Super Junior Part 1

Super Junior, one of my first K-pop loves...you know before I heard what actual good music was. Lol, I kid but in all reality one cannot deny the fact that Suju doesn't exist as a singing powerhouse. In all reality...many of them don't sing that well...it makes me wonder that if they had been capable what an acapella  would sound like with all 13 of them O.O is that even possible?

(Yes I know this particular video is in Chinese but this is the one I'm partial to having heard it before the Korean one...one of the only if not only Chinese version of any of their songs that I like)

I fell in love with Super Junior-M's Super Girl. This was my, what I like to call, "official" entrance into K-pop. I replayed that song dozens of times. Heck, I added A LOT of views to that video on their channel...well whatever channel it was before SM got an official channel. 2009 was my introductory year..half way thru in December...just in time for DBSK to blow up and Hankyung to sue. -_- yea...

But we're not here to talk about my bitterness, no. We're here...well I'm here to talk about Super Junior. It's phenomena, it's appeal and most importantly-it's members and what they add.

Now Super Junior is a massive group, duh. I ended up learning all of their names obsessively during my Super Girl days because it bothered me that I couldn't pin point who was who. I thought it rude to call them this one and that one and dude-with-hair and dude-with-eye-brows. So I persevered, I learned and I delved more into their music. Originally, I didn't like Sorry, Sorry-the song that can be argued was their peak. The random English was still too foreign. I used a lot of wikipedia in those days. But the biggest clincher and what made me like the group as a whole (beyond the awesome Super Girl...which is still a favorite today) was their charisma and character on different shows. I would say that shows like these, variety shows and programs as a whole, is what gets international fans into K-pop in the first place.

My reason for really liking Suju then, can be said to have little to do with their songs. Yes, I still listen to their songs but I have long since stopped looking at them through rose-colored lenses. Their charisma is appealing. Many of them know how to work the stage. The projects that they do bring out a different appeal, be it dramas, radio, performance, variety, modeling, etc.

That is the brilliance of Super Junior. They are a group that is structured around appealing to anybody and everybody. Literally. Their appeal gives them a dedicated fanbase, E.L.F. which in turn supports them to an almost obsessive (sometimes just obsessive...not even almost) degree which results in them making money and winning on Music Programs despite the fact that there are better singers out there.

SM knows how to market them well. The boys are trained well enough to know what they should do to get the best results, the most positive results. Now if only they would stop using the matrix cam and putting them in lit boxes...I really hate a lot of their videos because of the fact that they are cheap looking and suck.

Despite the lackluster MV's and the songs that with each comeback make me feel like their going down hill...Super Junior still tends to win in rankings. But the question is do you need all 13+ members in this group? The question is hard to answer. Some members bring it. Some do not. Some just bring it in different aspects. There are some I like, some I don't care about and some I just really dislike, despite my being a fan of sorts.

Check out Part 2 for the member break down!