Recording a Song When You are Not a Singer- Avery Wise

This project taught me more about K-pop than I ever thought it would, specifically in regards to the difficulties of singing and recording songs. Since I was not keen on being in the video, I offered to sing. I decided to do Dean’s parts and through this learned that while I thought rapping in English was difficult, Korean was much harder. I am currently taking Korean so reading the lyrics was not an issue for me. However, matching the beat and memorizing the lyrics was harder than anticipated. I do not do well having to memorize things under pressure, so at points it was a little overwhelming.

There were points I wanted to give up and almost cried because I could not memorize it fast enough. I repeated the major rap part at least 30 times before I was satisfied with the result. Through singing and rapping in a foreign language, I feel I was able to better empathize with foreign idols who come to Korea with only basic knowledge and are expected to sing or rap perfectly. In addition, once we started recording I became increasingly paranoid of messing up and self-aware that I am not that great of a singer. This added to the stress of the one-take strategy we were using to record the song. Knowing that this audio was going to be put over the music video my group mates worked so hard making drove my desire to do well and not be a burden to the overall group, much like members of K-pop groups often talk about not wanting to hold the team back and wanting to work hard for the benefit of the entire group, not just themselves.

Even with all these thoughts going through my mind, I think I was able to record the song as best as I could given the circumstances. I still do not think I am a good singer, but I believe I did enough to satisfy the group and positively contribute to the overall success of our music video.