When I first got into SNSD, I was busy trying to get ahold of all the current and back-related albums within the Girls’ massive catalog, and only barely paid attention to their latest Sub-Unit group that had just come out, Girls Generation TaeTiSeo or TTS for short. Comprised of Girls Generation’s “Hard Hitters” Taeyeon, Tiffany and Seohyun, their mini-album “Twinkle” focused more on the strength of the girls vocals than the decidedly more idol-centered SNSD projects, a move that was made pretty clear for me when I saw the MV for the title track.
I have to say that although I liked the song Twinkle well enough, I REALLY didn’t care for the girls’ look, aside from bangs, curly permed hair is the style I simply abhor, and though Seohyun wisely avoided the look, Taeyeon and Tiffany looked almost unrecognizable to me in that video with those crazy hairstyles, and I have to admit I didn’t have a whole lot of interest in getting it, allocating it to a “side project” that wasn’t part of the real SNSD discography. With that mindset, getting the Twinkle album was kind of put on the backburner and might have stayed that way for awhile, but by chance a friend of mine made a copy of the album for me, and wouldntchaknowit, that first night driving around listening to it, I was just blown away by it and it immediately became a regular album in my CD player in my car, and within a month’s time, knew that this was one mini-album I just HAD to have! I ordered it immediately!
When you think about Mini-albums or EPs in general, they’re usually presented in a CD sized digipak or jewelcase with little else, and I was totally expecting the TTS album to follow suit, but I’d forgotten one thing, and that was that when it comes to their Mini-Albums, K-pop releases are second to none!
Opening up my package, the first thing I was presented with was a big white folded up paper, which turned out to be a 18x24 folded up poster, MAN, though I didn’t care for the TTS hairstyles much, I couldn’t deny how BEAUTIFUL the poromotional pictures were! And and Billy Mays would say, but WAIT…there’s MORE!
Taking out the poster, I was next presented with this beautiful 5x7 package with a glossy mylar sleeve around it… when removed you got an overlay picture card and a pretty box…
Inside the box was an amazing 15 postcard set that featured pretty and colorful shots of the girls on both sides..
Postcard Set
And by the time I got to the collectible random member card (mine was of Seohyun) and the fold-out lyric booklet, I was so overwhelmed with goodies that when I came upon a silver seriographed object inside the booklet, I didn’t recognize what it was at first…THE CD!!!! LOLOL, I’d unpacked so many goodies from the package, I completely FORGOT the reason the package was FOR!
Yep, ultimately, all that extra stuff was all just enhancement to the actual point of purchase- the ALBUM, and Man, what an album it was! A MINI Album, to be sure, but so chock full of goodness! From the opening strains of the uber-funky title song “Twinkle” to the passive song “Baby Steps” through to the Hard Rockin’ “Checkmate”, this one ran the entire gamut, and even managed to introduce me to three new FAVORITE songs, actually the three middle songs, OMG, Library, and Goodbye Hello! First we’ve got OMG (Oh My God) that sounds like it could have come straight from the HOOT sessions, so brassy and full of punch, this retro-jazzy tune even reminded me of the old classic Hikaru Nishida stuff, for some reason!
Next we’ve got the sweetest track on here, the marshmallowy gentle “Library”, I’d already fallen in love with the song by it’s insanely catchy verses and chorus, but when I saw a Tiffany fancam and I got to see the song with her doing her absolutely adorable hand gesture- dance moves during the chorus, it sent it to the next level of LOVE!
And to top it all off we’ve got the amazing feel-good masterpiece Goodbye Hello, which is probably one of my very favorite SNSD tunes right now. How good is this song? Well If I had to sum it up I’d say that if Andy Sturmer and Roger Manning of Jellyfish ever wrote a K-Pop song, it might sound an awful lot like this song, full of bright McCartneyish piano chords, sweet choruses and an achingly heartbreaking story (of a girl who can’t believe her boyfriend would leave her), listening to Taeyeon, Tiffany and Seohyun harmonizing on the choruses sounds sooooo awesome, bittersweet never sounded so good!
Since the time Twinkle has been released, SNSD has so far released one Japanese Single already (and are preparing for another one), but I’m holding out for their next album proper- if it’s ANYTHING like TTS’s Twinkle album we’ll have one HELL of an album on our hands!!! Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com
