Greatest Hits:: Ladies' Code: Galaxy

 Looking at my submissions, of the five or so I've got left right now, all but two of them are boy groups and one of those two is a soloist. So I'll finish off the girl group submissions and then get going with the boy groups. The submitter for this one specifically pointed me to a performance on Show Champion for this and said that they really admired the group for coming back after the accident with a song like this. Now, I'm mostly familiar with Ladies' Code because that's the group that Ashley from Dive Studios is from, and I love her. I think she's hilarious. But I don't know much about the group or their songs, so this was news to me that something had happened. 

This is the group's most streamed song on Spotify, I think, which makes me so soft inside. MYST3RY was Ladies' Code's first single album, released in February of 2016, and their first release as a trio following the loss of EunB and RiSe. Galaxy has some chops behind it, produced by MonoTree, written by songwriters Choi Young Kyoung (who has written for Taeyeon, fromis_9, Dreamcatcher, and Everglow) and G-High (EXO, LOONA, Red Velvet, various NCT subunits), and arranged by Sean Soowan Chung (BTS, Seventeen, Block B, BTOB). Both song and album peaked on the charts in the mid-teens. I actually found a Music show performances were limited for understandable reasons.

• Group: Ladies' Code
• Debut Date: 2013 March 07
• Company: Polaris Entertainment
• Status: Hiatus
• Album: MYST3RY
• Song: Galaxy
• Release Date: 2016 February 24

This is a gorgeous song, and I'd bet dollars to pesos that the LAVELYs cried the first time they watched it. (I'm saying this with an understanding pat on the shoulders because heaven knows that there have been certain songs that have made me weep the first time I saw the video for, most recently being Moon.) The shots of the five person choreography made my chest tighten up. I'm also picking up on some vague Wizard of Oz vibes, which is interesting. What's strongest, though is the obvious symbolism. Triangles are the obvious one. They're a three-sided shape, which makes it an obvious choice to have given how many members the group has to perform now, but a fun fact that I learned while watching one of my gaming channels on YouTube play a bridge building sim game is that triangles are the strongest shape, which could symbolize the group's resilience. How many times can I use the word obvious this paragraph? There are so many triangles littered throughout, and the way the music video ends, specifically with the triangle highlighted and the members forming it, is pretty firm about their resilience.

Scissors were also a pretty easy one to pick up on. I counted seven showings of the scissors though I could be off. Scissors, if they're sharp, cut cleanly, but if they're dull, they tear instead. Honestly, I can't decide which one feels more likely to be the intending use in the music video, though now that I'm thinking about it, it might be both, a clean cut, like a DOA, or a tear, like a four day lost battle. I promise I'm not lingering on things to be morbid, but one of the main motifs of this music video is their specific loss and recovery.

And now that I think about it, the music video starts with the song title and black and white, darkness, the three members while sitting around a telephone still in black and white, darkness, and then finally color. The positioning of the hands also implies waiting.

Trapped bird.

Empty chairs.

There's one of the scenes where there are three clear glasses and two blue glasses, but the repetition of either three or two is, again, sprinkled throughout, to the point that I'm not sure I could catch all of them.

And now that I've probably made you not want to watch the music video if you haven't already, I will also say that the moody, debatably gothic setting is gorgeous, the montage is fascinating and well done, and the choreography is very well suited for this.

But the song isn't just the music video. It's also so smooth just as a song. There's no real bold statement to it, no low rumble of rap nor an emotional belt, but it's still so impactful because of the unhurried way the song flows from verse to chorus and back. 

And also, I'm loving how many different fandoms I'm seeing in the comments of the music videos to support them. That warms my little Fangirl heart.

I'm going to start off with the submitter's recommendation here. There really aren't too many live performances of this song that I can tell, which is perfectly fine. I've done more with less, and this isn't the kind of song that I'd necessarily want a plethora of performances for.

First of all, love the lighting at the beginning. It does such a good job with emphasizing the loneliness and grief of the song. It also does a really good job of hiding the backup dancers until it's time for surprisingly sultry choreography, keeping the emphasis on the three of them. Like, this is incredibly well crafted. The lighting designers deserve major kudos for this. Speaking of the backup dancers, they're going to make me cry a little because they're dressed like they're shadows of the other three. 

Ashley has a cute little wave in this. Zuny has moments where she's incredibly cute. But generally, this is an incredibly subdued song.

Okay, so this one, coming to us from MCountdown. The colors are reversed compared to the Show Champion stage, with the members in black and the two backup dancers (as well as the male backup dancers) in white. I want to take a second and just applaud the LAVELYs for the fanchant. It's so loud and clear, but then the fans are also so very, very quiet when it's not fanchant time. 

This performance actually does a great job of embodying what makes Ladies' Code stand out, with the classy, sultry choreography and the smooth ethereal vocals. I would love to see...well, not this song because it feels really personal, but another of their songs get covered by some of the younger groups. 

And here is the one from Simply K-Pop. This one is interesting because the members are all in different colors this time around. But I have to give the cameraman kudos for this one because they understood the assignment and focused in on the tiny details, something I thoroughly approve of. 

And I also appreciate that Zuny is in more of a cream than a white, which helps her to stand out from the backup dancers in their white a little bit more. 

All in all, the song is just gorgeous. Yes, Galaxy is nine years old, but there's a timelessness to it that defies its age.