A post dedicated to DBSK, and why their entrance into the Japanese music market is damn respectable.

1. DBSK/TVXQ becomes Tohoshinki in Japan, because they’ve accomplished so much in their Japanese activities that they actually earned a damn Japanese group name of their own. It’s like they become a totally different group, an actual legit Japanese group, as they start performing in Japan. They aren’t a Kpop group who just pops a very mild Japanese version of a Korean song on the side.

2. Performing on staircases in malls, in schools, having to enter work buildings, interrupt meetings to hand out some of their flyers and CD albums THEMSELVES and plead people to listen to them well, having to exchange business cards with others to get them to listen to Tohoshinki, was all part of their daily activities in Japan. Again, they had to do it in person, the five of them. There are videos of it.

3. It wasn’t until three years after they started promoting in Japan, that they were finally able to hold their first Japanese concert. Not ‘concert in Japan’, but Japanese concert. Meaning every. Single. Song performed was in Japanese.

4. They got to hold 4 Japanese concert tours in total, from 2007 to 2009, and not one song was performed in Korean. All Japanese.

5. They learnt practically everything about Japan. From the LANGUAGE, to the CULTURE, to the HISTORY of Japan. This includes manners, ways of speaking, expressions, the geography, the cities’ particularities (ex: food specialties), the traditions, and more; heck, they were making up dozens of ‘oyaji gags’, which are word plays with Japanese words. Let’s not forget Junsu’s obsession with those gags and tongue twisters.

6. They never had translators during interviews, or on talk shows. It was up to them to understand what was said and answer by themselves, in Japanese, for everyone else to understand.

7. When they went overseas to promote in Japan, even while they were struggling with their own promotions, fans back in Korea turned their backs on them. They complained about DBSK not caring about them enough to come back and said DBSK favored the Japanese fans over Korean fans. Hell, we had Jaejoong crying at a fanmeeting while talking about this issue and pleading the fans to wait for them, until they come back to promote in Korea.

List of their Japanese songs (originally Japanese, not translated from a Korean song):
…performed live*
- Kotoba wa Iranai*
- Asu Wa Kuru Kara*
- Somebody To Love*
- My Destiny*
- Break Up The Shell*
- Stay With Me Tonight*
- Aisenai Aishitai
- Eternal
- Heart, Mind, Soul*
- ZION*
- Sky*
- Begin*
- Choosey Lover*
- High Time*
- Dead End*
- Proud *
- Yakusoku *
- Miss You*
- Step by Step*
- Hello Again*
- TRICK*
- No?*
- Forever Love*
- Summer Dream*
- Ride On*
- Darkness Eyes*
- Lovin’ You*
- Rainbow*
- SHINE*
- Last Angel*
- CLAP!*
- Love In The Ice*
- Together*
- Kiss Shita Mama Sayonara*
- Song For You*
- Day Moon*
- Secret Game*
- FORCE*
- Survivor*
- Why Did I Fall In Love With You*
- Nobody Knows*
- Beautiful You*
- Wasurenaide*
- Purple Line*
- 9095*
- TAXI*
- Stand Up!*
- Kiss The Baby Sky*
- Bolero*
- Take Your Hands*
- Stand By U*
- Box In The Ship*
- We Are*
- Share The World*
- Try My Love*
- No Pain No Gain*
- Two Hearts
- Runaway
- Close To You
- Keyword
- If…
- Sennen Koi Uta
- Tea For Two
- Break Out!*
- With All My Heart
- Toki Wo Tomete*
- Wild Soul (Changmin solo)*
- Maze (Jaejoong solo)*
- My Girlfriend (Yoochun solo)*
- Rainy Night (Junsu solo)*
- Crazy Life (Yunho solo)*
- Xiahtic (Junsu solo)*
- Melody and Harmony (JaeChun)*
- Shelter (JaeChun)*

After the lawsuit:
JYJ:
- Get Ready*
- Itsudatte no Kimi Ni*
- Long Way*
- W*
- Intoxication (Junsu solo)*
- Kanashimi no Yukue (Junsu solo)*
- Beautiful Love (Junsu solo)*
HoMin:
- Magenta
- Thank You My Girl*
- I Don’t Know*
- Telephone*
- B.U.T.*
- Back To Tomorrow*
- Superstar*
- Easy Mind*
- Blink
- Android*
- I Think U Know*
- Duet*
- Weep*
- Still*
- Shiawase Iro No Hana*
- Winter Rose*

I know I’m missing some; it’s just too hard to keep track of all of them because there are too fkg many. That’s way over 100 songs right there, only in JAPANESE.

List of Japanese songs translated from a Korean song they all actually sound beyond legit:
- Hug*
- One
- Rising Sun*
- ‘O’*
- I’ll Be There*
- Beautiful Life
- You’re My Miracle*
- Mirotic*
- Checkmate (Yunho solo)*
- MAXIMUM (HoMin)*
- Keep Your Head Down (HoMin)*

May be missing some.

8. So basically, if you look at the*, they performed over 95% of their Japanese songs live. And I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a pretty damn long list.

9. Their performances in Japan (which includes all the concert tour performances as well) were ALL. LIVE. As in, no lipsynching whatsoever — at that time, artists weren’t allowed to lipsynch. That probably changed now because you see a lot of lipsynching nowadays. As far as I know, for 30-songs-and-more concerts, which is what DBSK held in Japan, they were allowed to lipsynch one or two songs. Nothing more.

I don’t even know what else to write. I’m looking at this song list, and I’m just dumbfounded. This is pretty fkg impressive. I kinda just feel like punching holes into walls and flipping tables right now, because so many ‘new Kpop fans’ don’t even know about these five absolutely amazing guys, or don’t bother to check them out because they’re ‘old’.
They’re not even that old. The age ranges from 24 to 26 years old.
Plus, talent has no age restrictions. And it’s thanks to them your oppas, noonas, unnies and/or hyungs are breaking into the Japan music market so easily.

While Yunho & Changmin, and JYJ are doing great right now if you ignore the major cockblocking by SME, I kinda just want them to come back together and show the world what it’s been missing on. Their acapellas were unique and their stage presence was indescribable.
Good thing it’s YUNHO, CHANGMIN, JAEJOONG, YOOCHUN & JUNSU we’re talking about here; otherwise, they wouldn’t be doing so great on their own.

Partly why I admire, respect and support BoA so much as well. She went through something similar.

*breathes into a paper bag* I started hyperventilating for some reason o_o

(via jaejoongsjiji)