004: Obsession
K-pop, funky synth jazz, chess, 2025's TDE takeover: obsession or..?
This week I want to talk about another deep emotion: obsession.
If I could describe obsession as a feeling, it would be the same feeling that I have listening to what I would call funky synth jazz. Videodisc by Trevor Barstow and Continuum 1 by Nala Sinephro tunes me into this frequency perfectly, having a unique sound that I can describe as a vintage picture of ethereal meditation, locking me into a trance that romanticized a banal scene like traffic during rush hour. This particular sauce of jazz doesn’t scratch a certain part of my brain just right, but poses my synapses with precision, just enough so that I can place my attention to what’s in front of me.
The look of obsession can take on different forms. ‘The Queen’s Gambit’ just happened to come onto my Netflix feed numerous times and I eventually caved and dove right in. I was immediately captivated by Anna-Taylor Joy and her character as Harmon. Depicted as a quiet, powerhouse of a woman in the world of 1960s chess, Harmon paves her space and is satiated by the chase of being the best chess-player in the world. I was in awe of how over a span of almost a decade Joy’s character spent majority of her life in silence, yet has a fulfilling life that she dominated in. In spite of this she’s devoid of most social experiences that make us human.
Another exploration of how obsession takes up your time: I had a call this past week from an old friend. We met about six years ago from a previous job and I followed up with him about a possible job opportunity. And he was frank. He’s putting everything he has into establishing a matcha cafe in Portland. He bought the lease for the space and is waiting for the finalized permits and logistics. I asked what type of help he needed and he said ‘anything’. He’s opening up this cafe all by himself: handling the leasing, creative direction, supplies, etc., all by just him. It’s a daunting task and he said it was going to be difficult. But this was his dream—something he had talked about even six years ago, the last time we spoke. It’s interesting to see obsession commended in the lens of a genius and on 60+ hours worth of hard work, but is there meaning and purpose for obsession that is used for our aspirations, even if that commitment consumes your life?
If funky synth jazz was the suspension I feel when I’m underwater, then K-pop would be the crashing waves on the shore. Being a 2nd gen K-pop stan is something about myself that I don’t readily share, but with the trending of the opening choreography from SHINee’s 2013 hit Lucifer, a 2010s revival, I had to indulge in the content, and was confronted with the nostalgia and fixation from that fervent time of my life.
It’s telling of my age to see how the 2010s are coming back on the international scale and I’m in disbelief. I gape at realizing that the Lucifer MV was released in 2013 and I reflect on how being a K-pop fan during that time was some of my bravest work. An industry that was breaking through and slowly accelerating into the mainstream, Kpop at the time was paradoxially underground, for the most part unknown in the States despite having an aesthetic as loud as a neon dress in a blacklight club. The bright palettes, maximalist fashion, and exaggeration of themes that was prevalent in each music release felt like a fever dream. It had a feeling of deviance during a relatively conservative time, with guys wearing makeup, combining ripped black skinny jeans and comical hairstyles on clean androgynous faces. I loved it. And looking back I wished I did so unapologetically. I remember watching every music video and every live performance as a way to procrastinate from my assignments and as something to pour my frustrations into. With the updates about the groups I was obsessed with and the album cover openings videos I devoured, it almost all existed on my screen. And yet I was locked in. The obsession peaked at the end of my senior year of high school for me, and it served its purpose.
K-pop is an obsession that I allow in for the same reasons I ate up the discourse for Kendrick Lamar’s Superbowl Halftime show: finding the meaning in every detail, even if some of the meaning was created by its audience, is exciting as hell. This isn’t to say that Kendrick’s Halftime show doesn’t have a plethora of symbolisms and metaphors (it absolutely does), but it demonstrates the phenomenon of ‘myth-making’. The same phenomenon that occurred when Cole Cuchna of Spotify’s Dissected podcast speculated a 7-entendre within the four bars on Doechii’s ‘Bullfrog’ from her Alligator Bites Never Heal mixtape. And I can’t imagine the feeling I would have when an audience would see something that I created with a sense of obsession to the point where it’s even more meaningful.
Obsession can look obscene and it could grow into the negative manifestation of it, like hyperfixation and addiction, but if meaning and intention to build something is added into it, then obsession isn’t actually what’s being discussed. Rather, a more appropriate word would be passion. And it’s in passion that can lead to a fulfilling life.
I think passion and obsession can get so convoluted within the current context of the world, in which many of us may equate investing 40+ hours into something as a inevitable necessity of working, especially in a job that more likely than not isn’t satisfying. But it’s ironic bc the same system detaches us from caring and having joy, and having such passions that don’t contribute to systemic means are seen as discouraged. There’s nuance in that conversation that I can get back to, but I think passion looks like obsession for those that don’t understand its purpose, or one’s purpose yet, as well as the urgency for it. And there’s no doubt that with passion, one thing, such as time, is sacrificed for another. But when you make it on the other side, when you see the result of your ‘obsessions’ — an art piece, an un-selfish digital product, or a really good night out at a Kpop concert with a life-long friend — it’s a passion, a drive that one is in complete autonomy of, rather than the other way around. And that makes up the myths and stories of our lives.
If it gives you fulfillment and it makes life that much more interesting, then yeah, it really is that fucking deep.