Shinhwa’s “Touch” is basically the opposite of sonically pleasing

I got a bunch of people asking me to review Shinhwa‘s “Touch” for whatever reason, presumably because fans wanted my take knowing that I generally like the group. However, one should be careful what you wish for because when I ignore something it’s probably a message in itself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VITVlI80qgs

About a year ago I posted about Shinhwa’s “Sniper“ and I basically loved it. As much as I wish I could say the same for “Touch”, this is a candidate for a year-end list, and not a good one.

“Touch” starts out as a smooth but basic-sounding R&B type of jam, and the lack of tempo and crooning vibe was starting to bore me as it was. But as soon as the chorus hit, boy did I yearn for a basic, boring R&B vibe, because it suddenly became an absolute fucking clustercock of sounds that is about the furthest thing I can think of from sonically pleasing to my ears. Then they go with cowbell starting with the rap verses, which just further proves that sometimes when you go with original sounds there’s a reason why they’re original. Seriously thought it might’ve become a ‘Saturday Night Live‘ skit at any point for a while there.

In that sense, “Touch” seems like a joke Shinhwa would pull, but the video is dead serious throughout, and so is the song. It’s honestly just a bizarre track from them and not a well they should go back to going forward. They are way better than this experimental mess of a track that wasn’t even experimental in an interesting way.

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‘Unchanging’ Album

“Touch” Song