Girl group THE ARK show much promise in their debut with “The Light”

THE ARK are a five-member girl group that comes from Music K Entertainment, which is a subsidiary of Key East Entertainment. The group made their debut recently with “The Light“, and they certainly made an impression.

The song was relatively simple and primarily served as a vehicle for both the music video and the rapping/singing of the members. While I think it could come off as too OST-esque for some, I was just impressed with the promise of both the rapping and the vocals, as they both showed quality and kept my attention throughout. I wouldn’t say this is necessarily quite my thing, but in terms of introductions, I can see the direction they might go from here.

In terms of the music video, there’s not much to complain about. Yeah it’s a bit cheap and obvious in terms of the emotional ploy at work, but those concepts can work if executed well, and this was. The story was impactful, especially with the obvious allusions to Sewol, and the acting was surprisingly competent from the member of the group, so it really did seem like a mini-drama. This concept is actually something I think a lot of music videos nowadays have gone away from in Korean music because they’ve been done to death before, but I enjoyed this callback of sorts.

—–

Visually, the member who stars in the music video is really cute, and so is the one with the brown hair. Of course, you’d never know who the latter was because she wasn’t in the music video, which is the primary detriment of a debut drama music video like this no matter how well done it was. I’m guessing that’s why they released the #Hashtag interview so soon after the release of the music video.

As for the other three … well, let’s say I hope they’re talented. Or they’ll probably “get prettier” for their birthdays or whatever excuse, but at least they have a decent amount of spread in the group between rapping/singing/visuals/acting that there’s a foundation to build upon.

—–

Apparently THE ARK was supposed to be a hyped group debut, but I never got involved in that, so I came away from this impressed and looking forward to see if they can take the next step forward, especially in terms of establishing the other members. We never really know how things are going to work out in the long-run, but in terms of debuts, this was something to build on.