One of my weird habits is that I listen to ballads when I work out (I think it helps me concentrate) and I have a "work out" mix chock full of slow jams which of course includes some K-pop tunes. I was flipping through some songs at the gym when a girl next to me saw my iPhone screen and yelled, "Oh! You listen to Ailee? I love her!" Normally I would've been like, "Yo.. why are you staring at my phone?!" But she was cute so of course, I let it slide and we got into a conversation about K-pop. Unfortunately, she has a boyfriend but who knows what can happen with a little K-pop power.

Cool Things of the Week

2NE1 on 'Running Man'

Girl groups on 'Running Man' isn't anything new but it is when it comes to 2NE1. A few months ago, YG Entertainment stated that they would make more of an effort to get their artists out into the TV world and so far, they are sticking to that plan with this appearance along with CL and Sandara Park appearing on the show 'Incarnation'. The girls themselves said on the show that they wanted to change their image and get away from the "scary girl" look. More power to them and I hope this is just the start.

The IU / Eunhyuk Picture Revisited

Speaking of 'Incarnation', IU appeared on the show last week and while she addressed the Eunhyuk photo scandal, the hosts didn't get too aggressive with the questions they asked and IU did her job which was to seem like she was giving information but not really. In other words, nothing was resolved and it looks like this whole scandal has drifted into the abyss where celebrity scandals go to die.

Tiffany, Taeyeon, Sunny in LA for Korea Day

The three ladies of Girls' Generation were at the L.A. Dodgers vs. Cincinnati Reds baseball game to celebrate Korea Day. Those teams feature the two most well known Korean players on their roster (Ryu Hyun Jin for the Dodgers and Shin Soo Choo for the Reds). Tiffany sang the US National Anthem, Taeyeon the Korean Anthem (see The Taeyeon Experiment), and Sunny threw out the first pitch (she did a decent job relatively speaking). I only wish I were in LA to try and convince Taeyeon to read this column!

Hyorin Going Solo?

Of course she is! Listen, SISTAR as a group is very talented but there's no question that Hyorin is the Diana Ross (or Beyonce if The Supremes is a little too old school) of the group so it's not a surprise that there are reports that Hyorin is preparing for her solo debut. K-pop realizes that even if they let a member go solo, fans will come back for the next group project as well. It's double the money utilizing the same singer!

Girl Group Round-up

A list of all the girl group appearances on variety shows (that I saw) this week.

• 'Incarnation' - IU (see Top 5 Current Girl Groupers)
• 'Radio Star' - Clara (so... I guess she's getting popular for having big boobs?)
• 'Weekly Idol' - Girl's Day
• 'Star King' - A Pink (see Top 5 Current Girl Groupers), SISTAR, Jessica Gomes
• 'God of Food Road' - After School Jooyeon (see Top 5 Current Girl Groupers), Eyoung, Kaeun
• 'Real Men' - Rainbow
• 'Running Man' - 2NE1 (see Top 5 Current Girl Groupers)
• 'Healing Camp' - Suzy
• 'Hello' - f(x)
• 'Beatles Code' - 5dolls

The Taeyeon Experiment

Each week I will post a picture from Taeyeon's Instagram feed in the hopes that one day, she'll post a picture of herself reading this column.

So classy in that dress at the Dodger's game. As a bonus, here's a video of her and Tiffany singing the Korean and U.S. anthems:

Pic/.Gif/Video of the Week

This is an interesting picture from CL's Instagram feed taken with the very famous DJ Skillrex. The guy is credited with taking the dubstep sound into mainstream and a lot of the integration of dubstep with pop music is in large part because of him (and his weird hair). It's interesting because if he's working with the crew over at YG, I'm curious to see what comes from all this. Hopefully the results are better and come out faster than whatever they did with will.i.am.

Uncle Fan Mailbag

I think kkangjji and I are virtual BFF's."Among the [older K-pop girl groups], i,e. SNSD, Kara, 2NE1, Wonder Girls who do you like the most? And among the 'new generation of [girl groups], i.e. A Pink, Dal Shabet, Hello Venus, Crayon Pop, [who] do you like the most?

-kkangjji

I seem to answer at least one of your questions a week so thank you for reading each week and participating although I find it depressing that your definition of "older girl groups" includes SNSD (Girls' Generation) and Wonder Girls (for me that list would include S.E.S and Fin.K.L). More than liking one group, I tend to like certain songs and concepts. For instance, I loved WG's "Nobody", Girls Generation's "Hoot", and 2NE1's "I Don't Care" but I'm not tied to a single group. As for the newer groups, I don't know too much about them so what I listen to is based on how much I like the individual members. I liked Eunji from her role in 'Reply 1997' so I got into A Pink; it's as simple as that.

For sure. "I hope I can be Uncle Fan's friend *brofist*"

-soshibias1250901

Any fan of girl groups is a friend of mine.

A Few Non-K-pop Related Things

1. 'World War Z' is the officially my favorite movie of the summer so far. I'm a little late to the game but from start to finish, the entire theater was on the edge of their seats. 

2. The nerdosphere is aflutter with news that Apple is furiously working on its latest game changing gadget, the iWatch. I mean, do Apple geeks even care that much about this? Unless it can tell me what time I should buy a lottery ticket to increase my chances of winning... not interested. 

3. Speaking of the lottery...The Powerball lottery is up to $235 million (as of 7/30/13). If I win this week, the Uncle Fan will be retiring for good and moving to a cabin near a lake to do some fishing for the next 40 years.

Top 5 Current Girl Groupers

1. Taeyeon - Did you see her sing the Korean national anthem? How can she NOT be #1?
2. Eunji - I think she's getting hotter. I feel creepy saying that but it's true
3. Minzy - The 2NE1 dancing machine was showing off her brute strength on 'Running Man'
4. Jooyeon - Adding her to my growing list of 'pretty girls who eat a lot'
5. IU - At least she had the guts to talk about tweeting a picture of her and a guy in bed. 

Song of the Week

That's it for this week. Have a good one and make sure to go eat something good today!