Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Spazz! INFINITE's Kim Sunggyu

Warning: this corner might not make sense because, well, spazzing isn't really what you call an intelectual activity. I write who I've been paying attention to. The difference between Muse of the Moment and Spazz! is that MoM is also more of to spread awareness of the awesomeness of a particular tallent while Spazz! is just another fangirl activity. I apologize beforehand if and when things go crazy, because the possibility is quite high. Nevertheless, enjoy!


Who is my first Spazz! "victim"? It's none other than the honey-voiced leader of INFINITE, Kim Sunggyu!

I think I have to thank Sunggyu and his voice for making me fall in love with INFINITE. Yes, I know there's two main vocalists in INFINITE. But Woohyun's voice is, how should I say this, generic. His voice is wonderful, but there's a lot that's like him. Sunggyu is different. His voice just caught my attention in many marvelous ways and I haven't gone back since. To me, Sunggyu is the number one. His voice is just lovely and awesome and just melts your heart. Many fans coined the term honey-voice for him. I think it suits him. His voice is smooth and sweet. But aside from smooth, I actually think it's crisp. Here's to using food-related terms for voices. But, again, compared to Woohyun, his voice is more clear. I like it better than Woohyun's. Sorry, Namu.

He's also the one guy that I hear singing the chorus during live performances. If you must know, most groups don't bother with the chorus. They just let it be. Why? Because most of the time the chorus is sung by all, and this is where the most rigorous dancing takes place. But no, INFINITE is singing almost full live. Why almost? Well, there's still some lines that are not sung but I'll let that be. I mean, how could this guy sing so awesome while doing rigorous choreography? I still don't know how he does it. He doesn't even sound like he's out of breath or anything. Pure vocal magic. Lesson to other groups: practice your vocals while practicing your dance, don't do it separately.

Sunggyu actually ran away, is that the right term?, from his home of Jeonju, North Jeolla to the big metropolitan called Seoul. He then later went to Hongdae, which is known for its indie music community. Hongdae by the way is the abbreviation of Hongik Daehakgyo or Hongik University. It's also an arts school, and I think there's technology majors too but it's mostly known for arts. Okay, so back to the Sunggyu-ran-away story. He went there all by himself, just out of uniforms, and joined a band. Yes. How rock-n-roll is that? I totally forgot what the name of the band was (was it Beat or something?) but the songs they brought was very anti-idol music, at least to my knowledge. They did Linkin Park and Ellegarden (J-rock band) and did many other songs around the rock genre. I saw a pre-debut video of him and his band and they did f*cking metal rock. Awesome! He did the whole screaming thing. Me love. Yes, I'm that chick who love me some hardcore once in a (very long) while.

I actually feel somewhat bad for him. I'm pretty sure rock bands aren't too big of fans of idol music. As far as I know, he actually auditioned for Woollim Entertainment because he thought he'll be in an actual band of some sorts where they play instruments and all. Even though he now thinks being an idol is cool and all that, I bet there's still that little part of him that still wants to do rock. And in a recent interview he did say that he'd love to try rock again later on. But hey, if he never debuted as an idol I wouldn't be here spazzing a whole post about him. So that's my gain.

Besides his marvelous voice, he's also a pretty handsome boy. I've actually heard people thought he was ugly especially during their rookie days. Say what? He may not have double eyelids or have a Grecian bod or have chiseled body features. He's human. But he's not ugly. They say it's his haircut's fault. Well to me, his haircut during "Come Back Again" was awesome. He should totally go mohawk again.

Sunggyu and his skinny, sexy self, plus the glorious mohawk.
Featuring Namu and Hogod.

I first saw him in BTD (yes, the amazing that is BTD). He was the only member I cared researching about because of his marvelous, marvelous voice. I thought, in BTD, he looked a bit, I don't know, not his best? Especially in the video. I blame the horrid costumes! Seeing him in a fur coat and/or a thick woven turtle neck makes me feel stuffy for his sake. But when they decided to switch it up with the sparkly long-sleeve and leather halter top/man apron, that's when I thought that's more like it.

Stuffy, yet dandy.

I actually don't like how he looked during "Nothing Sober Nothing's Over". He looked very girly. I like my men looking like a man. Not a Grecian god. Just a man.

In the BTD era, he and the rest of the boys are all skinny. Not SHINee circa Juliette skinny (that was a horrendous moment in SHINee history, if you ask me), but skinnier than their healthy image when they debuted. My maternal instincts kick in and I instantly want to feed him. Yes just him.

Look at skinny Gyu! I will hold you responsible, Woollim.
And now... With the promotions of "Be Mine", I love his styling choices! Because I love it when a guy can pull off a hair curl/twirl. Not as extreme as Superman but like cool hair curl/twirl.

Behold the glorious hair curl from the side.
Oh, and don't get me started on his leadership skills. He leads the pack like a boss! I watched the latest (5th episode) Sesame Player, the variety show they starred in, and Leadergyu, as we fans like to call him, showed us his leadership skillz. Okay, so maybe in the episode he looked very bossy. But then again this is a variety show. But he's not a bad leader because he actually tries with all the study he's done and also because he makes it noticeable and places himself as the leader.

He's also one polite kid. He was chosen as the 5th most polite idol ever. 5th isn't a very cool place to stand but when the poll was conducted they weren't active. It means that he left quite an impression. Most of the voters were staff which goes to show at how nice he is because sometimes artists don't give a damn to staffs. One other thing that impressed me quite a lot was the BTD performance during Chuseok. Chuseok is like Korean's Thanksgiving and, compared to America's own, it's one of the biggest holidays of the year. So what happened during that performance? They integrated a bow before the famous scorpion dance. How cool is that? And yes, it's Sunggyu's idea. Aw... International fans thought it was their thanks to the fans. Hah, how naive. It's actually a lot more than that. They're bowing to the whole friggin nation. And it's not just a 90 degree bow. It's a full floor (what do you call this?) bow. Awesome.

Thanks to his voice, I came back from my K-pop slump. Yes, to me K-pop was that bad at the time. Still is, but it's picking up pace. INFINITE is that light at the end of the very long tunnel, that burst of sun ray at the end of a dark, rainy day. Okay maybe not that much. But they bring hope to K-pop. At least from my point of view. But all my love for them started because of BTD and Sunggyu's voice.

PLUS HE'S JUST SO AWESOME! CAN'T YOU TELL?

To prove my point, here's a totally awesome song he did on Yoo Hee-yeol's Sketchbook, a full on live performance filled with lovely Sunggyu vocals. Hooray! Singing starts at 4:40.

6 comments:

  1. I loved your post!!! Leader Gyu is also my favorite member in infinite and the 1st I noticed when I discovered them with BTD ^^

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  2. you know... YOU'RE TOTALLY VOICING MY HEART OUT OMG I LOVE KIM HAMSTER SO EFFING MUCH. MY TOP BIAS EVER.

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  3. Arghh..we have same opinion...i'm agree n like it..sunggyu just not ordinary person..actually he very special..n my bias forever..thanks for sharing

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  4. I totally love your post, albeit a bit late. Let's just say I'm a late bloomer....hehehe. I only started noticing Infinite when 'The Chaser' was released. It wasn't until this year that I was really into them and 'Be Mine' is my all time favourite. Sunggyu quickly caught my attention with his very distinct unique vocal. Yes you can definitely hear his voice over the others during chorus :)

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  5. I totally agree on with everything you said. Same with me it was sunggyu that draws my attention to infinite. But it was when I hear his solo song I Need You. I knew infinite from their first song "Comeback Again". When The Chaser hit no 1 spot on various music charts, i really didn't bother to look out more information about them. But now, I've searched and watched tons of videos with infinite and sunggyu. There are some which I really want to know what they're talking about but there are no eng sub available. It makes me hoping I can understand korean and sub the shows so other international fans could understand as well. Ah!

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  6. Woah u read my mind!

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