[KCON18NY] Day-2: Sunday Concert

Right after the red carpet event ended, I got in line to enter the concert venue. I met a nice girl who received a lot of skincare freebies from Innisfree, Laneige, and Mamonde, and gave me some! It took a really long time for the line to move, so I'm glad I had company. Eventually I made it to the security check where the staff were quite aggressive with their metal detector and bag search. Because I was wearing my metal belt, it set off the detector and the worker thoroughly patted me down.

Today I was sitting in Section 6, Row 5, Seat 5. My Goldenness friend just happened to have been in Seat 7! I was so happy that we could cheer for Golden Child together as it was apparent everyone surrounding us was here for NCT and Wanna One. Here is the view from my seat. You can see there's some railing to the left that could be obstructive for those closer seats. They played Golden Child's "It's U" music video on the screen, giving me more time to practice before the big moment!

At 7:29PM the pre-show began with MC Danny. Cover group Maru performed. Here you can see that pit was getting more crowded.

At 7:42PM they played the same VCR as yesterday, with Golden Child, Pentagon, and Stray Kids demonstrating what not to do at concerts. The VCR was just under 4 minutes long.

At 7:48PM they played another VCR announcing today's lineup, but they didn't include Golden Child...then it segued into introducing Golden Child's image!

Right after, Donghyun alone opened the concert! He had a solo dance at the main stage for 15 seconds before the other members joined in. This opening dance was 40 seconds long. This is the same dance that the members performed later on during the July 11th episode of Weekly Idol.

Next they performed "It's U"! My friend and I shouted the fanchant in full force.

During the dance break of "It's U" (just before the last chorus) Jangjun shouted something "forever!" Then they headed to the extended stage to finish off the song!

The members headed back to the main stage and had the "Who's Next?" segment. Daeyeol began the introduction with "Hello everyone" then the members shouted "We are Golden Child!" There were real-time subtitles on the side screens. Daeyeol said in Korean, "It's a great honor to present Golden Child's stage here in New York. Should we start off with explaining what our team name means?" Tag replied, "Yes! Our team name Golden Child...is...that comes once every 100 years. It means we will lead the Kpop industry with our music and charms for the next 100 years and to be an example for the next..." (I can't hear my fancam clearly but you get this gist of it). They want to be the "Next Almighty Boy Band". Jaehyun said that "It means that everything's possible and that we can lead the music industry for a hundred years. Now we will show you our...dance performance!" Donghyun said in Korean, "We just showed you cute dance moves on our "It's You" stage. We can be very strong as well. Let us show you." All the members then started dancing, with Donghyun in front and center. Next Joochan said in Korean they'll show their singing! Joochan started singing "Havana" so beautifully! Jibeom then said in Korean that lastly they'll show their aegyo. Jangjun went first and said, "I will sing a song just like this situation" then he started singing the beginning of Taylor Swift's "Blank Space"! Next Bomin sang part of his line from "It's U". Daeyeol got the audience charged by shouting to the left, "Are you ready?", then shouting to the right, "Are you ready?", then facing the center and shouting, "Make some noise!" He then quickly and cutely bowed twice to the audience! Seungmin then said, "You are a good boy, you are a good girl," then he spun around and made the muscle gesture and said, "we are all super...awesome!" Next Joochan was so cute saying, "I need you" in a high voice and making a V sign on his face. Y then captured the audience by singing, "You are so beautiful~" and then doing aegyo. Jibeom then made finger hearts and said in a very high voice, "I love you!" Next Donghyun said, "I love New York" and did his full body heart.

Jaehyun said, "Love you so much" and made a big heart above his head. Even though Tag didn't go yet, Jangjun started saying in Korean, "Now Golden Child has shown you many sides of the group." The members called him out for skipping Tag. Then Tag went on, "Hi guys, my name is Tag, and I'm Tag, and you're Tag," while doing finger hearts. Jangjun went on again in Korean, "If you think Golden Child has what it takes to be the almighty boy band, (in English) make some noise!" Seungmin then cutely said in Korean, "We'll continue to show you diverse sides of us. Please show us a lot of love." Then Y introduced the next performance in Korean, "As we wish all of your days to be happy. Here is '모든 날'. (In English) 'All Day'."

I was so surprised for Golden Child to perform a ballad at KCON; I thought they'd try to capture the audience with title dance tracks. But I'm so happy to see them perform this song and to show a variety of their performances. It was beautiful seeing people in the audience waving KCON lightsticks in support of Golden Child! They stayed on the main stage for the entire song.

Right after "All Day", Golden Child got right into performing "DamDaDi"! They performed majority of the song on the main stage.

During Jangjun and Tag's line, "Please stay with me / Please don't go away", the members headed to the extended stage. It's cool seeing the members walk the catwalk and take their time before getting back in formation, because they perform the song in an informal way that's not usually seen on a single stage.

The lights turned back on and the members had their ending ment, but without the real-time subtitles. Daeyeol asked a mood-making question in Korean to the audience and we all screamed in agreement. Daeyeol then continued in Korean, saying that next week Golden Child will be having a comeback, and that the song will be refreshing. Jangjun then said in English, "we will be coming back next week" and since I couldn't process life I thought he meant they'll be coming back to New York next week. Then Daeyeol introduced their next song "Crush"! But he said it really cutely in Korean, like " 크러시". Jaehyun wrapped up the ending ment with, "First we are so thankful that you guys invited us to New York. And July 4th, our first new mini album, our first single album is released so please support us. Love you." And he gave a big heart above his head. Jaehyun finished with, "Our next song is 'Crush.'"

They performed "Crush" on the extended stage. I'm so happy they chose this song to perform at KCON because it shows a different side of Golden Child and the choreography is so sharp and powerful! I'm so proud of Jibeom during his mini solo dance. I never thought they'd perform "Crush" since they didn't promote it outside of their fanmeetings, but I'm so happy to have seen this live! Right after the performance ended, the members walked off the extended stage and next to the diamond/platinum pit. Golden Child's entire stage time was over 21 minutes long.

I'll take the time to discuss this - a few weeks before KCON NY, MWave announced an online event called "My Playlist KCON" where from anyone can vote for the songs they want to see being performed on stage from a designated list. Oddly enough for Golden Child, the list included intro track "Miracle" and OST "Love Letter", but didn't include their side tracks "With Me" or "Crush". Though global Goldenness continued voting for "I'm Falling" to make its debut out of the Woollim dungeon, the results were "DamDaDi" with 24.7%, "Lady" with 16.6%, and "I'm Falling" with 13.7%. The results of this event were used as suggestions for the artists, but by default people outside of the fandom will vote for title tracks and the artists will perform their title tracks regardless. So in the end, this event was pretty useless for helping songs like "I'm Falling".

I also wanted to add that a couple of hours before the concert, my friend's friend did the test drive at the Toyota booth and won 2 tickets to a sound check for tonight. They went and got to see Golden Child perform "DamDaDi"! I wish they had advertised such a special event; there seems to be a lot of hidden events that the artist do which could have been made more known.

After Golden Child's stage was a solo stage I honestly can't recall much but I'll try my best. Next was a special solo stage by LE of EXID.

Fromis_9 held their stage next. They were given the title of the "Next Vitalizing Girls".

As a transition there were 2 special MCs in between stages.

EXID performed next and they entered by walking down our aisle and onto the extended stage!

During EXID's ment, one of the members asked the audience, "Do you know the choreo to 'Up & Down'?" It was like they were asking me directly, after I had failed Jibeom dancing this earlier at Golden Child's artist engagement. EXID then went on to perform this song.

Next was the special couple duet stage, with Jiwon of Fromis_9 and...Joochan! They performed "Hawaiian Couple" on the extended stage for 2.5 minutes. I'm so happy Joochan had another stage - he's so good at performing duets and looked so cute in his preppy boyfriend outfit!

Another pair of special MCs came onto the main stage, then NCT came out to perform. During their ment the members had 3special missions: "melt the fans with your aegyo in your own language", "sing a sweet and mellow pop serenade", and "pose to show off your handsome self". The members broke off into subgroups and indivudally performed their mission.

To transition, 2 more special MCs were at the end of the aisle of Section 20.

Lastly headliners Wanna One performed first in sub-units, then came together as a whole.

After Wanna One's stage, all artists came back on stage for a final farewell. Golden Child came out first! They walked out to the extended stage but stayed on the other side. Next Fromis_9 came out, then NCT, then EXID, and lastly Wanna One.

Golden Child was on stage for 2 minutes before everyone headed back to the main stage, though it was kind of Wanna One and NCT to come to our side of the extended stage and wave to fans.

Here are all 5 artists on the main stage. As the NCT members were walking past Golden Child, the Golden Child members bowed to them, and then to Wanna One. Wanna One took the time to go back to the left side of the main stage and wave at fans as all the other groups already headed out. The concert ended at about 10:05PM.

Afterwards my friend and I headed to the connected parking garage to send off the artists. Sadly it wasn't a good gamble, as we saw all 5 groups but it was rather rushed. Golden Child, NCT, and Wanna One went to theirs vans pretty quickly. Golden Child sat on the left side of their tinted van while we were on the right side, but fans on the correct side of the street were able to see the members waving their lit phones to fans behind the tinted windows.

This wraps up my experience at KCON NY 2018! Next up will be my experience at KCON LA 2018.