#zero: fever

Take Me Home

This verse is also translated as; ‘Trapped in the suffocating darkness and wandering around, falling down. All sides are blocked, I can’t even choose the direction, which scares me. I get more and more scared as time passes.’

The first two lines of this verse are also, ‘not a single person here looks at me.’

The first line of the second verse here is also ‘Somebody takes me home’ which is interesting, because it’s more telling a story than pleading.

The third line is also translated as, ‘That place I dream of every night,’ and the last line ‘place in our memories’ is also translated as, ‘place in my memory.’

This verse has an unusually large amount of juxtaposition, even for this song. I’m not surprised, knowing Joong and how he likes to shove as much meaning and storyline into his verses as possible (and we know he is involved in writing his verses). I wonder what the point of this was. Is it two versions of Joong fighting with each other Dr Strange and the Multiverse of Madness Wanda-style? Or is it Joong having conflicting thoughts on his actions? Or just another example of him going insane?

Honestly, all of them are compelling ideas.

The fifth and sixth lines of this verse are also, ‘Is it a small comfort from you? I’ll escape this place and go inside my dream.’

‘With warm eyes’ is also, ‘with the gaze that’s not cold’ and ‘if we share’ is ‘when we share,’ which is, obviously, much more certain. It’s not a matter of if we share our dreams, it’s a matter of when. The last line is also translated as ‘we go back to that place,’ which makes it sound like they are either on the journey, or have reached home, while the original translation makes it seem like they are just planning/proposing to go back. 

Joong is shoving the juxtaposition into everything he does here, idn’t he?

Conclusions

While I’m not a fan of this type of music, I can definitely agree with this person who thinks that it should have been the title track of the album... only, for different reasons. 

Hey, little boy Why you look down? 똑바로 봐 Look straight 부릅뜨고 Open your eyes and

같은 배경에 속지 마라 더 강해져야 해 Don’t be fooled by a similar surronding, you have to be stronger 세상은 바보가 아니야 The world isn’t a fool

총알이 탕 A bullet’s “bang” 가시는 픽 A thorn’s “pick” 번개가 팡 A lightning’s “pang” 바람은 휙 A wind’s “woosh” Everything is just a moment baby 정신 꽉 붙잡아라 baby Hold on tight to your senses, baby

아리고 따가운 바람 속에 (Hey, little boy) In a stinging and hot wind (Hey, little boy) 부딪혀 찢기는 게 삶이야 It’s a life of being bumped into and torn

신발 끈 조여 매고 Tightening my shoelaces and 거칠 것도 없이 Without difficulty 세상을 내 것처럼 다 The entire world will be like my own thing 두 주먹 꽉 쥐고 With both fists clenched and

두려울 것도 없이 no more Without any fear, no more 나를 봐 good little boy Look at me, good little boy

Oh (Hands up, hands up) Get ready for a new day We gon’ ride

Oh (Hands up, hands up) 지금부터야 나를 봐 good little boy From now own look at me, good little boy

틀어진 세상에 울리는 bell A bell ringing in the wrong world 힘 빡 주고 달려갈게 I will run with all my strenght 어쩌면 이곳은 캄캄한 스릴러 Maybe this place is a dark thriller 그러기에 올라온 우리의 트레일러 That’s why our trailer was released

Do do 따가운 비 A hot rain 발밑에 비친 내 모습과 빛 My reflection and my light reflected under my feet 틀린 팔자 돌려 무한대로 넘어 바꿔낸 뫼비우스의 띠 The Möbius strip that turned the wrong destiny into something beyond infinity

NOTE: The Möbius strip, also called the twisted cylinder, is a one-sided surface with no boundaries. It looks like an infinite loop (or the infinity symbol). Like a normal loop, an ant crawling along it would never reach an end, but in a normal loop, an ant could only crawl along either the top or the bottom - that doesn’t happen with the Mobius strip because it is one sided so the ant would be crawling in both the top and bottom part in a single stretch.

그래 착하게 사는 거 Yeah, being nice 정해진 길 따라가는 거 Following a set path 1부터 10을 다 아는 거 Knowing everything from 1 to 10 그게 뭔데 What’s up with that? 너의 기준은 바로 너 Your standard is only you

아리고 따가운 바람 속에 (Hey, little boy) In a stinging and hot wind (Hey, little boy) 부딪혀 찢기는 게 삶이야 It’s a life of being bumped into and torn

신발 끈 조여 매고 Tightening my shoelaces and 거칠 것도 없이 Without difficulty 세상을 내 것처럼 다 The entire world will be like my own thing 두 주먹 꽉 쥐고 With both fists clenched and

두려울 것도 없이 no more  Without any fear, no more  나를 봐 good little boy  Look at me, good little boy

Oh (Hands up, hands up) Get ready for a new day We gon’ ride

Oh (Hands up, hands up) 지금부터야 나를 봐 good little boy From now own look at me, good little boy

조금 더 크면 다 알 거야 You’ll know when you grow up a little 지겨워 그런 말들도 I’m tired of those words too Why should I know that I don’t want it 지금을 누릴 거야 난 I’m going to have a hell of a moment now

우리가 간다 우리는 가 We’re coming, we’re going 말리지 마라 말리지 마 Don’t stop us, don’t stop 우리가 간다 우리는 가 We’re coming, we’re going 말릴 테면 말려보던가 If you’re going to stop us, try to stop us

우리가 간다 우리는 가 We’re coming, we’re going 말리지 마라 말리지 마 Don’t stop us, don’t stop 세상은 바보 아니고 바보 The world isn’t a fool, fool

우리가 바보 아 몰라 그냥 가 We’re fools. Ah, I don’t know. Just go.

신발 끈 조여 매고 Tightening my shoelaces and 거칠 것도 없이 Without difficulty 세상을 내 것처럼 다 The entire world will be like my own thing 두 주먹 꽉 쥐고 With both fists clenched and

두려울 것도 없이 no more  Without any fear, no more  나를 봐 good little boy  Look at me, good little boy

Oh (Hands up, hands up) Get ready for a new day We gon’ ride

Oh (Hands up, hands up) 지금부터야 나를 봐 good little boy From now own look at me, good little boy

‘Turbulence’

So, at this point I do notice that Wooyoung is talking about the darkess, as if he is opposing it, which suits his character in the story. Additionally, Mingi mentions the rough wind, which is a symbol of the desert they began their journey in, and which he often  mentions.

Seonghwa uses dehumanising language to talk about the members, which is a little odd and not what I would expect from him. My only guess really is that, since he is connected to Hongjoong, he sees the situation in a far more removed way, and can see the dangers of the path they will take.

Whereas San, in contrast to Seonghwa, uses includive and humanising language to say the same thing. This could have been a translation error, but if it wasn’t, I thik this is because San is friends with/allied with Wooyoung, so both ae working to heal the rift that Hongjoong caused in the universe.

This reinforces my idea that HALAteez/the ATEEZ that are in the FEVER series are kind of living on two timelines at once - the original timeline which made Hongjoong go crazy, and the timeline when he tried to fix everything that went wrong, but it didn’t work. The two run simultaneously, and both lead to the beginning of the Treasureteez story. But, only kind of. Let me explain.

I’ll discuss further in a later post, but the FEVER era songs include both elements that are clearly the first time that something has happened to HALAteez (eg. ‘Good Lil’ Boy’ and ‘THANXX’ talking about them growing up). But they also include songs that have both original aspects, and aspects of the repeated timeline which Hongjoong created. ‘Turbulence’ is an example of this, as it includes both references to the FIRST end of the HALAteez journey (and must fulfill this role anyway, as otherwiseno other song would), but also includes mention of the division between Hongjoong and Wooyoung after Hongjoong’s actions - where Hongjoong keeps trying to find the Treasure, and Wooyoung tries to stop him to find the Treasure TOGETHER, and to heal the universe.

In which case, it is entirely possible that ‘Turbulence’ IS the end of the story, but the metaficitive nature of the storyline leads to it including explicit foreshadowing to later events. In this way, the song shows both the original timeline and the later timeline, at the same time (kind of), both simultaneously leading to the Treasureteez timeline (kind of).

Sorry for the tangent, let’s get back to the analysis.

Here, hwoever was translating just cleared up the meaning of Hongjoong’s line by writing it as ‘The world looked down on from a high place does frighten me’, which has the same meaning, it just expresses it better.

I also wanted to mention Mingi’s last line. I love this line. It is perfectly balanced, and could be easil overlooked, but could also hold so many connotations. As a member of HALAteez, he rcognises the end of his journey (which is, of course, metafictive). Additionally, he describes HALAteez finding their ANSWER, the end of their journey of youth (a key theme, but especially for HALAteez). We have seen them find their ANSWER before - it was set up in the ‘Answer’ MV as they sat with their Treasureteez counterparts, and was finalised in the ‘Answer’ Kingdom stage as they sacrificed themselves for their successors to find the Treasure.

So the line literally sums up the HALAteez journey after the end of the song. It’s not a fun journey, but it is the end of one nonetheless.

Again, there seem to be a lot of differences in ATEEZ’s songs between whether they ‘can’, ‘should’, or ‘must’ do something. I am still unsure if these differences are intentional or not, but I feel they shouldn’t be overlooked, so I will continue to take them at face value and analyse them as they are.

Another difference between can/should/must.

Conclusions

Very interesting sog with very important lyrics, especially so if all of the slight differences in phrasing throughout, and which members say them, are correct. Has an important position in the storyline and confirms a lot of my previous theories. Additionally, the MV is a perfect fit for it.