Video Analysis of “30 Sexy”
Rain showed his transformation to a 30-year-old sexy mature man image in the music video of song “30 sexy” through his music, choreographed dance and differences between two groups of background dancers. This song is title song from his album Rain Effect, which is his first studio album in 6 years, also first album after military service. The time of the song release was also about the time of his thirtieth birthday, which indicated by the name “30 sexy”. I consider this song as a milestone of his transformation from a boy to a man, which was embodied by visual expression of this music video.
First of all, the music style of “30 sexy” is quiet different from Rain’s earlier dance music or ballad songs. This one tends to contain some hip-hop and slow electronic elements with use of trendy synthesizer and simple hip-hop drum beat. This change in music style encouraged the audience to relate it to his image change. Another thing that I noticed was Rain used English lyrics “Party-ya-yi-ya oh baby” “Cause I’m 30 baby, come over here” as chorus. Benson in ‘English and identity in popular music’ argued that “Their use of English is likely to involve the projection of new identities” (2013: 26) and “their music videos projected more sexually assertive identities than those found in their earlier Thai and Japanese work” (2013: 31). His use of English in this song projected his new identity of a 30-year-old sexy man, which contributed to his image transformation.
“The global popularity of Rain and his shirtless torso contributed to generating a new standard for K-pop’s male performers, transforming the body itself into the primary stage prop” (Epstein et al. 2012: 7). Rain’s performance is known to be powerful and popular. He used it as a tool to promote his new musical identity in “30 sexy”. Since this music video is performance-based, the choreography stands out and became a very important element. The whole choreography holds on to a smooth and slow dance style. Following the concept of being “sexy and mature”, he tends to show his sexiness by adding a lot of body twisting with intimate facial expression.
This video utilized 3D light and visual effect to illustrate black and white background of choreography done by Rain and his background dancers. The background dancers in this music video are two groups of people, mature men and sexy women with mask and red short hair. It is noticeable that the mature men’s looking were not unified like in other mv, they have their own hairstyle and hair color, and some with mustache some with hat. These dancers emphasized the idea of mature male population that represented by Bi Rain. On the contrary, the female background dancers (referred as “sexy lady” in lyrics) can be easily identified as the same person with same red hair, same mask covering their faces, and same costume. All of them were wearing a black high slit dress, frequently doing dance moves that show their bare legs. “Just as the hard male body conveys ideas of a ‘global and powerful Korea,’ so too then have ‘interminable’ bare female legs become a marketing tool and branding technique for an enticingly toned and ‘impeccably executed’ Korea.” (Epstein et al. 2012: 14). The music video emphasized male glamour in this contrast, objectified women to highlight men power.
“K-pop is driven by the visual” (Epstein with Turnbull 2014: 316). Artists usually express themselves not only through music, but also more often, through their music videos. Rain utilized different elements in this mv to convey an idea of: a man growing up and reach age of 30, which is an important age of becoming sexier and being able to attract more “sexy ladies”.
References:
Benson, Phil. “English and identity in East Asian popular music.” Popular music 32, no. 1 (2013): 23-33.
Epstein, Stephen, and James Turnbull. “Girls’ generation? Gender,(dis) empowerment, and K-pop.” The Korean popular culture reader (2014): 314-336.
Epstein, Stephen, and Rachael M. Joo. “Multiple exposures: Korean bodies and the transnational imagination.” The Asia-Pacific Journal 10, no. 33.1 (2012): 1-17.