Kpopalypse Nugu Alert Episode 19 - MFECT, Oriental Showcus, Hexagonal Water

It's time again for another episode of the most loved and loathed series on Kpopalypse blog, yes it's Kpopalypse Nugu Alert!

Read on as Kpopalypse finds more nugus especially for you!

Imagine that you're a k-pop company CEO looking for a way to shoot a hot new video for your group.  You hold a boardroom meeting and run through the various options available with your video shooting team:

Drama video - no way, you'd have to hire a scriptwriter for a start, then you'd need multiple locations and great props for it to look even halfway good... this is going to be way too expensive, let's not bother.  Your team agree unanimously that this would be a royal pain in the ass.

Box video - you think "wow SM are so cheap with their box videos, how hard can it be" so your team make some enquiries at a set fabrication company and find out that to get a box that can realistically compete with the stuff that SM uses can actually cost over $100,000.  Who knew?  Needless to say, fuck that shit.

Studio video - "okay, this will be alright, we don't need the box, we'll just hire out a studio", but some more ringing around confirms that all the studios in your area are booked out for months in advance doing various other nugu k-pop projects.  Damn.

Location video - "fine, we'll go to that amusement park everyone else uses" you say in frustration.

Your video director is aghast.  "No, I'm not shooting there!" he says.

"Why what's the problem?  Too cliched for you?" you snort.

"No..." his face turns red as he continues.  "I fucked the sister of the guy who runs that place and leases it out to all the k-pop groups!  I didn't use protection and I had no money so he had to pay for her abortion!  He said he'd kill me if he saw me again!  I'm not going to shoot there!"

You stand up and point at him angrily.  "Fine, then I'll get another director!"

The entire room starts mumbling and coughing.

"Um.... I actually fucked her too" says the assistant director.

"Yeah, er... me as well... can't we just shoot it somewhere else?" says the lighting tech.

"It's going to be so awkward... I forgot to pull out" mumbles the production assistant.

You sigh.  "Okay, so who here has NOT had sex with the sister of the amusement park guy, please raise your hand."

You look around the room, no hands go up, except one.  "I haven't", says the secretary changing the filter in the coffee machine at the back of the room.

"Okay, FINE THEN.  Forget interesting props, we'll just go and shoot it in the middle of fucking nowhere!  The fans had better not blame me if it looks like shit!"

This episode of Nugu Alert is dedicated to those k-pop CEOs who may have found themselves in a predicament similar to the above.  We've all seen k-pop videos with spectacular scenery like Taeyeon's "I", but SM had to go to New Zealand to find vistas like that, which is a little beyond the nugu agency's budget.  If you could only go locally, and the outdoor nature scenery there was boring as batshit, would you still film your music video there anyway?  The following videos are the result of agencies who answered a resounding "yes" to this question, let's take a look!

Usual nugu alert rules apply:

• Less than 20k hits
• Nobody outside of Korea cares
• Kpopalypse thinks you should watch these, just because

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MFECT - Just You

The boys of MFECT have a reasonably decent song and do their best to make the most visually out of some incredibly flat grassland and dirt roads.  At least the levelled-out OH&S compliant ground surface means that they're less likely to trip and do themselves an injury, showcasing a rare instance of k-pop agencies giving a shit about the welfare of their group members.  The girls of The Starz who came to the attention of Kpopalypse in Nugu Alert Episode 15 for filming part of their MV in a bombed out warehouse with dangerous shit all over the floor are probably jealously complaining to their agency now "why didn't you look after us like this?".  It doesn't end there however, M.fect's video director then daringly tries for some night shots using candlelights suspended from trees as a prop, and there's even a few shots filmed at the end of a pier where there's a funny metal frame construction that I guess the director thought looked a bit like the impressive random metal structures that hang around in the background of SM box videos:

Kind of similar, right?  Okay, never mind.

YouTube views at time of writing: 9455
Notable attribute: girl at 1:58 so transfixed by bits of paper that she doesn't notice the oncoming car in the background, everyone please wish her a speedy recovery
Nugu Alert rating: high

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Oriental Showcus ft. Koonta - Puzzle

Oriental Showcus are nugus at least for the purpose of Nugu Alert, but Koonta sure isn't.  Koonta's main gig is reggae group Rude Paper, he isn't afraid of a collaboration or two, and being highly experienced in locating green outdoor areas in Jamaica Koonta has decided to give his reggae friends in Oriental Showcus an image boost by pointing them in the direction of the nearest recreation park with long overgrown weeds and a river by it.  It's this kind of thoughtful action which has led to this visually outstanding video, featuring singing by some weeds, singing on a bridge by some weeds, singing in a park near a bridge by some weeds, and more.  The instrumentalists don't get the same location variety as the singer however, probably because the effort involved in finding multiple good locations for each instrument was probably stretching the timeframe and budget just a little too much, but hey, when it comes to making low budget videos you've got to prioritise.

There was however time for three singers on the bridge, showing that perhaps the editor had more time on his hands than the director.  Or perhaps there really are identical triplets fronting this group and the director just shoved them all on the bridge at once hoping it would collapse so he wouldn't have to listen to any more of this boring reggae-lite.

YouTube views at time of writing: 6622
Notable attribute: video staff couldn't be fucked picking up all the trash in the creek at 3:23
Nugu Alert rating: very high

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Hexagonal Water - Aduuduu

It's hard to even know where to begin with this outstanding video, an audiovisual artifact of cool trot and over-the-top visuals surely custom-made with Kpopalypse Nugu Alert specifically in mind.  Going against the grain by being filmed with bold, revealing long-shots (no fast cutting here) and an almost completely still camera, it's unclear whether Hexagonal Water is one person, a group of people or just a hoax like their namesake.  However what is abundantly clear is that our singer is definitely having a good time.  Not only this, but in a refreshing change of pace from the usual k-pop fare, his daring, highly exuberant dance moves are completely non-choreographed, and really come to the fore in the breakdowns, starting from the instrumental section that begins at about 1:30.  Later on there's four people dancing and I'm unsure whether it's another clone job like Oriental Showcus or if this group really is comprised of the four most spontaneous improv dancers in South Korea, but if you go to a club in Seoul and you see that double-take head move during a song's breakdown from a slightly pudgy guy with JAV star teeth, be sure to go up to him and say that Kpopalypse Nugu Alert said hi.

YouTube views at time of writing: 1107
Notable attribute: quickly-flying birds that leave the scene at 0:31 then return at 0:43, clearly drawn back by the singer's charisma
Nugu Alert rating: extreme

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That's all for Kpopalypse Nugu Alert!  I hope you've enjoyed this episode's selection of nugus, and Kpopalypse will return with even more at a future date!