Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
Bobby has been used as a punchline around these parts for his still amusing take on what hip-hop is, but it’s been his sweg lord musical efforts with iKON and as a soloist that has actually made it easy to write him off. Thankfully, it seemed like he dropped a lot of the pretense on “Runaway” and it resulted in something of his I actually enjoyed.
Bobby doesn’t reinvent the wheel with “Runaway”, nor does the track do anything that necessarily jumps at the listner. However, this is a stark improvement for his normally discardable act in which he appears to try very hard to prove he’s a tough guy rapper. But it’s more than just the genre choice at play here, as his rapping is simply much better without him forcing that cringe growl effect on every line, which definitely helps him flow better and makes it easier to see the skill that shot him to stardom on ‘Show Me The Money‘.
Furthermore, while he’s not going to be belting out ballads any time soon, his vocals were a pleasant surprise in their rawness, giving off a sense of authenticity rarely heard in his other title tracks. “Runaway” is a well put together, subtle release from Bobby, which is shocking in itself, but perhaps even more surprising is that it grows on you with repeated listens and makes me hope Bobby will mix in more of these efforts going forward. Color me impressed.
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