Red velvet
there has always been something odd and off, a darkness at the heart of RV's concepts, right from the start. Sometimes it's plain to see, sometimes it's hidden or merely hinted at, but Red concepts are never just straight out cute-bright and Velvet concepts are never just straight out sexy-mature-serious. There are underlying layers and off-kilter symbolism. Some examples: Happiness - a very preppy, energetic song and MV. Yet the initial version of the MV had references to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and the 9/11 plane attack of the Twin Towers and an edit of Seulgi playing around with it. Ice Cream Cake - who can forget the haunting chanting of a child tune that the song begins with and that could've come straight out of a horror movie? In fact, the ICC chant was reused in Red Velvet concerts as an accompanying introduction theme of their scary horror segment at their Redmare concert. One of These Nights - what quite some RV fans had already figured out, not only is the song a sombre, mournful ballad, it also pays tribute as a remembrance to the horrifying Sewol boat incident. The symbolism is heavy and abundant in the MV, from the interiors in the MV that resemble ship interiors (the passages, lights and round windows), to paper boats in the teaser, to the various enactments used in the MV that resemble the descriptions of the happenings during the boat sinking, with Joy as the sole member representing the few survivors. Russian Roulette - the song is so happy, so bright! Yet in the MV we see the girls trying to off eachother in various ingenious attempts. Dumb Dumb - we see the girls being bored with their daily factory work life, feeling as if they're robots and clones, doing the same, meaningless work over and over again - only to truly come alive when they can smash everything up Red Flavor - sure, a happy video with large fruit getting interviewed. But what's really going on, why the seemingly innocent looking fruit is so large, is that - ok, I got nothing on this one. Peek-a-boo - all pretense has been discarded. Here we see the girls (alive? Ghosts?) planning and practising all kinds of murder scenarios, to be used for their monthly lunar sacrifice of a pizza boy, probably instigated by a late or otherwise bad pizza delivery once upon a time. The many pizza boy shirts in glass boxes and the 'missing delivery boys' poster on the pole with many rows of pictures on it shows that this has been going on for a long, long time. Also let's not forget the stares. Where as most girl groups in kpop are shown brightly smiling and winking in their videos and promotions, with Red Velvet we're often confronted with their deadpan, emotionless, cold stares in their videos, teasers and promotions. Even at those moments where if it were other girl groups there would be bright smiles and winks. Not with Red Velvet. There are those stares into the camera again. Cold, assessing as if they're looking straight into your soul. It occurs so many times, that it can't be anything else than that it's on purpose. JYP ordered Miss A not to smile at their debut performances, which was also done with a purpose, but with JYP and Miss A the purpose was to give them an empowering aura of strong girls. Not so with Red Velvet. Since their debut there are always these moments in their videos and teaser material that countermand the apparent bright themes and energetic tunes, that signal that something's off. Underlying themes and resonances that blend in with the main themes until something new, something different arises. This in an almost Lovecraftian way: no straight in your face horror, but more a lingering suspense, a feeling of discomfort, a coldness, a vague unease for something only seen from the corner of your eye. And this is reinforced by those stares, delivered in a deadpan, morose coldness: from the ending of Bad Boy, to Russian Roulette, to Peekaboo, to OOTN and on and on.