I am an avid fan of Korean pop music. Over the years I have bought probably over a 150 Korean CDs. Some were of rock and rap, but mostly of it was ballads and pop music. I have not bought that many recently, because I am getting older and the same high pitched, high energy of Kpop doesn’t do it for me that much anymore. I am loyal to a set group of singers and bands that usually produce one or two albums per year. One of these groups is the now defunct JEWELRY. I have all their Cds. From their fifth Cd on they got two new members, Kim Eun Jung and Baby J, also known as Ha Ju Yeon.
Ha Ju Yeon is going to be who I will mostly be talking about. According to her biography on many websites it is said that she was born and raised in Southern California and is known as the fluent English speaking rapper of the group.
Now, I can accept that she is so called rapper, my disdain for that title is for another entry on a future date, but the fact that claims to be fluent in English. She is not! She is speaks English is such a forced and strange way that it causes me to spontaneously spew blood from my ears whenever I hear her utter any kind of word in English. I am not trying to rag on her because she doesn’t speak English well. That’s fine and I can accept that, what I don’t like is how both Ha Ju Yeon and her management team tote her around as this Korean American who speaks English perfectly.
She claims to have gone to school in the United States and only recently went to Korean to pursue her rapping and singing career. In Korean pop music a lot of singers like to incorporate English lyrics into whatever bullshit song they are singing. Most of the time it sounds fine. It is accented and sometimes sounds funny or cute but it is tolerable.
The Kpop singer BoA is a good example of someone being humble about her English skills. In 2009 BoA broke through the US music charts with her hit club and gay anthem “Eat You Up”. It is a nice song about a girl who wants to consume everything her man gives her, well maybe that is not a good interpretation, but she played it to a packed audience at the GLBT parade that year. The song and album kind of sucks but it’s all in English and it is accented and weird, but she admits that she had trouble with the language. Which is great cause she acknowledges that she has a hard time with English.
Ha Ju Yeon’s English is so cringe worthy. Its not about her accent but her intonation and it sounds weird and bad. In the song called “VARI2TY” she begins the song with her speaking in English and the way she sounds is so odd. Its like words were tortured or beaten out of her. Plus the fact that she is the rapper of the group. A rapper of the group who only raps in shitty English.
I am not making fun of her English, I am mad at the fact that she is supposed to be this great fluent speaking Korean American girl who made it in the Kpop scene. Jessica Jung of the Girls Generation has the best English in the Kpop scene. She was actually born and raised in San Jose, California and she speaks and sings English perfectly.
Jessica Jung and a few other ladies have the right to be called fluent English speakers. Not Baby J AKA Ha Ju Yeon.
Below are two examples of how shitty her English is. You can get an example of how bad her English is within the first 45 seconds of each song, thank God!
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