When I heard that KARA’s Goo Hara is releasing a solo album, the thoughts that came into my mind was half excited, half worried. From the start of her debut, as KARA’s visual member, she is someone who always receiving criticism regarding her vocal. However, she is also someone who always shows a noticeable improvement in her skill and proves her growth every time she released an album. If you look at her solo song ‘Secret Love’ that was released on KARA Solo Collection album, Goo Hara’s potential as a singer can be seen.
At last, Goo Hara released solo album. ‘Alohara’ is an album where you can see her thirst to be a solo singer that have been hidden all those times. It’s an album where Goo Hara herself participated directly in every process, from the album concept, choreography, to the MV and finished through careful meetings with the staffs. Goo Hara even gives changes to the stylings for each stage on music program. On every single stage, Goo Hara talked it together with the stylist. It’s an album that was born ‘From Goo Hara, by Goo Hara, and for Goo Hara’.
However, the response to the title song ‘Choco Chip Cookie’ that was chosen by Goo Hara herself was kind of hit and miss. Instead of Goo Hara’s unique freshness, ‘Choco Chip Cookie’ has a metaphorical sexiness, it was very different with the current girl group’s trend. Moreover, ‘Choco Chip Cookie’ has a dreamlike melody that softly stays on your ear. It’s a song with a strange charm.
Goo Hara is aware of the response toward ‘Choco Chip Cookie’. Tenasia recently talked with her on a music program and she expressed the responses that surround her album “I think it’s between like and dislike. There were some who expecting fresh and bright song like my previous solo song ‘Secret Love’. There were also lots of response that said the song ‘Hara Goo’ is more appealing and questioning why it’s not the title song. I pushed for ‘Choco Chip Cookie’since it’s a song that hooks you the more you listen to it. I aimed for that”.
Putting aside the response about the title song, there’s also another mountain that Goo Hara needs to climb. The criticism toward her singing ability. As expected, Goo Hara is well aware about this. She knows very well what is her own strengths and weaknesses. Even though she doesn’t have a vocal that will give you goosebump like other talented singer, but she has the capability to dominate the stage and draws people attention on stage. She has showed her growth all these times and this solo album too not a perfect work but it’s more like another step of her growth. her determined dream about being a singer is also one of her strength.
“It’s not that I’m not aware of the criticism toward my singing ability. But even then I still want to do activity as a singer. I don’t want to do acting just because people saying I can’t sing. Because I know that I shines and colorful on stage. I think it will be alright if I show my growth every time I prepare an album. Even when I heard people say “You’re going solo?”, that words motivates me.”
Goo Hara isn’t scared of criticism. Instead she accepts malicious comments and expressed “I get cursed a lot, however it’s better than no comments". It’s a time when I can develop more through those hate comments. While preparing, I didn’t expect to receive comments such as ‘It’s a big success’, ‘Goo Hara is a great solo singer’, but instead I want to give them curiosity and expectation like ‘Oh, she has this side of her too? I’m looking forward to her next album’. It’s a bait for me to prepare for a better album.”
A popular music critics, Kim Sunghwan gave his review “The song ‘How is it’ reminds me of 4minute’s Hyuna, while ‘Hara Goo’ is Lee Hyori. However, ‘Choco Chip Cookie’ reminds me of Goo Hara. It’s not a common song. Goo Hara must have wanted to show a different performance. Since it’s not a challenge that was done because of obsession toward becoming a hit, instead it properly reflects the desire that she really wants to convey. In the end, it’s far from the mass appeal, but I can feel the part that even without KARA, Goo Hara is accomplished in doing performances alone.”
Goo Hara’s bait is a success. The immature prejudice of “Goo Hara is doing solo?” started to be melted slowly through Goo Hara’s growth and passion toward performances. KARA itself is a group that already passed their growing phase and already reached the top. Then what kind of growth that can be seen from Goo Hara who already took her first step as a solo singer.
Kim Sunghwan gave his affectionate advice by saying “It’s my personal wish, but I hope Goo Hara will choose her next song after listening to music a little bit more deeper and do a research seriously about various genres. She has the voice type that will get thinner as the note range become higher, so she needs to make up for that, and also when she pursues something other than something trendy, she needs to think more about how to express it better.”
Source: http://tenasia.hankyung.com/archives/599872
Trans: Yuda (thank you so much :))
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