Hyoyeon’s “Wannabe” is aptly titled and it fails on about every level

When Hyoyeon released “Mystery“, I was pleasantly surprised. Not because I thought the song was particularly good, but because it was a passable showing that laid a foundation for a plausible future as a soloist if she was given the right song. Yeah … well “Wannabe” is not that song and now I’m thinking she shouldn’t get another attempt.

“Wannabe” is basically the musical equivalent of the ‘oh no baby what is you doin’ meme.

It starts with a sound that resembles a human imitating a lawnmower failing to start, and while I hoped that would go away when the verse hit, much to my dismay that was actually a foundational sound for the verses. But that’s not Hyoyeon’s fault, right? Right. What is her fault, though, is the atrocious rapping. Everything from her intonation to her flow just exposes a complete lack of rapping ability, and the only reason I got past 30 seconds is because I had to express how much it annoyed me. This is the kinda stuff I expect to hear while browsing through mixtapes of nugus on SoundCloud that I got directed to from a HiphopKR post, not something SM Entertainment actually signed off on.

Oh yeah, this had a San E featuring, but at least he recognized it would be a waste to commit something decent to this mess and completely mailed his verse in by basically just reading his lyrics. Whatever, get money, my man.

Anyway, then came the chorus, which honest to god sounds like they accidentally put the wrong one in and they just decided to roll with it anyway. The rest of the song and music video is a tryhard sweg sweg sweg CL impersonation, but then for the hook they break out into some kind of musical number, and not only is it jarring, it just doesn’t fit or work at all.

Not only is “Wannabe” bad, but it’s bad almost on a cringe level. It’s to the point where her stans that kept whining about how underrated and unappreciated Hyoyeon was need to never say that again. I’m sorry, but I seriously don’t understand how nobody involved in this stopped it at some point and said we need to reconsider and do this over or something to that effect.