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Saturday, September 14, 2013

This little Piggy Doll didn't go to market

We all know about the Piggy Dolls comeback, yeah?  If not, you can read up about it here.

Quick recap for those who haven't been following this: three girls were in a group called Piggy Dolls that debuted a couple of years back and they were kinda chubby, then they came back and became somewhat less chubby... and then they came back again recently but this time it was actually three completely different girls using the same name who were typical-kpop-skinny, thus defeating the purpose of the original Piggy Dolls concept.  Great, now we're all up to speed.

When this happened, I did my best to get a brief snapshot about how the k-pop community felt about this.  The response from YouTube, various articles and forums was fairly expected and mostly the same - naturally, the notoriously whiny "vocal talent is everything omg" crowd were horrified that clearly superior singers were replaced with some averagely-voiced but prettier girls.  Screencaps and a lot more after the jump.


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And here's some comments recently left on their earliest video, "Trend", just for contrast:

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 Now let's get a few things straight:

1.  Yes, I do agree that using the same name for a different bunch of girls to the last lot is kind of odd.  I would think that in fact would be odd in any case no matter what the group was, if a complete member-swap was done.  Imagine your favourite k-pop group comes back and it's a completely different bunch of people - no matter the artist, you'd be weirded out.  Most k-pop fans cry a river of tears when just ONE member changes.

2.  Yes, I do think that the name "Piggy Dolls" doesn't really have a lot of meaning when applied to some typically super-skinny k-pop girls like that new lot they threw in there.  Standing up for equal representation of different body types, helping girls with low self-esteem... yeah, I get it.

3.  Yes, the old girls are probably better singers.

4.  Back in "Trend/Piggy Style" days I totally would have Piggystyled that girl with the red hair, who was at that stage fairly curvy and in my opinion looking far sexier than later on when their album came out, and also far sexier than about 99% of other k-pop girls in general for that matter.  That's actually not really relevant to any point I'm about to make, I'm just putting it out there just in case some of you reading this right now look a bit like her and aren't doing anything much this weekend.


Girl on the right, 10/10 - would pig.

BUT BEFORE WE TAKE UP OUR PITCHFORKS AND TORCHES WITH THE VOCALFAG CROWD AND GO TO BURN DOWN THE BUILDING OF WHOEVER WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR ALL THIS FUCKING SHIT, LET'S HANG ON JUST A FUCKIN' MINUTE HERE, CUNTS.

What does a YouTube search of Piggy Dolls reveal?  Here's the top three matches:

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The first MV hit for their earliest song "Trend" doesn't even have 10,000 views yet.  Their album feature track that came out later with the girls noticeably slimmed down, "Know Her", did substantially better and has nearly 60,000 views - but it took two years to get there, which isn't that impressive, a video of your friend lighting his farts with a cigarette lighter posted at the same time probably would have more views than that by now.  In the meantime, the new song with the all-new skinnier girls has just over 40,000 hits in ONE WEEK.

I wonder what k-pop fans who were supposedly in love with Piggy Dolls and their "amazing vocals" were doing?  Not checking out the girls on YouTube, obviously.  Maybe they didn't need to because they'd already purchased the music and had supported these wonderful talented girls that way?  I thought I'd take to the forums and ask the question that it hadn't occurred to anybody else to ask:

pdss


Well, that's a fairly resounding "no we didn't buy this shit, are you serious?".

However, do you know who DID buy their stuff?  ME, that's fuckin' who.

When I went to Sydney in May 2012 I saw their album in the Sydney Media Asia store, the biggest and cheapest k-pop store in that city that stocks official albums.  It was $22 (a typical new release album price for Australia), and I thought "wow, that's a bit steep, might pass on that because I would rather save my money for the T-ara Fleshlight", so I didn't buy it at the time.  I returned to the same store in February 2013 and saw the SAME ALBUM, and it was $10, and it also had a "buy 2, get 1 free" sticker on it.  I thought that was a good deal but I couldn't find two other k-pop albums with the same sticker on it that I also wanted (you know how these pricks are, they only put them on the crap nobody wants), so I passed on it again.  I returned to the same store in September this year and THERE IT WAS AGAIN FOR $5, and the "buy 2 get 1 free" had been changed to "buy 1 get 1 free", which basically means in real terms it's costing me $2.50.  "Wow, they really must want to get rid of this shit" I thought, so I picked it up for curiosity's sake along with a Seo In Young album.

To prove it, here's my personal copy, still in the wrapping, with the price stickers intact.

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I'll show you this on my stream if you like.  If you look closely, you can see that there's actually three price stickers layered on top of each other, they just stuck the new lower price on top of the old higher one. Here's a closer look:

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If I peel the top layer of the price sticker back, you can see the previous price of $10:

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And under that, the original price of $22.  The ink came off on the bottom side because the price sticker is so old:

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In Media Asia, when you buy a k-pop album, if they have any left over in their stash behind the counter they don't give you the one off the shelf, instead they give you one from the stash and put the display copy back up.  In this case, the guy behind the counter just let me keep the copy in my hand, which means it was the LAST ONE... that they had been trying to get rid of for AT LEAST A YEAR AND A HALF.

Sydney currently has a population of over 4.5 million people, and NOT ONE of them thought it fit to add a single Piggy Dolls album to their collection even when it was priced at about the same value as a bag of corn chips. No wonder the company completely swapped out the lineup - you cunts weren't fuckin' buying it!  Yeah it was a dick move, not to mention pretty naive of them to think it would be received well, but what the fuck did you expect... for them to keep these girls on who make no money because "they're so talented like omg" and they get a few positive Internet comments here and there?  Get fucked and shove your stupid moralising about how talent doesn't matter anymore up your ass, because in the real world of the music business, it means nothing.  If you want your favourite musical artists to succeed, guess what - you've got to do more than start "vocal threads" on the Internet and post comments about how horrified you are about how superficial everything is, you've actually also got to spend some fucking money, cunt.

So where are these fans of extraordinary vocal performances, who love the old Piggy Dolls, where are THEY at?  My conclusion, and I think this is a very fucking reasonable conclusion to come to, is that they don't fucking exist at all.  It's the same old story - Koreaboo fans around the world want more than anything else to be like fans in Korea, so when they see Korean fans whining about "vocal talent", they also whine about "vocal talent" whenever they get the chance, just to be trendy and cool, but that whining of course doesn't actually translate into anything real, because in their heart of hearts they don't even believe their own bullshit but are just saying it because that's what Koreans say.  I bet they didn't buy the latest Susan Boyle album either - now there's someone trading on vocal talent, cynicism about the looks-based music industry and literally nothing else (certainly not good songs, that's for sure).


Fap to THAT.


49 comments:

  1. I have always wanted to buy some real physical copy of albums, but if any one of my family knows I did that, they will freaking scold me (great family, right?) for wasting my money, especially my sis, she complains all the fucking time when I buy stuff that she doesn't like, and wants me to save all my fucking money that I earned myself.

    Now I'm ranting ._.

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    Replies
    1. Why are they getting onto you for spending your money your way? That's a dick move XD

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    2. Well it's all that care and love and shit, but I think there's a line on how much you can limit someone. They do all this to me, and wondered why I didn't want to get a part time job. One of my motivation in working part time is to spend the money you earned yourself.

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    3. You'll just have to max out their Internet bandwidth until they learn.

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    4. ^

      Care to explain what this means? I really don't get it xD

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    5. Oh wait, you don't live in my country, right? I forget that "hogging all the Internet" is a concept that doesn't really apply in other countries where the Internet actually works properly.

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    6. I'm currently living in Perth, my family is back in Indonesia though. I still don't understand how hogging the internet will teach them a lesson:/

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  2. The one thing that confuddles my brain is this; Winning Insight should have realized that member changes are a touchy subject, right? Any kind of internet search about T-ARA can reveal the fan backlash when Hwayoung was added (and subsequently kicked out), plus the witch hunt against Dani just being a trainee. So why didn't they just debut these girls as a new group with a new name? I completely agree that no one in the industry actually cares if you're talented, just that you can sell, but all this backlash against the all new Piggy Dolls makes me think that they'll sell even *less* than the original lineup. Which is a shame, because the new song isn't that bad. The singers aren't as good as the original, but they are pretty damn good compared to K-Pop's usual standard of talent.

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    1. The old songs were weak and the new song isn't great either - that's the real reason why Piggy Dolls have never gotten anywhere, and won't get anywhere now. The label's move swapping the members out but preserving the name was dumb but ultimately it doesn't matter - a good song would have saved them. (T-ara fucked up in every possible way last year and at the absolute peak of the trendy hipster T-ara hatred Sexy Love came out and still hit #3 on Gaon, because the song was catchy and didn't suck.) I don't know if the new PD will sell less than the old one though because I don't know if it's even possible to sell less than one copy of a CD in 18 months hahahahaha.

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    2. You could always *not* sell at all :3

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  3. Replies
    1. I thought the same exact thing when he was writing about porking a fatty haha.

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    2. A great lyricist once said "The deeper the cushion, the sweeter the pushin'".

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    3. Personally I'd pork the piggy. Shakin' the bacon. All that good stuff.

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    4. Kpopalypse is a chubby chaser, I have no chance.

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  4. I own the T-ara Roly Poly album, the second 2NE1 album, SNSD's Oh! album and I think that's it.
    I'm not into buying singles, I want a package with several songs I like.
    Thus, for me personally, the best Asian music album I own is the Morning Musume 10 years anniversary double-CD album.

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    1. Why the FUCK would you buy T-ara Worst album you Freak

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    2. I actually meant "John Travolta Wannabe", I always mix the names up.

      It's funny you call people freaks.

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    3. I almost bought T-ara's Roly Poly/John Travolta Wannabe album, but I was disappointed that the five "remixed" songs weren't really remixed.

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    4. I only know the versions on the album and really liked every single one.
      Eventhough I've bought it for the two Roly Poly songs, Wae ireoni became my favourite song. Not just on the album, but of all of T-ara's songs. It's really great Pop and I'm very surprised it didn't became more well known.
      Maybe it wasn't as easy and lighthearted as most K-Pop songs.

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    5. I think Wae Ireoni just got overshadowed by how big of a letdown Yayaya was. I love the instrumental to Yayaya, but the stupidity of the lyrics keep it from being a favorite of mine.

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    6. I bought the "Roly Poly Copacobana" repackage just for the big photos. The fact that it contains RP the best k-pop song every written (plus a bunch of worthless non remixes ahem) is just a bonus. Wae Ireoni is great too, it's like ABBA, and everyone in Australia loves ABBA.

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    7. t-ara's first is classic. should throw in Miss A's album in there too. good production in a k-world swimming with "mini albums" and singles

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    8. I only ever listened to Breathe and 1~2 other miss A singles. They were good, but not that I would want to have a whole album of them.

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  5. I went overboard with buying music from the group I like and literally have entire bookshelf (albeit a smaller one) for my collection of over 40 INFINITE CDs and DVDs.

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    1. what the F*ck Over 40?? they barely have like 45 song..You purchase every song individually and put it on the Shelf?? you must have alot of dvd. then you like me with Sulli Collection, lol :-Pp Sulli Collection composed of every f(x) hardcopy CD, SMTOWN 2011 Tokyo Dome, 2012, IAM all edit so it only show Sulli and some Krystal part, SMTOWN Winter Album deleted all non-Sulli song from CD, sulli94.net Special DVD that come with FULL PACKAGE from 2013 photobook + gifts set(i missed out on 2012, still living in a Regret), A CD composed of all Sulli parts in song, Sulli LIVE COMPILATION for every promoted song(in Seperate DVDs), ONE 정리 BEST dvd, Case for Sulli Photocard, Postcard, and trash bin for luna items (-: I keep Select Krystal item though, just in case someone need or want it :-Pp

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    2. I have every version of every CD so there's quite a lot of Japanese ones with the first press limited editions (expensive as fuck). Then there's their concerts and DVDs. Working on collecting their variety shows and drama but for over $100 each and some with no English subtitles I'm being lazy. Also have some multiple copies due to photocards (whoever invented that idea was a marketing genius for getting more money out of dumb fucks like me) and 3 signed albums.

      I always liked the groups music and had a few albums but then for whatever reason Lee Sungyeol became my ultimate bias and he is pretty much the hottest thing ever so I need to own everything with his face on it because his face is perfect.

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    3. for variety shows+dramas, why not just download them? it's not like running man or weekly idol will have its official DVD anyway... a quick search on yt will get you to their english-subbed stuff, then let keepvid.com/clipconverter.cc do all the work. For starters.. the drama Sungyeol recently cameo in? kbsworld uploaded it on its official yt channel

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    4. @Sulli Christ "Sulli LIVE COMPLIATION for every song promoted" does Sulli even sing live?

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    5. Sulli could be voiced by a midget dwarf backstage for all I care.

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    6. I was probably too busy fapping to her to actually realise whether she was actually singing live or not L0L

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  6. I really want to buy some of my favorite groups' CDs but I can't because my parents would think that it's a waste of money to spend on something you could snap so easily. I shouldn't even be surprised about this, because when I spent a good portion of my Chinese New Year money on cupcakes for my friends on Valentine's day, my dad was like, "Why did you waste money on your friends? You're so stupid."

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    1. If you really want your bias to make money the best way to ensure that is not to buy CDs but to buy products that they endorse in a CF. Just hope they endorse something practical that is useful and that your parents don't mind you having... like chicken!

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    2. hnnng cupcakes

      was cinnamon involved

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    3. I only own, no, I don't own any physical kpop cds, I have a couple of digital kpop cds and a few physical jpop cds and that's it...

      it's like, I want to support my favorite groups, but since piracy is easier... and cheaper....so piracy is my preferred method of getting kpop music. It's one of the ways I discovered it in the first place.

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  7. I really want to buy some of my favorite groups' CDs but I can't because my parents would think that it's a waste of money to spend on something you could snap so easily. I shouldn't even be surprised about this, because when I spent a good portion of my Chinese New Year money on cupcakes for my friends on Valentine's day, my dad was like, "Why did you waste money on your friends? You're so stupid."

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  8. I bought every korean album T-ara has, cuz those chicks need money lol

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    1. I bought 'em all too just to piss off netizens after the scandal blew up. Money well spent.

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  9. I asked a question about this on ask.fm. :D It's nice to see a fresh and informative view on this stuff, especially considering the tendency of internet Kpop fans to regurgitate the baseless opinions of other netizens. Kinda hypocritical of fans to complain about groups' failures in the market when they don't even buy music from those they want to support. This especially applies to nugus, who need it more than established groups with prominent fanbases. Piggy Dolls could've been where Crayon Pop are now if they promoted some earworm single and got monetary support.

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    1. K-pop fans in all countries are great about saying one thing and doing another. People always go "they're over" when something cops hate and "they've got it made" when the comments are good but the truth is always different. The forces that make someone leave a comment on the Internet have nothing to do with the forces that make someone financially support an artist (or not, as the case may be). The entertainment business in Korea needs to realise this.

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  10. If anything, our "love" for idols is purely driven by libidinal desire. We fancy (a.k.a. wet dream) ourselves making love to our biases. With all due respect to the original Piggy Dolls, but who will fantasize a piece of fat slob anyway?

    The K-netizens are giving T-ara hell but CCM's still got their back, not so much T-ara suck KKS really hard as the group is still pulling in an impressive amount of money (although its veracity cannot be independently verified, but an article ranks the most profitable girl groups in the first half of 2013 as 1. SNSD 2. 2NE1 3. F(X) 4. 4minute 5. T-ara 6. Sistar). So why has T-ara emerged from last year's career wrecking scandal relatively intact? It's certainly not because of their "talents", but many people are still falling for their "visuals".

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    1. I'd threesome with that Piggydolls chick AND Eunjung, personally.

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    2. Which Piggydolls chick? there are the "old" three and the "new" three, propelling the grand total of Piggydolls chicks to 6..........But yeah, I'd like to do Eunjung as well. I especially like the fact that she's a bit on the "thick" side as compared to other Kpop idols (those meaty thighs for instance)............

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    3. The one that I singled out in the blog post, obviously.

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  11. Pirate for life..

    http://cdn.alltheragefaces.com/img/faces/large/neutral-pirate-poker-face-l.png

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