XG brings us to space and back to Earth
If there are pop group concerts you can go into blindly and still end up mesmerized, XG’s is probably one of them. And you could feel it from the get-go, when Jurin, Chisa, Hinata, Harvey, Juria, Maya, and Cocona emerged onstage at the recent Manila stop of their “The Core” world tour. I wasn’t sure whether they were meant to be cyborgs, insectoids, or something in between, but in their plugsuit-like outfits, they brought to mind a squad of mecha pilots from an anime—say, “Neon Genesis Evangelion.”
From their high-tech command center that was the SM Mall of Asia Arena, they launched us into space with cinematic visuals of deepening galaxies and mystical caves. And when a full moon appeared, the Alphaz transformed into a pack of wolves howling into the night.
Their visuals, which meld sci-fi, celestial, and extraterrestrial elements, aren’t entirely new or unprecedented on their own. But because their look differs from what we usually expect in this corner of pop—and because they commit to it so completely—they spark a sense of novelty all the same, and in turn, invite curiosity even among the uninitiated.
Hard to categorize
While the scene is rife with acts that follow trends or try to draw outside the lines, XG—true to its revelry in the unconventional and otherworldly—feels beholden to neither impulse, making the group hard to categorize (And surely they will tell you that they refuse to be).
Their performances and stagemanship feature the foundational elements expected of a pop group—synchronized dancing and shifting formations—but XG often eschews symmetry and clean lines for uneven clusters and staggered columns. One minute, they’re in a perfect triangle; the next, they’re stacked—crouched, upright, or lying down—and then crowded on one side of the C-shaped stage.
Their movements—especially in songs such as “Gala,” “Mascara,” “Woke Up,” and “TGIF”—are heavily inspired by street dance. They vogue, they tut, make sharp stops and distorted angles. Their arms dangle and flail like marionettes; their bodies move like mechanical toys wriggling to life; their fingers roll like tendrils.
And in this theatricality of beauty and oddity, it’s impossible not to be captivated.
While a high-concept aesthetic may sometimes be seen as a mask to hide behind, XG uses theirs as a doorway. Futuristic world-building aside, there’s a palpable reverence for ‘90s and 2000s R&B, which they use to bridge the conceptual with the relatable for the more casual listeners.
Stripping back the bombast
During the rap line’s stage, Jurin, Harvey, Maya, and Cocona performed “PS118,” evoking the vibe of friends hanging out on city stoops. In “Rock the Boat,” the group tipped their hats to Aaliyah, interpolating the late icon’s song of the same title. Their similarly wired debut track, “Tippy Toes,” meanwhile, brought the house down with a dance break that fused a New Jack Swing bounce, pulsing floor work, and the click of stilettos as they strutted.
The vocal line—Chisa, Hinata, and Juria—took the stage for “4 Seasons” and stripped back the bombast, all the better to appreciate their vocal harmonies. Still in keeping with good ‘ol R&B were the sultry, slightly melancholic midtempo songs like “In the Rain,” where their seemingly disparate movements eventually melted into fluid shapes; and dance ballads like “Is This Love,” where the stage was corralled by columns of orange light—as if we were being abducted, willingly of course, into the XG ship.
During the encore, now dressed in casual fits, the seven members brought out some of their biggest crowd-pleasers—“Shooting Star,” “Million Places,” and “New Dance”—bops that easily sparked singalongs and converted the area into a massive dance floor. As they roamed around and sang perched on the barricades, it felt as if, after an intense trek into deep space, they had finally brought us back down to Earth.
And when at last you find yourself singing and swaying side to side to “Left Right,” you realize that you need not know the lore, the inside jokes, or even the members’ names to enjoy the ride. For a group that seems to have come from another world—and for all their imagery of the extraterrestrial—it never actually feels alien to be in it.
