Hear me ramble about Girls' Generation

Here are some thoughts I've had while watching Girls' Generation's music videos and live performances, mostly from between 2009 and 2013. It's not about their music this time, because now I want to talk about how the group performs on stage and in general.

Elegance:
The members of Girls' Generation are definitely meant to look attractive on stage, but not necessarily "sexy". That would be a simple trick to get people to watch, but the way they appear is way more balanced and purposeful than that. Using any simple tricks like that would ruin the elegant atmosphere around them. They're not there to make you drool, they're there to fulfill a higher ideal of beauty and elegance with their look, their clothes, the way they stand and the way they behave. They stand with a straight back, look into the camera with a reserved confidence, and act like they're royalty. The viewer get what they want, but not too much of it. It's a balance that never really goes out of time. Other girl groups may have copied whatever was trendy at the time, or tried to act way too cute or be way too shocking without having any interesting art underneath to back it up with. Those groups feel dated now, but we still watch Girls' Generation's performance of "The Boys" and think they look cool and elegant.

Charm:
Tiffany has undeniable charm (and eye smile) that is just hers and can't be manufactured, but charm can still be very manufactured, and we're very gullible when it comes to this. A confident smile and some good lighting and it feels like the members of the group are our friends. Then after having created this parasocial illusion, they're very well-trained in not breaking the illusion. The girls always talk about their fans like we're their friends, and never say anything controversial that makes us doubt the illusion of them being nice, friendly and "perfect". You rarely read headlines where the members are caught saying anything that breaks their group persona, or breaks the image of them being that nice, friendly and unproblematic person who just as well could be your neighbour as a world-famous star performing on the big stages. In her book "Shine", Jessica Jung writes something like "Smile like the whole world is your best friend" about how they're trained to behave in front of a camera or an audience, and it isn't really more complicated than that. We see a smile that comes from the heart (even if it's also meticulously practiced) and we like that person. And it doesn't matter if we know that we don't know that person, because we feel like we do.

Stage presence:
When you don't think about how you look or what to do, and instead you're just present in the moment, that's what makes you look good on stage. Stage presence makes you fun to watch, because you believing in the performance makes the audience believe in it. I can't remember many vocal lines sung by Yuri, but I always like when she does something in a performance, because it looks believable and cool. That's because she has a great stage presence more than anything else. Stage presence is what makes a performance look good, even more than the technical ability to perform (but this is just a repetition of what I've said before).

Unique personal expression:
Even if it may feel like the members' personalities are washed down to fit a perfect ideal and to move together as a synchronized group, I still think it's this oiled machinery _mixed_ with the members' individual personalities that make Girls' Generation so good. They may wear the same costumes, but they all have their own unique charm. And when I say "unique", I don't mean some weird quirk that makes you stand out, I'm talking about that part of a personality you can't see, the part you can't manufacture. SM Entertainment can train the members to do everything right, but you can't turn someone who isn't Taeyeon into Taeyeon, because only she is herself. And here I think it all comes down to Lee Soo-man's personal intuition when it comes to finding charismatic and interesting people and seeing the potential for it in seemingly normal people (which is why it's such a shame he got kicked out of his own company... You can't replace Lee Soo-man's unique skills and vision even with a 1000 very smart people). He seems to be good at finding people who have something interesting about them that can't necessarily be put on paper and described with words. Girls' Generation differs from other girl groups in how every single member feels special, and no one feels like a backup dancer or someone faking an interesting personality.

Singing voice:
The group's vocals are obviously mainly meant to be listened to, but it's also something about being really good at singing which feels and looks cool in a performance. When I think about who are the "main" members of the group, I think of the ones who are the best at singing (Taeyeon, Jessica, Tiffany, but I may be biased here...), and I don't think that's a coincidence. Singing, and especially singing really well, is a powerful human capability. Still, Taeyeon laying nice adlibs during the last chorus of a song is a big part of what makes their performances great. Girls' Generation aren't a group with only perfect singers - their thing is more that they are all well-rounded in many different skills - but they have a special vocal sound and a special way to do melodies and harmonies, which combined with things like Taeyeon laying some nice adlibs during the last chorus of a song (and just her vocal tone and delivery in general), is a big part of what makes their performances.

Putting in the effort:
Girls' Generation feel like a more "definitive" group, than other similar girl groups from the same time, but I can't point at any specific thing that makes it this way. All the early 2010s girl groups kind of did the same thing. Girls' Generation doesn't have a gimmick or "thing" and they aren't really doing a specific genre. They're not the most extreme group, the most interesting group, or the most innovative group (but they're probably the closest to being this last one...). And when you can't put the finger on why something is really good, when you can't point to a specific attribute that makes it special, then no tricks have been used to make it appear good. It's actually good for real, because real effort has been put in.

I think Girls' Generation's greatness comes from being just a bit more talented than the others, from putting in a bit more effort into everything, and from having producers who are just a bit better and more daring with the sound. And the main point here is that they put in more effort into _everything_, into all different parts, and not just one or two things. They're really good at singing, and at performing, and they have interesting music, and their outfits are well thought-out and fashionable, and they look really good. And they don't do anything in a sloppy way. That, combined with how they "came first" (you may also argue that they didn't) and defined the trend for the kind of girl group they are, is what makes them feel like the definitive K-pop girl group and not just one of many.

The power of many (9):
One thing about Girls' Generation is that it's just cool that they are so many. Like, the shock of seeing so many people at the same time on a stage. The weird formations they can do. How they're not just a group of individual people on a stage but a big organism moving in sync.

Since they're a group, and not just individuals who happen to be on the same stage, you can't remove one member from the group and think the group will just lose 1/9 of its quality. Something will feel wrong when they're not 9 anymore, the formations and movements that were made for 9 people now don't look completely right anymore, and the formations depending on the group being an odd number of members now look slightly off too. And part of the charm of such a definitive and powerful girl group is to see them in 2025 performing their debut song from 2007 with the same members on stage like they did when they debuted. This unfortunately never happens, since Jessica left the group in 2014. You can enjoy the 8 members and their individual qualities how much you like, but you can't ignore that part of the group feeling disappeared when a member was lost 11 years ago.

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