Greatest Hits:: MBLAQ: Stay

 Summoned for you directly from The Form, it's ironically a song from the same album that I've already done a BBS post from. I chose to do Darling because of the roulette wheel and shuffle, so that one's on me. But apparently someone out there in the world really likes this album to slide the title track my way as well. 

So, I was technically focusing on the repackage album of this for Darling, so you get sort of new information. Released in 2011, this was their first full album. Containing a grand total of thirteen tracks and a runtime of 43 minutes, which averages out to a little more than three minutes a song, it's at a good length, even with the first track dropping the average. It did pretty well on the charts, peaking at second on the Gaon weekly chart and third on the Gaon monthly chart. No music show wins with it, but that doesn't matter because music show wins are not the final dictator of love for a song. 

Flashing Lights warning for the music video.

• Group: MBLAQ
• Debut Date: 2009 October 14
• Company: J Tune Camp
• Status: Hiatus/Disbanded
• Album: BLAQ Style
• Song: Style
• Release Date: 2011 January 10

This is peak...that time period. The hair. The clothes. The dramatic, smoky eyeshadow that if you leave it on too long without touching it up, you look like a raccoon. What? I don't have any experience with that. Nope. (This is sarcasm). Although, their eyeshadow? It looks more like flowers or some other kind of plant was drawn on with liquid eyeliner, which is super cool. Love the details here. I'll get to the actual song later. I just really want to talk about this music video. It might be because I'm working on something regarding the song, but it reminds me of a redder Everybody by SHINee. It's a little less science fiction-y than Everybody, but I am also reminded of The Fifth Element, so Style is like the love child of Everybody and The Fifth Element. 

Actually, I'm going to nerd out on the music video for a minute, if that's okay. It's also really hard to get clear screenshots of the music video, refer to the above link, because of the camera movements. So I'm going to just share some of them.

First of all, that opening? That transition? I mean, I know how they did it, but it doesn't change that I think it's really cool. So, it starts off blue and then transitions to red while also playing the video in reverse, which is a severely underutilized technique as far as I'm concerned. Why? I'm not entirely sure, but it is really pretty.

I tried to get the two shots as close to being parallels as possible. But that is actual artistry. Look at that.

Bad news: I had a hard time getting screenshots that were halfway clear because the camera was moving so much. But the ones I did get?

I mean, look at the framing here? The eye is naturally drawn into the member in the center because of both the set and the lighting, but the choreography also highlights him with the others bent around him.

The next three screenshots are going to highlight costuming and the aforementioned eyeliner. And their hair because nice. The middle one in particular (Thunder, who is "ma baby" according to the submitter, which just generally makes me smile with their fondness for him) has the fluffiest looking hair and I'm fascinated with the dye job. He looks so good, and even though they all have some sort of fur to their costuming, his hair takes that role because it looks a lot like the first member's fur mantle. And I love the single glove they've got going on.

It's a little hot. Not going to lie.

And another one of the third one from later, because yes.

So that's a thing. They're very pretty.

Moving on, I really, really like the set here (which, spoiler, it's mimicked in some of the music show performances I'm going to be offering to you). The heart centerpiece and the lights leading into it as well as the side lights leading to the heart once again focus the eye into the center with the members. But the red specifically drives down to the member in the center, who is not fluffy-haired Thunder. He's at the back right. 

And for the last one, I saw a comment on Tumblr back around when I posted the review for Darling, and I'd love to find it again but I can't, that said something along the lines of "When I think of diva groups, MBLAQ is the first that comes to mind." And I snagged this screenshot. And was reminded of that comment with that. Like. Okay.

Okay! That's it for the music video!

So, the submitter included a link to a video where Beast's Yoseob was mimicking Lee Joon (looking at the screenshot with the heart, he's the one on the left in the all-white top and the black pants. And in the one just above here, he's the arm you can just see on the left. The one just behind the dramatic one with the black fur is not Lee Joon, even though he has black pants from the pants because those pants are white in front) performing this. So I'm going to share that video with you all as well, since it was also "fantastic." 

That's actually pretty adorable. And funny. Lee Joon is so serious about the whole thing and Yoseob rocks on in and does his part, which is a little precious and Lee Joon's expression there is delightful. Also, the two groups are apparently really close, which isn't something I knew before this moment, but I can't tell you how much I love it. And the way Lee Joon breaks his serious expression to laugh at Yoseob is, again, nothing short of adorable.

And on the subject of Lee Joon, the eyeshadow in this next video is incredibly appropriate to the year, and he once again takes this job incredibly seriously, but what an incredible voice. The amount of work his eyebrows are doing while he's singing that is impressive, in a softer, subtle way that makes me smile a little. He clearly takes his job seriously.

So, does anyone else see severe potential in this song for a cover? It could be for a survival show or not, or just something that a group does because they want to drop a cover, but I can think of multiple groups who would do really well with something like this. BTOB would be top of the list because I'd love to see them do the choreography, but A.C.E's version could be very interesting, as could Cravity and DXMON. This is such a good, well-rounded song, and I'd love to see younger groups apply their intensity to it.

Because this choreography is delightful. Do they have to hop around an excessive amount? No, but who cares? They've got powerful moments when the song justifies it and softer movements to compensate for it.