Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
Is it a good sign that it’s not even three months and baseball has barely started yet I’m already in a two-week hole that I spent the weekend making up? No! But still, here’s a massive catchup with big names and some pretty solid stuff, honestly (aside from one trend).
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SEULGI (Red Velvet) – “Baby Not Baby”
I love Seulgi because she’s an entertaining idol and … well, honestly look at her, but this falls into solidly above-average territory. The production does a lot of the heavy lifting, yet even it doesn’t quite go anywhere significant as the song goes on. Over time and with repeats, the repetitive nature of the track has become a sore spot, and I found myself wishing it had that punch that a lot of the Britney Spears material it borrows from had.
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Hoshi & Woozi (SEVENTEEN) – “96ers” + Mark (NCT) (Feat. NCT’s Haechan) – “+82 Pressin” + Changbin & I.N (Stray Kids) – “Burnin’ Tires” + HAN & Felix (Stray Kids) – “Truman” + Bang Chan & Hyunjin (Stray Kids) – “Escape”
Sigh.
Revolves itself around a gimmicky interpolation without much else going for it.
Probably my favorite of the bunch just because it sounds like a low-energy NCT song and kinda limits the rapping.
The electric guitars are cool and it has tempo at least.
The 8-bit touch is neat … everything else is like a compilation of what I hate most in a trendy hip-hop track.
Sort of a very-poor-man’s Imagine Dragons.
Boy groups have been doing so well this year, but man, the hip-hop units have seemingly been plentiful and crossing average would be an improvement for the vast majority. I haven’t been feeling the mainstream Korean hip-hop scene of late, so having idols aping those sounds mostly just makes it the stuff I already haven’t liked but with worse rapping skill.
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SF9 – “Love Race”
If nothing else, SF9 at least seem to put out listenable works with consistency. The electric guitar perhaps endears me to this more than it should given the surprisingly lumbering pace. It almost felt like an Xdinary Heroes song that was toned down for a pop group.
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THE BOYZ – “VVV”
Yeah, I’ve seen the glowing praise for this from my hag brethren, and I agree that it’s an appealing second-gen throwback song that races and soars with a nice post-chorus. But what made many of the OG songs indelible was a refrain or hook that embedded itself into your brain to go along with the rest of the elements, and I just never attain that feel here. It’s probably the best of the bunch, and maybe I’ll have to do a mea culpa later, but for now it feels like it’s missing one piece that happens to be the most important.
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NMIXX – “KNOW ABOUT ME”
I wrestled with this one a while, and I’m still a bit on the fence, but after a week it became apparent that the languid R&B vibes were the biggest takeaway. That said, the wobbly bass intrigued me, the vocals are obviously a highlight, and there’s uniqueness in the trip-hop section during the bridge, so it’s still a quality song and the arrow for them is still pointing up.
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FANTASY BOYS – “Undeniable”
That acapella riff that it begins with and the vocal flourish in the bridge deserved better than the raps that flank it. Yet it still actually builds nicely into the chorus, but then shifts down in both energy and tone, almost representative of a burying of the song’s potential.
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Ailee – “MMI”
They even have Ailee doing this shit, K-pop needs an intervention, stat.
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J-Hope (BTS) – “MONA LISA”
Well, the choreography paired with the set is pretty cool. Yup.
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If your favorite song from the last two weeks is missing from here, that could maybe possibly be a good sign!
