Battles with Integrity

Gukmu has done a cover, trad-style vocals, of what was released as an instrumental track called "Score Suite" on the KPop Demon Hunters OST. (I hope that's an accurate description---short though it be, I hesitated thrice while typing it. Haven't seen the film.) I think this unrelated clip has the film version, though since it's actually a chunk of the film as released, it may get C&D'd.

The Korean voice actors for Rumi, Mira, and Zoey have covered "Golden" as a trio, with a fairer distribution of lines: Shin Na-ri, Kim Do-young, and Kim Ye-rim, respectively.

Arden Cho, who voices Rumi's spoken words in the film's NorAm release, has teamed up with Cha Eun-woo, one of the rl inspirations for the character Jinu, to cover "Free." Cho's channel has also released ... an informal chat? Not sure what to call it; it's cute.

Billboard Korea has released a short interview (in Korean, with English subs) with several members of The Black Label, which produced some of the OST's songs. The group is a good example of the contemporary blurring of whether an entity (and its member individuals) is primarily diasporadic or peninsular.

ETA JTBC has now interviewed Ejae as well, which I link mostly because it has not only English and Korean subs but a Korean sign language interpreter.

Binding off the blanket has taken about two weeks by itself. The blanket is currently a dripping lump, stitch-complete and with all of its yarn-ends dangling. I was able today to sew in a dozen yarn-ends for Socks's shawl, however, by having nothing to knit within reach during a video call.

Following the blanket are two options. One may fail as not a good match of yarn and pattern, so it awaits viability before being described. The other has lapsed twice despite being an excellent match of yarn/pattern. It's a straightforward assemblage of minor texture, knit-purl only (no cabling, no lace), and I wondered whether I'd balked at having to consult two pages at once for something that simple.

Today I began typing it out, which revealed that it has some bits in three places, not two, and it formats one of those places as a pseudo-outline with broken structure while instructing the reader-knitter to iterate unevenly over some of the bits. (For example, knit lines 1-4 twice, for a total of 8 rows---and on the next visit to those lines after doing something else, knit lines 3-4, then 1-4, then 1-2, for a differently arranged total of 8 rows.) I guess reorganizing the pattern to make sense is basically an exercise in refactoring someone's code.

One may conclude that the KPop Demon Hunters OST has splashed in South Korea, specifically, by the range of individuals who've uploaded covers of "Golden" to YouTube, the better to ride a potentially global wave of publicity.

The cover by An Yujin of Ive has been produced, despite the short turnaround time. Clean phrasing, and almost boring in how effortless An makes it seem (she's worked very hard already).

The cover by Kwon Soon Il of Urban Zakapa isn't effortless, but he's done really well, including in the falsetto notes between his comfortable range and the belted G and A.

More than a dozen other professional performers have also uploaded covers to YouTube, she said blandly, not naming them. Most of those reveal that it's not all that hard to get to high G, even the topmost high A, if you're already sop-range or if you just throw some air at the phrases. I mean, if I wanted to wake up the smallest neighbor napping next door, I could still get that G on a good day. (Not the A, though! Not since I was ten or so. I think "Defying Gravity" in Wicked goes only to an F?---been a while since I checked.)

What seems hardest is to have enough reach for the high notes without sounding strangled, while also carrying all of the song's lower notes (which are comfortably middling for my current range; Kwon's falsetto overlaps mine). Props to Ejae, the lead song-writer and performer, for making an excellent pop vehicle several ways, including as an implicit showcase for her voice.

Here's the official Sony video for "Golden," with lyrics. Formally it's sung by a trio, but the other two voices have a pair of lines apiece---mostly they're backing vocals.

(Will reply to comments later, sorry!)

ETA Short interview with Ejae in Korean, uncorrected eng sub (subtitles---as people used to say for kdramas).

I've reached ch. 17 of Percival Everett's James: A Novel, which recasts Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from Jim's perspective. Despite having been the web publisher of an edition of the latter, I haven't read HF entire since, hmm, 1990, in a Norton Critical class set that the teacher bought on her own dime and lugged home from the UCI campus bookstore. That is, it's fine to go into Everett's finely balanced novel with only an impressionistic sense of its antecedent; no need to discomfit yourself by catching up.

In ch. 15 of Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl, Brownstein quotes several critics' reviews of S-K's All Hands album, then comments on the album more intelligently and deftly than the critics.

Windy Chien's A Year of Knots (17% so far) seems to be part knots and part mild memoir of having owned an indie record shop in the Mission district, worked at Apple, and only then become a selfstanding creative.

Because my nearest aunt (in her lifetime quest for the status and domestic comforts reft from her at single-digit age) encouraged it, and because my father didn't want to spend money unnecessarily, my mother usually consulted my aunt for should-we-go-to-the-doctor medical questions. ( i'm fineish, no different from last month, but i have an idea )

The plants that the landscaper placed too close to a fence and that I was too ignorant to gainsay have been deformed variously for neighborly relations, now that those plants are tall enough to peek over. Leaving the resulting twigs where foot traffic would otherwise result in winter mud has been effective, so far. Tiny housemate considers it her duty to pull them apart somewhat, to the extent that she complains if I don't toss the cut branches her way. She's learned not to linger over the ones whose bark oils are dog-unfriendly, and whenever I use my thumbnails to strip drying bark, she complains again: just toss the stick!

The persimmon tree grew so much in response to the unusually wet spring that several branches became long and heavy by midsummer, apt to break---more lopping.

Most plants my height or shorter have been drifting towards sere yellow-brown, except the peony, which almost chose dormancy this year and has put up a hand-height of leaves. Self-seeded dill shoots have appeared again, thanks to the ants. Self-seeded California poppy has dried out for the season. Half the hydrangeas are the smallest they've been so far, between drowning in oxalis over winter and being too shaded by other plants since spring; the other half look much as they did last year. A neighbor's semi-myrtle, which smells similar to eucalyptus whenever I trim the overhang from my side of our fence, has sent up shoots more than a meter into my yard, including beneath one hydrangea. The latter may not last, since I try not to water that corner as a result.

The wisteria stub nudged a handful of green vines upwards, which tiny housemate tried showing me, then eating. (The eating was thwarted.) Last year, with a drier preceding winter, the wisteria stub was quiet. My struggles to find and discard wisteria seed pods before tiny housemate could poison herself were the prior fall, when she was a puppy. I suspect she was only showing me a new thing in the yard, not remembering the seed pods, but even hey-look is pretty cool from a dog when it's not something the dog has caused.