Or, so might my version of the "Tell Me" song go, a song that one can't seem to escape – and I don't even OWN a TV. Or, as the soon-to-be-dead, coming-of-age initiate pleaded to Timothy Dalton's character in the Arborea scene of the 1980 camp sci-fi classic, Flash Gordon: "End it now. Spare me the madness!" – so do I share said sentiment every time I see some star start to shimmy shoulders on the telly to that taudry tune. Dang! My alliterative workout for the day is definitely done.
Anyhoo, I just put up a post on FeetManSeoul about this recent "wave" involving the Wonder Girls "shaky shoulder dance." Not quite as bad as the "achy breaky heart" and associated shenanigans, but its extra-annoying.
"So, I'm just gonna say it: the Wonder Girls have no talent. None. Oh, come on. Don't get mad. Just think about it objectively for a minute. They can't sing AT ALL and they can't dance to SAVE THEIR LIVES. Do you remember their first live performance of "Tell Me"? It was terrible. Horrible. I'm scarred for life. On my eyes. And not using Michael Jackson or someone as the standard, because Korea has enough good dancers to compare with, from all the way back to Seo Taiji and the Boys to Boa and Lee Hyori. They can at least perform decent dances. But what is all this "shaky shoulder dance" crap? So they wiggle suggestively in sync? Whoa – what a concept. *I* can do that, and I'm in my mid-thirties with a gut. I just have to channel my old Kid-n-Play/MC Hammer moves made in front of the TV, but if you give me a few minutes and the motivation, I CAN do the Wonder Girls dance. And what's with them being 14 Western age? That's just pervy, dude, since the two 14-year-olds LOOK 14. We're not talking Britney at 17 with the tongue-in-cheek schoolgirl video – we're talking Jodi Foster in Taxi Driver with the disturbingly bad makeup job. Eww."
"But now, we have a Wonder Girls dance "wave"? Nooo. Not another "wave." And for what? Some rejects from an audition for the Doosan cheerleaders now working as street dancers opening a Paris Baguette could do the "Tell Me" dance better than the Wonder Girls. Has Korean pop culture really gotten so bad? There isn't anyone more talented who can be on stage during prime time? This is it? And what's more, now we have announcers on variety shows following along to the dance for fun and showing up IN THE NEWS for doing it. Why? Let it die."
A far more extended post is available on the FeetManSeoul site.
