The Coming One - Super Band (2020)

HIGH-QUALITY BOY BAND SELECTION SHOW

I came to Super band 4 because of THE GALAXY. After finishing Chuang – 2021, I really wanted to spend more time with some of the trainees and Super band 4 happened to have 3 of them.

I would say I enjoyed Chuang – 2021 more (aka there were more trainees that I enjoyed watching), but I highly appreciated the musical quality of Super band 4.

*WELL-ORGANIZED SHOW
This is a well-structured show/ competition, though of course, at the end of the day, the one with more fans would be the winner. Still, sometimes the journey is more beautiful than the destination and this was true with this show.

I like the idea of forming the band from 2 people to 3, 4 and then 5. The process of grouping, disbanding and then regrouping reflects the reality of bands. In any musical gathering, you have to try to see whether you can fit with the others and no matter how difficult and heart-broken it is, if any of the members doesn’t feel like they could go on with the show, they have the right to quit and start all over. Thanks to this format, the viewers could see a wide variety of combination. Some of them worked miraculously, some of them didn’t, and that’s the attraction of the show.

I’m also particularly impressed by the expertise of the coaches. There were small tests and after each of them, they gave the bands the scores and actual helpful feedbacks. The coaches devoted their time and effort into guiding the trainees so that they could put on the best performances. They provided the trainees with harsh, to-the-point comments, yet at the same time still showed them enormous respect, even if the styles of music weren’t to their liking or the trainees didn’t really want to change. Hardly do I see such dedication coming from the coaches. The relationships between the coaches – trainees were more like teachers – students and I think the “MUSICAL HIGH SCHOOL” concept worked wonderfully!

Lastly, there was a quite equal of screen time among the bands. Besides those who had to leave the show very early, the ones that stayed did get enough chances to shine. No particular groups got too much attention are were especially focused all the time.

**MUSIC
I was in no way an expert in music. I learn a couple of musical instruments but only superficially. Therefore, I’m ill-equipped to give in-depth comments about the skill of the trainees and the coaches. The best that I could say is that the trainees in the show could just randomly pick up an instrument and performed a super complicated piece of music. There are some instruments I have never even heard of the names in my life and their sounds were just incredible.

***STRONG PERSONALITIES
The trainees in this show were really artists. They expressed their emotions freely. Some even ran away and lashed out during filming, which makes the show feel closer to reality. It may not be much but in Asian culture, showing such strong characteristics in front of the camera is not something you see every day.

****FILTER
I’m so happy with this filter. It looked really pleasant to the eyes. Even though the trainees did have some make-ups, they looked natural and at the right age. They looked the way they were supposed to be. Many of them were only 18-19 years old!
If I had to pick at the show, I would say there were a couple of things that prevented me from giving the show a higher rating

*COLLABORATION
I didn’t like the collaboration at all. I wouldn’t point at any specific ones but some of them were pretty … weird. Moreover, I always felt the stage was too crammed whenever there was a collab. Most importantly, nearly all of the trainees failed to on a par with the guests, which was not difficult to understand, judging their experience. In many ways, it did them more harm than good.

**EXTRA MATERIALS
This is my own problem. I couldn’t find the After party episodes with Subtitle to watch!!! Why weren’t they available on the official platform. I felt like I couldn’t know enough about the trainees to decide whether I should like them or not.
…
I cracked my brain to find any other problems with Super band 4 but so far I couldn’t think of anything more serious. I think this show is really worth watching, especially if you have some basic knowledge of music. Honestly speaking, I often found myself clueless whenever the coaches gave the comments. Still, It was very fun to watch and I could say the organizers wanted to promote more meaningful things (like team spirit, traditional music, family pride) than simply just make money for the show owners.

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