Girls’ Generation, also known as SNSD from their Korean name, is a famous Korean pop girl group. Actually they are extremely famous in all Asia and they are considered as the legends of Kpop (The Korean pop music industry), the Korean nation’s girl group and other similar “titles”. They also have a lot of fans in Europe and USA. They debuted at 2007 and they are very successful ever since. However, although they were so famous, I only came across them at the end of 2019. This acquaintance literally changed my life! This is how it happened…
In general, I mostly prefer to listen to rock music – my favorite band is Deep Purple. I also like pop music, I grew up at the 80s after all, and also some Greek folk music since I live in Greece. When I was young, I was listening to music from radio, television and vinyl disks, tapes or CDs. When internet started dominating the world, this changed and I started visiting various sites to listen to new music. Then youtube came up and of course it soon became the main source of listening to music. This was important to me, because Greece is a rather conservative country and all the mainstream channels (I mean radio stations and television shows) more or less play the same songs. If you want to hear music from Asia or other countries or in a language different than Greek and English, then you have to do it on your own.
Thanks to youtube I got to know a lot of great musicians that I wouldn’t have heard otherwise. One of them is Marty Young from Taiwan. He is very good at covering classic rock songs, so I initially heard him at a crashing cover of Deep Purple’s “Burn”. Then I checked the other videos from his youtube channel and I really liked the way he was playing, not only the covers, but also some songs of his own. So I started following him.
Several months later, at October of 2019, Marty decided to cover “Gee”, perhaps the most famous song of Girls’ Generation. I listened to it and I really liked it, so I kept on listening to it for the next weeks. At first when I saw that the song was a cover, I didn’t pay much attention, because the group and the song were totally unknown to me. I didn’t care, because Marty’s version was really nice. One day, however, I decided to check on this Girls’ Generation group. I thought that perhaps it was some rock girl group that would be fun to hear. So I got to the official music video of Gee…
…and I was totally impressed. I found the concept of 9 different singers and dancers constantly switching from one to the other amazing. I am sure a lot of people had the same feeling with me when seeing Gee MV for the first time. There is however a striking difference. As said, I grew up at the 80s, the golden era of pop music. I have heard thousands of pop songs throughout all these years. As a saying we use here in Greece states, this is a wish and a curse. The wish part is that I had the opportunity to hear a ton of great musicians and songs. The curse part is that it becomes increasingly difficult for me to get impressed anymore. Imagine for example that you are 15 years old and you listen to Adele. Most probably you will say “wow, what a great voice”! But not me. I have heard so many good singers that I can only say “OK, she is good”. So getting so much impressed by Gee was a huge surprise for me. I never thought that at the age of 45 I could be so much influenced by a music group.
I quickly found out that Girls’ Generation is a Korean group, so I realized that this was part of Kpop. I had heard of Kpop’s existence in the past, but never really spent time on it, mainly because I mostly like rock music and also because this music is never played in Greece. The next step was to pick up one of those youtube lists with a title like 100 greatest Kpop hits. I initially liked around 30 of them so I started hearing them more often. Then I noticed that I really liked around the half of them and I decided to write down the group that was singing each one. The list was something like this (by the way here you can notice that I don’t like boy Kpop groups):
Girls’ Generation
Girls’ Generation
Girls’ Generation
Mamammo
2NE1
Red Velvet
Girls’ Generation
Girls’ Generation
Girls’ Generation
It became evident that I really liked this group, so I started watching more and more music videos of theirs. Then I came across their full live concert at Tokyodome at 2014. I think this was the turning point for me to become a Sone, i.e. a dedicated fan of Girls’ Generation. It is really difficult to express my feelings when I first watched this concert. It is more than two and a half hours long, but I had no difficulty in watching all of it at once, when we all know that no one even considers watching youtube videos longer than 10 minutes. Their dancing and singing, the continuous changes of outfits, concepts, positions and vocal combinations, their interaction with the audience, everything was so impressive to me that I couldn’t believe it.
A few months later I was a true Sone. It’s not only that I had learned their names, that I had listened to all of their released songs and that I had watched every possible youtube video with Girls’ Generation included. Every Sone knows that the relationship with the girls (well OK, they are not considered girls anymore) is beyond this stage. They are not just loving artists to us or some people making money at the Kpop industry. It is almost impossible to explain this to someone that hasn’t felt the same way. The closest I can think of is a relative, something like a sister, a cousin or a nephew. Their impact is so immense that causes unconditional love towards them, without expecting or wanting something in return, just like with a relative. It is your family, so you love and support no matter what. I don’t know how this happens, but it does and I am very happy with it. I think the girls also know and feel that from us.
Right now, November of 2020 as I write these lines, I listen to Girls’ Generation songs every day and I intend to keep this up till the end of the year. Most probably even further. I follow each one of them at Instagram and I watch all of their activities, even if it is about some make up or perfume advertisement, which is by default not interesting to men. I am eagerly waiting for their new activities and hope that they will get back on stage to perform again someday.
Thank you Yoona, Hyoyeon, Sooyoung, Yuri, Taeyeon, Sunny, Seohyun, Tiffany and Jessica (even if you have left the group) for all the joy you have brought in my life. I wish you all the best for the future. Keep healthy and fighting! Who knows, perhaps one day I will have the chance to see you in person!
