Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
If you had not heard of RoaD-B before it’d be hard to blame you, as the group itself wasn’t even RoaD-B until 2022 started when they rebranded from BXK, who themselves only debuted in 2020. Anyway, the five-member boy group are from Campus Entertainment (themselves rebranded from New Planet Entertainment), and they’ve decided to resuscitate with the Sweetune-produced “Nonstop“.
Probably should’ve been a sign.
Perhaps the most surprising thing is this song making it to RoaD-B to begin with. Either the company splashed for producers with the kind of cache that Sweetune have, or enough bigger companies and groups passed on it in favor of making Generic Bombastic Boy Group Comeback #55. That’s a bit of a disrespectful thought to have towards RoaD-B, but none is intended, and it’s more of a reflection of what a quality start the group’s rebrand gets itself off to thanks to “Nonstop”.
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The track is a breath of fresh air in the context of the modern boy group landscape, but would be quality regardless of year. It starts by throwing listeners into the deep end with the hook and then lets the song simmer across tense synths before ramping up energy again. It’s a dynamic song in that way, but it never gets too sidetracked in terms of tempo, nor does it lose the importance of highlighting melody,
The boys themselves do well, even with the instrumental starring for the most part, and I actually wish they were given more opportunity to spread their swings. The verses especially could’ve used a bit more charm, but they seemed to be held back so they weren’t really able to inject their own personality into the song.
Fortunately, the instrumental is more than enough to hold interest, and that eventually gives way to a burst of synth-y goodness for the chorus, basically ramping up the elements that made the rest of the track standout, with a particularly aurally-pleasing fill dropping in at 1:28. The repetition of “nonstop” makes for an addictive hook and creates a memorable starting point to hum along to while randomly walking around the house, and it’s pretty appropriate given the sense of propulsion that continues throughout the song. It’s just fun, man.
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It should be interesting to see where RoaD-B go from here, as with a bit of investment and effort from the company, they could be onto developing a unique (for this generation) sound of their own, the kind that can rise a group out of nugudom with at least a dedicated fanbase. Or they could make this a one-off and join the rest of the crowd. Regardless of what lies ahead, RoaD-B are certainly on my radar now thanks to this gem of a comeback with “Nonstop”.
