were surprised that this kind of music wasn’t being played on the radio in Korea. It’s really only kpop or trot music, unless there is some magical radio station we are unaware of which is possible since we don’t really listen to the radio outside of our taxi rides. Which might I add, are really funny because we know every single kpop song that comes on the radio so we end up singing, dancing, or Music Monday joking the whole way to our destination, much to the dismay of the confused taxi driver. It also feels perfect for Katamari Damacy. I feel like rolling something up right now! Wait…that didn’t sound right. DRUGS ARE BAD! Anyways, this is such an uppity song, and the Peppertones have a few albums out which are all pretty good. Enjoy the Peppertones!

3. Step by Step – Battle

The very first kpop song we ever heard, and supposedly (Martina changes into an old woman story telling voice)… Seungri from Big Bang was almost put in this group…Yup. Rumour has it that Battle was a group formed from a kind of kpop band battle show (maybe with Shinhwa, the legendary Korean boy group), and these guys were the winners, but I’m not totally sure, so don’t fire murder me. Anyways, great song, loved the dance for this video and I’m crushed that they’ve fallen off the planet. Also, when I first saw UKISS with “Manmanhani” I thought the blonde guy in Battle and Kevin were the same person.

4. Paradise – T-Max (BOF OST)

Any Boys Over Flowers fans out there? If yes, then you already got the cold sweats and shivers from the title of this song. Getting flashbacks are you? Of EVERY SINGLE MOMENT IN THE DRAMA THAT INVOLVED ENTERING A ROOM?? Since SImon and I are really huge fans of all types of music, the music being used in a movie or drama really affects us and this song did nothing but pull me out of the moment NON STOP. It was very appropriate for the first few scenes of BOF when Jandi was in shock from the sheer amount of wealth floating around her, but during the final scene of the whole drama? Really? I actually burst out loud laughing. If you haven’t heard this song before, let me know if it you get the cold sweats or if it’s only in relation to BOF watchers.

For the original post on K Crunch Cocktail: Mirotic Paradise Step Bikes, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

Happy Belated Valentine’s Day, everyone! Yesterday we went out for a romantic couple’s WANK in Korea and did some couple-ey things. One we’ve done many times before, and another we’ve never tried before in our lives. Cool!

The first thing we did was completely new to us: a cake decoration cafe. Basically, you go to this bakery, pick out a cake type (like chocolate, strawberry, sweet potato, cheesecake, etc), and then you decorate it! They’ll make the cake for you and leave it as a blank canvas for you to paint your masterpiece on. When it comes to decorating the cake, you have to pick out your own toppings at the self-serve toppings bar. Every item has a price tag associated with it, and prices range anywhere from 300 won to 2,500 won. Once you’re done decorating, bring your cake up to the cash, they’ll tally all that you’ve used, and calculate the final price. Our cake: 20,000 won, which is less than 20 bucks. Not bad!

As for how the cake tastes…we actually don’t know! When we were walking back home at night, after finishing our day long WANK, we stopped by Cafe Lua and gave them the cake. She was working a long night, so we figured we’d offer her the cake instead, because sharing is caring. It was only when we started walking home afterwards that we realized, hey, it might seem very arrogant of us to give someone a cake with pictures of us on it. Oops!

Anyhow, the second part of our romantic WANK was at a Korean Sticker Booth. Woot! Now, we’ve been to Korean Sticker Booths before, looong time ago, and we do go to them occasionally, but we haven’t actually been to one in a while. Well today’s the perfect day for it!

As you saw in the challenge, we had to make Valentine’s Day cards, and then we had to pit our best one against each other. Here’s the full gallery of the cards, in case you were wondering what the others looked like (or, if you wanted to use them as Valentine’s Day cards for your friends, of course!)

Moving on, many of you might not know what McCol’s soda tastes like, and so you probably don’t understand how horrendous a punishment it is for us to have to drink it. Please note, though, that it’s not meant to be a punishment drink. Some people enjoy McCol’s soda and think it’s delicious. We, however, are not those people. McCol’s tastes very, very, very bad to us. Nasty bad. In fact, we even use it as a prank when we have new people come over to our place, like “hey! Want to try a McCol’s? It’s delicious!” and then we watch their reactions. Priceless. Now you get to watch our reactions when we drink this. Yuck!

And lastly, you know these WANKs wouldn’t be complete without some bloopers! There’s so much that we have to cut out of these videos to keep them of decent length. We cut out our entire food eating sequence! It wasn’t anything special, though: we just went for Korean street food: dokbokki and twiggum. Anyhow, check it out here!

For the original post on WANK – Valentine’s Day Fun!, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

This week we review F.T. Island’s “Severely” for Kpop Music Mondays. Haven’t seen it yet? Check out the video below to know what we’re talking about:

F.T. Island fans, aka “Primadonnas”, you finally did it. We totally didn’t expect F.T. Island to win this week. Last week on the KpopCharts you and Block B fans battled it out, and – really – Block B just squeaked out a win. Oooh so close. But then we were worried about what we will call the “Teen Top” effect, in which older videos with lots of votes get beaten out by newer videos and a flash of votes. But, nope. F.T. Island persevered. Yay!

And we’re happy that F.T. Island won. This is a really great song, very different from what we usually review. It’s not overproduced, maximalistic Kpop. It’s a few guys playing instruments and singing, and making great music in the process. We really liked “Hello Hello” when we reviewed it, and we really like this song as well

A bit of clarification, though, on what we originally thought of this video. When we first saw it, we thought to ourselves, holy crap, this is a huge rip off of JYJ’s “In Heaven”. In fact, a lot of the complaints we had about that video we have about this one, namely, if your revived love is supposed to die on a specific day, try being a bit more proactive in keeping them safe. Seriously. Tell them to stay home. Doesn’t matter if you sound crazy. Be open and honest in your relationship, dammit! Poor communication skills lead to breakups and, in some cases, DEATH! For that matter, to us it seems like almost every TV drama has problems caused by people who can’t communicate worth a damn. Everyone’s gushing about “Breaking Bad.” We’re halfway through Season 3 and think that the whole cast is a load of dimwits. But that’s another story.

The main point of the clarification we’re trying to make before we got distracted is is that we thought that this video was a clear rip off of JYJ’s In Heaven. Other people then told us that F.T. Island did another similarly themed video a while ago. And then there’s 30 minutes ago which is also similarly themed. The point here, then, isn’t who copied who. The point is that everyone’s trying to make you aware of how dangerous driving in Korea is. Remember kids: RUN OR DIE!

Another thing we wanted to say that we didn’t say in the video: we’re saying this because we watched the video a hundred times over, as we always do when we review a Music Video, and this is a conclusion we came to: THAT GIRL IS A TERRIBLE ACTOR. Totally devoid of emotion or facial expression. Sure, she’s pretty, but good God! There must be some higher standards for an acting role than that! BARRGH!

Anyhow, if you’re a fan of F.T. Island, you can pick up the album by clicking on the banner below. Side note: I’m not sure why their album isn’t up on iTunes yet. Some labels are really quick to put their music up on iTunes, but we’ve been checking for a while now to no avail. Bah! Get the physical album instead. You’ll be cooler that way.

And, lastly, we’ve got bloopers for this week, as always. I’ve been getting the giggles for some reason lately. Today I got them, probably, from being pounded on the chest by Martina. Ha! Also, to that cool girl from Vancouver who I met today in Bucheon, right before I ran across the street screaming like a maniac, sorry for not saying goodbye afterwards! You looked like you didn’t want to talk to us anymore, after I ran across the street screaming like a maniac, probably because I looked like a maniac. Really, I’m not crazy!

For the original post on F.T. Island Severely – Kpop Music Mondays, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

Hello everyone!

Welcome back to our second edition of the K Crunch Indie playlist, where we talk about some cool and (fairly) new songs in Korean Indie. We make these into YouTube playlists, so if you’re watching this on a Mobile device, you’ll have to click on each video manually, but in Playlist mode on the computer, all the videos will play automatically one after another. Also, we’re linking to the music videos themselves here as well, just in case you want to jump back here for future interest. FORWARD HOOOOOOO!!!!!

1. eAeon – Bulletproof:

Any Apparat fans around here? We’re big fans ourselves, and even used an Apparat song for one of our older videos on Ramen Tasting. Anyhow, we don’t want to say that this is just like Apparat, more that they share a similar mystical and static-ey sound. This song actually totally blew us away, and our friends over at Korean Indie told us they are HUGE fans of this guy (who is the leader from the duo called Mot). This is his first solo album as eAeon and I can’t wait to hear more from him!

2. Big Phoney – I Love Lucy:

Ok. Elliott Smith. LAST NAME WE’RE GONNA DROP…or are we… Now, we know that there are lots of acoustic strumming, emo-singing guys out there, but, I swear, as soon as we heard Big Phoney sing we both gave each other big eyes and shouted “Elliott Smith!” It’s haunting. And this is coming from big fans of Elliott Smith (RIP). I think by sounding like “Elliott Smith” we mean that Big Phoney also has that kind of raw yet beautiful sound to his voice. I don’t know if I can explain this. Anyone want to help me?

3. One More Chance – 카페에 앉아

STEP BACK GIVE ME ROOM! *Simon begins pelvic thrusting* I didn’t think I’d ever hear something that reminded me of old 80′s R&B with that BING sound that I know so well, but sure enough, I did. Frankly, I don’t think this song is as great as the other songs on this list, but I think that’s because R&B relies heavily on understanding the baby making lyrics that accompany it, and since I can’t understand it very well, it kind of loses it’s appeal. But maybe that’s just me! Oh and Martina’s way out, because she rarely ever likes anything R&B related. Except for D’Angelo.

4. PeterPan Complex – 자꾸만 눈이 마주쳐

This song actually comes as a video request (we like video requests, by the way), so thanks to SerinaTomoe for suggesting the song.

Anyhow, we realized that when we were talking about this video we might have sounded a bit harsh since we didn’t really love the video, but when we looked back on what we filmed, we realized that we didn’t praise the song highly enough. This is a great, fun song. Sure, it doesn’t sound like the slower, softer PeterPan complex that fans are used to, but that doesn’t make it a bad song. We like it when bands evolve their sounds into something out of their comfort zone (like Animal Collective or The Liars…but not you Sufjan Stevens, your newest album was not good). OK NO MORE NAME DROPPING I SWEAR! Except for one: we only do these Indie Playlists once a week, and only cover a few songs. Do check out Korean Indie if you want to keep more up to date with the Korean Indie scene. They’re a lot more thorough than we are.

Lastly, if there’s a video you want us to do for the next playlist, leave us a video response, and we might just pick your video and song. Woot!

For the original post on K Crunch Indie: Bullets, Lucy, Cafes, and Peters, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

Hey everyone! Welcome to the second edition of the K Crunch KpopCharts Update for the week of February 11th, 2012. Today we’re talking about four more videos on the KpopCharts and how they’re doing. We’ll give you a chance to vote on them all, and hopefully we can review your choices for our Music Mondays. So, if you’ve got half an hour to spare, sit down and check out today’s playlist. If you’re on a mobile device, well, playlists aren’t your friend.

1) Jay Park “Know Your Name”: Vote for it!

Jay Park is back, fresh off the heels of “Star,” which we reviewed and loved the chicken dance for. COKA! COKA CO! Chickens don’t clap! Ah. We really miss Arrested Development.

Anyhow, there are two versions of this song. One is a slow acoustic version in which Jay Park, again, acts awkward around girls. Another is a good version! Ha! Joking. Some of you like seeing Jay Park interact with girls and be maegyo. We prefer to see him dance to something more upbeat, which is why we like this song a lot more. Check it out if you haven’t already!

2) Se7en “When I Can’t Sing”: Vote for it!

Se7en’s back! Back when we went to the YG concert we heard him talking about coming back a lot. And now he’s here! He sings a ballad-y kind of song in which he performs, looks all sad, and then watches TV in Jay Park’s house. This time, though, he doesn’t blur out the top of Jay Park’s house the way Jay Park does. He just watches TV all sadly. Seriously, how do you have such a big house and old, tiny-ass TV? Se7en, give us a call. We got a big TV. I’ll bring it over to your place and we can play video games together. Or you can sit down and stare at it if that’ll make you feel better.

3) LEDApple “Time is Up”: Vote for it!

Ok, this is our first experience with LEDApple. Their sound is very different from what we’re used to. This style of video is something we’re really not used to as well. Seriously! We make videos for a living (videos about videos: META VIDEOS!) so that’s why we pay attention to small details in Music Videos. Anyhow, we saw this video and were really impressed with the animations. Cool! We can’t draw worth a diddly squat – if you can’t tell from our TL;DRs by now – so we really appreciated this video. Ah! Ok we’ll stop fawning over that now.

4) Clazzi “Love&Hate” – Vote for it!

You know we’re Clazzi fans. We’ve talked about him and his music repeatedly, and totally gushed over How We Feel for one of our K Crunches. We’re not losing our mind over this song, though. Not that it’s a bad song. It’s still an awesome song. But we don’t really gush over darker sounding songs. We appreciate them a lot, but we don’t bounce around the house like bunnies. We’ll walk around and be cool to this song, but we won’t be silly to it. You know the distinction we’re trying to make? Ah! Things make more sense in our heads than out of them.

Yeah! So that’s it for this week’s playlist. See you again tomorrow when we introduce some more awesome Indie music. Woot woot!

For the original post on KpopCharts Update: Se7en, Clazzi, Jay Park, and LEDApple, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!

Woohoo! This week’s topic comes from angelicad7 from Chicago, who asks

Is there a Korean product(s) you cannot live without and thought “Why wasn’t this introduced back home?”

Yay! Easy topic! We barely had to put any thought into this one. With the more serious topics, like the ones on Homosexuality in Korea or Bullying in Korean Schools, we really have to reflect for a long time about what we’re going to say. But, with this week’s topic, we felt like PFFT! Just turn on the camera and we’ll start yammering.

Seriously, Korea’s a really freaking cool country when it comes to technology. And we’re technology nerds, so this makes us very happy. Yes, we’re Apple fans as well, and – yes – Korea isn’t very Apple friendly, though it’s gotten a lot better since we got here with many more Apple retailers popping up. Come to think of it, I’m not sure if we own any Samsung products here in Korea. Note to potential Samsung Marketing People reading this blog: send us Samsung stuff. Also, don’t read the next sentence. Actually, we just remembered that our TV is Samsung. Nevermind!

Anyhow, the amount of technology here, and the connectivity of Korea is just overwhelmingly awesome. We mentioned a few of our favourite things in this video, but that’s just scraping the surface. Other awesomeness includes:

1) GPS in every car: It doesn’t come built in, but every car we’ve been in has a GPS monitor thingy on the dashboard. It gives you full directions, monitors your speed and lets you know if you’re going over the speed limit for that road, automatically detects if you’ve gone off course and tells you where to turn instead, blinks and flashes and makes noise if your turn is coming up. Oh, and it plays TV for you as well. Watch the game while you’re driving. No joke. These things should probably be illegal, but aren’t, probably because they’re so awesome.

2) Kickass Cellphone Signal: I have never dropped a call in Korea. NEVER. Rarely ever does the signal go fuzzy. Seriously. Even when we’re on the subway, UNDERGROUND. Do you hear that, Torontonians? We can use our cellphones when we’re on the subway, even if we’re at the bottom of a transfer point, with two other subway lines above us. We never lose signal. Not even a freaking blip. Oh, and people can watch TV on their phones as well. Holy crap-your-pants awesome

3) Robo Vacuums: We don’t have one yet, but we want one. I remember watching the CES this year, and seeing a video about a Samsung vacuum that has a camera built into it, so that it maps your ceiling and knows where it’s going. The video was all like “oooh this is awesome and the future” bla bla blah. Went to the Home Plus nearby the next day and saw it on sale. Old news here, boys and girls. Old news.

4) Bidets: Not a fan of them, personally. Don’t want water spraying up my bum hole. But we’ve seen tons of them here, even in public restrooms. TOILET TECHNOLOGY!

5) Motion Sensor Escalators: Haven’t seen these until we came to Korea. A lot of escalators have motion detectors. They turn off if no-one’s on them. If you’re about to get on one and it’s turned off, you pass a motion-sensor thingy that tells the escalator to turn on. FREAKING BRILLIANT!

6) Elevator Buttons that Turn Off: How is this not a standard around the world? Push a button on the elevator by accident? TURN IT OFF! Doesn’t this just make sense? Hell!

Ok that’s it. Maybe there’s more but we can’t think of it right now. I’m sure the question was expecting an answer more along the lines of what we showed in our Wonderful Treasure Finds series, but we never got the chance to gush about Korean technology. Not sure why Korea doesn’t promote that more. Korea Tourism seems to be all about “Come look at our mountains and temples and history and old traditions and stuff.” Forget that. I want to live in the future, and Korea’s offering me the closest chance at that.

Yeah! Also, there was a long scene that we found hilarious, but too long, and too irrelevant to include in the final cut. We present it to you here: here we are trying to call the cops…on each other.

For the original post on Korean Products We Can’t Live Without, or for our kpop and Korean Food videos, check out our Korea blog!