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noonaishere · 10 months

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Music of the Heart [J.YH] - two | mahler

*One week later

You stood outside the doors of Wonderland Entertainment with your bass over your shoulder. It suddenly felt unrealistically heavy to you. That didn’t make sense, it had felt fine the whole time you were on the subway and when you walked from the station to the doors you were currently standing in front of. The building looked totally shuttered from the outside, tastefully designed to let outside light into the lobby while hindering prying eyes, considering who might be inside at any moment. You took your phone out and checked the email from the receptionist to make sure of the number you were supposed to call upon arriving. You copied it to your phone, and dialed.

“Hello?” The voice of a woman answered. “Wonderland Entertainment, this is Mina speaking.”

“Hi, I’m t/n, I have an appointment with Producers Kim and Maddox today?”

“What is this in reference to?”

“The position of studio bassist.”

“I see you right here. Are you outside the front door?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll buzz you in.”

The lock on the door buzzed, and when you pushed the handle, it released. You inhaled deeply and pushed the door open all the way.

The inside of the building was much more inviting than the outside would have you believe. It looked like most other upscale lobbies, though it did have decor related to the business it housed.

“Hi, I’m Mina.” The young woman behind the receptionist’s desk said as she waved at you from across the lobby.

You quickly walked over to the desk. “Hi. Um, do I need to sign in or something?”

“No, you already told me who you were. Let me just call someone from security to watch the desk while I take you over, and then I can walk you to the recording room.” She smiled.

You nodded. The recording room? You thought the audition would be in an auditorium or something with the kind of starpower Wonderland had under its management. While Mina picked up her desk phone and called security, you took the opportunity to look around. As far as you knew, this was the only time you’ll ever be in this building in the whole of your life, so you might as well get an eyeful.

There was the Company Statement, which you weren’t too interested in, not when there was a wall of accolades. There were vinyls and CDs in frames on one of the walls, ones that went gold or platinum, you suspected. You couldn’t see the names on the plaques from where you were standing, but you could see some of the package designs and knew which groups and soloists they were--

“He said he’ll be over in a few minutes, you can look around if you like.”

“Oh--”

“Everyone likes to look at the gold and platinum wall.” She smiled.

“Oh, okay. Thanks.”

She smiled and nodded as you made your way over.

You could see the names as you moved closer, and they were all of Wonderland’s biggest idols: the girl groups AUrOrA and proMISS, the boy group JUPiTER; some of the most popular groups around. The soloists, Yu Satbyeol, Cho Sookjin, and Choi Jongho were also there, with all of their gold and platinum albums displayed prominently. Somewhat further away was the record of a group you recognized: Ans:wer. You remember they had torn up the music shows as monster rookies and established themselves into solid careers. To your knowledge they hadn’t broken up, though, they hadn’t done much in recent years since they had all gone to do their military service around the same time. All the pictures of them looked so much younger than they were now, fresh-faced youths instead of grown men with wives and children, accolades frozen in time.

There was another wall with photos of their biggest acting stars and many of the idols from before were repeated there in tasteful headshots. For a moment you wondered if you even had the right to stand in the same building as them. But… no one told you to dream small. You were here for a reason.

“Miss t/l/n? He’s here,” Mina said and you turned to see one of the security guards getting comfortable in her seat at the desk. “I can take you over now.”

You nodded and walked over to join her.

You followed behind her for a few moments before she addressed you.

“So, are you excited?”

“Excited?”

“To audition for someone like producer Kim or producer Maddox?”

“Oh… well, I’d just be a studio bassist, so I can’t imagine I’d really be working with them.”

“You’d be in the same room with them.”

“Yeah, but they’re the ones writing the basslines, you know? It’s their vision. I’m just there to play,” you shrugged.

She turned to you and stopped. She pouted, bottom lip sticking out. She hugged you.

“Uh, thanks?”

“You’ll get it. I promise.”

You were slightly uncomfortable, but you could tell she meant well. You patted her back. “Umm, thank you.”

She stopped hugging you and smiled cheerily, and then turned back around to lead you to your destination.

Sure.

A few minutes later, you were at the studio door and Mina opened it for you, leading you in.

“The 2:30 audition is here.”

“Thank you, Mina,” one of the two men nodded at her.

She nodded and went to the door. “Psst!”

You turned to her.

He held up her fists and mouthed the word “Fighting!” with a smile before closing it.

You laughed softly and turned back to the two men, they watched Mina as she left.

“So strange…” the one who hadn’t thanked Mina said with a chuckle.

“Well, she means well.” The first man stood. “Hi, I’m Kim Hongjoong, one of the producers here at Wonderland Entertainment.”

He held out his hand to shake yours and you did. “I’m t/l/n t/f/n. Nice to meet you.”

“This is Maddox. Also a producer,” he gestured to the other man.

Maddox stood and shook your hand.

You did.

“It’s nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too.” He smiled.

“Now, t/n, you’re here for the bassist position?” Hongjoong asked.

“Yes.”

“Are you ready to play?”

You nodded. “Generally always am.”

His eyebrows ticked up as he shared a look with Maddox.

Maddox laughed him off. “Let’s get you set up.”

Maddox got you situated in the recording booth, where a camera was also trained on you.

“I hope you don’t mind,” Hongjong said through the mic. “We have a few people auditioning and we’d like to be able to review them later when we decide.”

“Not a problem,” you said as you adjusted the headphones you were wearing and tested your bass for the feedback. You adjusted a string slightly until it was back in tune.

“I hope you can sight read,” Maddox said as he turned the mic on.

“Of course.” You flipped through the sheet music. The pages that belonged to each other were numbered, but they didn’t have titles. So it was a quiz.

Sneaky.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Hongjoong said.

You nodded and arranged the sheet music on the stand so you could see it all, it could have only been part of the song.

You played the opening notes with a pick and thought for a moment before realizing what it was: Jungle Man by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. You smiled to yourself for having guessed it so fast. Now that you knew what the song needed, you stuck the pick between your teeth and started over, pulling and slapping at the strings to make the loud, funk-bass sound.

The sheet music ran out and you played the next portion of the bass line before stopping.

“You knew the song?”

“Yep. Chili Peppers have some pretty good bass lines.”

Hongjoong and Maddox looked at each other.

“You can start the next one when you’re ready,” Hongjoong said.

You nodded and set up the next song and clicked your tongue to the beat as you read it, it looked really familiar. You laughed to yourself and put your pick on the stand before playing with your fingers, because you knew this song too: The Last Baron by Mastodon. A song you had played a lot for practice when it first came out. You started right in with the crunchy part under the bassist’s verse before moving into the groove-metal section during the lead guitarist’s verse. The big slides made you glad you had practiced it so much, otherwise your fingers wouldn’t be fast enough to keep up.

You stopped playing and looked at the two of them.

You could see Maddox laughing. “Did you know that one too?”

“I used to use it to practice groove-metal basslines. Haven’t listened to it in a while though.”

Maddox nodded and turned away, his shaking back told you he was still laughing. Hongjoong looked… not annoyed; worried? Like he was thinking at least.

Maddox said something to Hongjoong with the mic off, and because you couldn’t see his mouth you couldn’t even guess what he said. Hongjoong nodded.

“You can play the last one.”

You nodded and rearranged the last set of sheet music. You looked at it for a moment and realized that the tuning was different from the first two. You took your headphones off and re-tuned. When you put them back on you could hear Hongjoong’s voice asking:

“You just did that by ear?”

“Yeah. I have perfect pitch, actually.”

You were looking at the sheet music and didn’t see what his expression was.

The note structure of the sheet music confused you; it didn’t seem like the bassline for any song you knew, and you knew a lot of basslines. You strummed a couple notes before you realized what it was. Had they thrown a Vivaldi theme in as a ‘bassline’ to confuse you? The transposition from a classical instrument to the electric bass was a clunky, to say the least.

“Who wrote this?” You asked.

“I did.” Hongjoong answered.

“Some of it’s wrong.”

“What--”

You started playing before he could finish his question. You suspect that the cobbled together bassline had been taken from Vivaldi’s violin concerto "Summer/L'Estate", from the Presto section; the part that was normally in commercials. You played it, though on a bass it was almost deceptively easy.

You stopped and laughed as you tuned your bass to a different tuning, one side of the headphones off so you could hear the strings.

“Was it that easy?” Maddox asked, a chuckle at the end of his question.

“It’s just that…” you paused to finish tuning. “If I was going to try and scare someone. I would have tried something like this-- though I really should be using a guitar for it instead.”

You began playing Mahler’s Symphony No. 1 in D major, 4th movement. It was one of your favorite pieces, for its complexity and sweeping grandeur, though it held a few unfortunate memories. You let some notes ring out, meant to take the place of other instruments in an orchestra as you played the main violin parts on the higher strings. It was a difficult piece to play on bass because even with the change in tuning you couldn’t make all the highest notes and had to improvise, but if they were going to try and trip you up, you weren’t going to let them. You played the first three minutes of the movement before ending where it naturally became quiet.

You let the final notes die down on their own and put your hand over the strings to quiet them.

Maddox looked shocked. Hongjoong looked like he might be mad.

“Well, that’s all the sheet music you had for me.” You nodded.

“Oh! Yeah! Let me help you!” Maddox said as he ran in and collected the sheet music. “That last thing was really amazing!”

“Oh, thanks.” You put your bass into its case and zipped it up before helping him.

“What was it?”

“A piece by Mahler.”

“I’ve never heard it before.”

“It’s his first symphony, if you want to look it up. Fourth movement.”

“I think I will,” he smiled. He held the papers in his hands as he gestured for you to walk ahead of him out of the recording booth.

Back on the other side of the glass, you stood in front of Hongjoong with your bass slung over your shoulder.

“That was… we’ll review the tape when we review them for everyone else.” He said.

You nodded. “Alright.”

“I can show you to the lobby,” Maddox said. “I’m no Mina, but we wouldn’t want you to get lost.”

You smiled and nodded. “Thanks. I guess I’ll hear from you if I hear from you. Nice meeting you both.”

Hongjoong nodded without saying anything and turned back to the sound board.

In the hall, Maddox led you to the lobby.

“Don’t let him get to you too badly.”

“No?”

“He’s like that at first when he meets people.”

“Well, I guess it only really matters if we meet again,” you raised a brow and smiled at him.

“Oh, haha, yeah. I thought your playing was really good.”

“Do you make the final hiring decisions?”

“Uh… no.”

You nodded. “That’s nice of you to say anyway.”

He nodded.

In the lobby, you turned and held out your hand. “It was nice meeting you, Maddox.”

“Oh-- it was nice meeting you too, t/n.”

You shook hands and walked over to Mina.

“Oh! How did it go? Did you get it?” She beamed.

“Probably not. It was nice meeting you, though.”

“Awww, thank you, it was nice meeting you too.”

You walked out of the building.

Okay, so maybe you shouldn’t have shown off the way you did. That was probably the exact opposite of what you should have done. You were just a little annoyed that they - maybe it was just Hongjoong, Maddox seemed like the nicer of the two - tried to trip you up with something that wasn’t even that hard to play. They should have transcribed Mozart’s Turkish March or even Paganini’s caprice 24 into a bassline if they really wanted to fuck you over.

But whatever. You were ready to go home and trawl the postings for more bassline auditions. At least you had your chance to try out for a company as big as Wonderland. At the very least, you couldn’t feel bad about being able to say that you had been in the building.

Even if the producers - though you were sure it was probably just one of them - were dicks.

As you were on the bus, listening to the newest crop of kpop comebacks, you had an idea for a new mashup.

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lightstar789 · 3 years

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"Either Or" With My Ult's Comebacks This Year!

NOTE: I'm only doing idols who have had two or more Korean comebacks this year. No foreign language re-releases, no repackages, no OSTS, no special holiday singles, no solo comebacks (unless said artist is a soloist). I'm also doing it based on discography, not styling or hype. K-Rock also won't be included as well (for simplicity, I have plenty of favorites). So without further ado, let's start the game!