It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s check out some new releases!
G-Idle’s Shuhua has some caonima energy. Kpopalypse supports!
BTS – Yet To Come (The Most Beautiful Moment)
It’s nice to know that even in the harsh desert climate, BTS’s face filter technology still works. Software you can rely on.
Stray Kids – Circus
SunnyHill also did a “circus” concept, and it was a weird, quirky cool tune that sounded like nothing else in k-pop, and still stands up as unique today. It would sure be nice to get a little more of that energy back into k-pop and a little less of whatever it is Stray Kids think they’re doing here.
Wonho – Crazy
Held back due to “quality” issues, Wonho’s video gets a slightly belated release and it meets required standards.
woo!ah! – Danger
Remember how I keep telling you that miss A’s “Breathe” is a complete piece of shit, one of the most tragic monstrosities of the last decade of k-pop? Well if you wanted to know how it could be improved, here’s a similar idea but actually done correctly. Kylie Minogue, pay attention and take notes.
APR PROJECT – 11:59
They’re wandering the desert looking for BTS’s face filters but I think their GPS sent them the wrong way. Nice topless body-smearing paint scenes though, I wonder if that’ll help these TRCNG members do well in the Kpopalypse Objectification Survey, which is now live for 2022 – CLICK HERE to participate and get in your votes while you can! Don’t be one of those people who complains to me “when was this, I missed it, why didn’t you tell everyone” after I’ve relentlessly shoehorned survey links into a month of roundups plus all my social networking. If you’re forgetful don’t worry, I’ll remind you to vote plenty more times.
Secret Number – Doomchita
Oh look it’s Secret Number in my area. If you’re going to just rip off a popular Blackpink song, why not rip off the final 30 seconds where they do something cool and different instead of the boring first two minutes where they scotch snap and try to sell phones.
bugAboo – POP
A decent chorus saves what would have otherwise been pretty disastrous, but there’s still this weird feeling I get when listening to it, like something is very wrong. Maybe it’s the utterly random English usage in both the song and video or maybe it’s just how that cool chorus doesn’t seem to have very much to do with the rest of the song.
FAINIT – Killer
Utterly disjointed and weirdly inept in a way that only the most nugu groups can manage.
UZA&SHANE X BAEMIN – Curry
Hey, it’s not a song about coffee! Thanks Uza and Shane for mixing it up a bit. There’s not enough k-pop singers riding flying pieces of naan bread. Who said all the possible k-pop concepts were done.
Cravity – Vivid
Cravity are back in my cavity and they’re even dressed like tooth enamel this time, I can nearly feel the drill go in when they do those horrible vocal bends.
MCND – W.A.T.1
Okay I actually burst out laughing at the thumbnail. but the song was unexpectedly good. As someone who was relentlessly bullied for my hair length in my school days I’m very pro long hair on guys so this even gets a tick visually from me despite no Viviz guest appearance anywhere.
Trendz – Who
Asking a group with the sheer audacity to call themselves “Trendz” to be in any way exceptional or different is probably asking a bit much, so this song slightly exceeded my low expectations. Points for the cool guitar and bassline, pity that the wimpy drums don’t quite hold up their end of the bargain.
Kang Daniel – Parade
Easily the best song Kang Daniel has ever had anything to do with, the gang-vocal chorus is a bit cheesy bit it’s not enough to ruin it, and the detuned organ is an inspired addition.
MADDYXP feat. Sleeq – Hwan
Why can’t your faves do something this cool and different, it’s because they’re too busy slobbering on corporate dicks, that’s why. While it’s sometimes tempting to boringly defend myself against constant charges of “misogyny” from the kiddies who don’t understand that corporate media and conservative pundits are manipulating them into sex-negative ideology, it’s a lot more righteous and fun to just throw my support behind cool songs like this. Actions speak louder than words.
Kang Hyewon with Stella Jang – Like a Diamond
Stella Jang hard-carries this ballad, wisely throwing ex-Izone Hyewon all the low notes and whispery, easy stuff. Even the sitting positions and body language screams “teacher and student”. Stella must feel how my teammates do in FPS games when they get randomly matched with me.
Son Dong Woon – Today’s Weather
Today’s weather is abs by the pool and overplayed instruments with a chance of shit melody. Another potential candidate for the Kpopalypse Objectification Survey, which is now live for 2022 – CLICK HERE to participate!
Kim Jaehwan – Snail
There’s a dog briefly but you don’t get to see much of it because of the mobile phone format video. Another reason why mobile phone format music videos should be punishable by jail time.
Kei – So Many Tears
It looks like Kei is just as upset about the absence of Lovelyz’ peak era song quality as I am.
Aimy Moon – Shooting Star
There’s too many people doing “virtual avatars” now, I think we need “avatar control”. Some kind of licensing system would be good, maybe background checks, certainly you should at least need to be of a certain age and have a clean criminal record.
SAGONG_EE_HO – Wake Up
I know what you’re thinking, “if we ban virtual avatars, won’t only the criminals have them?” but if there’s one thing that can stop a bad song with a virtual avatar, it’s a good song with a virtual avatar.
TOP G feat. Queen Wasabii – K TOP STAR
Just a novelty song you probably won’t even remember in a month but Queen Wasabii fits into it like a glove and has the right attitude to life. You can vote for her (or any current or former Korean idol or musician) in the Kpopalypse Objectification Survey, which is now live for 2022 – CLICK HERE to participate!
Seoul Mafia – Secret Game
I wonder which way k-pop fans will go here – will they hate it by default because he’s white, or like it by default because of the overtly gay video concept? Genuinely curious. Of course there’s no point discussing the music quality, because we all know that k-pop fans don’t even listen to music – if an artist took a fat shit and recorded it and released it, kpoppers would lap it up and ask for more as long as it ticked all their required socio-political boxes.
No Brain – Uh Huh
This just sounds like some overplayed western rock song that I can’t remember the name of.
Kimmy – Woori
These furry costumes look very low-effort, I guess supply chain issues from the pandemic and now the Ukraine war probably make it hard to get the correct fursuit material in time for the video shoot.
Asher – Lost Dream
Should have gone for a squid whatever concept like this girl here handing out pamphlets. It doesn’t have to be plush and expensive to be realistic. Why aren’t more furries into sea creatures, why is it always fucking wolves and foxes and tigers. I want to go to the furry convention as a box jellyfish with electrodes hidden under the suit and sting everyone until I get kicked out.
verycoybunny – More
While the Stratocaster here is legally actionable due to the headstock design, I won’t tell Fender if you won’t, because verycoybunny is pretty cool.
Yegny – Lazybones
More top-down microphone madness. Yegny must be a big deal given the massive supporting cast singing along to this song. Surely one of them could have told her how to hold a microphone.
Yunsae – Second Dream
Between your fave sounding like this, and some nugu, I’ll take some nugu.
Taewoo X Beom Seunghyeok – Hometown
Is this Taewoo from SPEED or one of the 26 other Taewoos in k-pop? I’m not sure but the song isn’t bad.
CHEEZE – Pong Dang
Don’t get too excited there, “the lovers” card in tarot usually means that you have to make some kind of choice that fucks someone over.
Taeb2 feat. Kidd King – Jump Out
I’m not sure what jumped out here, I feel like the Autotuned nonsense and rapping is the wrong choice over this beat.
Shana – One Night Stranger
Pretty cool, unusual instrument choices help it a lot.
Leady feat. J_ust – Dang Dang Yang Yang
mrds
Kris Main feat. Hae Eun – Do U Love Me?
Come on man, Autotune is a hard nope for rock songs like this. Nobody will hate you if you get a little raw with the vocals.
The Vastards – SIDE KICK
Here the vocals are better but the song isn’t. The previous song with this one’s vocal approach would be cool.
Wave to Earth – Calla
Road worn instruments on these slow ballad bands is hilarious. As if you treat it that roughly that the instrument could actually even get like that.
Summer Soul X ROMderful – My World
It’s no “Spacedog” that’s for sure but what really blows me away here is how Long:D didn’t use her in his video. You can vote for her (or any current or former Korean idol or musician) in the Kpopalypse Objectification Survey, which is now live for 2022 – CLICK HERE to participate!
Seol Hayoon – Saying Party
The reason why you don’t know about most trot singers even though they’re all drop dead gorgeous is because their music is really bad.
HOONIYONGI – My heart knows
Don’t let your grandparents catch you listening to this or you’ll be forced to submit to an hour of sitting with them while they excitedly play you “other stuff you might like”.
Rooftop – City Boys
A cool retro sound here helps the stupid rap posing get over the line.
Jo Gwangil feat. Brown Trigger – Break The Line
Being able to rap well often isn’t enough when you feel compelled to do it over some disco bollocks.
Bubble X – Kkureoki
This painfully nugu attempt actually has a better beat than Jo Gwangil’s thing. Sure, the production is limp but the ideas are there. There was tons of rap stuff I deleted from this week’s roundup because I was running out of space and it all sucked way more than this.
Keith Ape – What’s The Issue?
Holy shit Keith Ape has undergone a transformation. Or was he always like this? Who the fuck knows, but I hope he’s happy and living his best life. Not gonna listen to this song again though.
BONUS RANDOM VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
Men’s Health – K-pop Star Wonho Shares The Workout Routine That Keeps Him Shredded
Sorry about the lack of the new Wonho song this week, apparently it’s been delayed because they’re making it more high quality or something [EDIT: it got released a few minutes after I wrote this, typical heh]. In the meantime enjoy this workout video, gosh I wonder how he’s going to go in the polls this year. You can vote for him (or any current or former Korean idol or musician) in the Kpopalypse Objectification Survey, which is now live for 2022 – CLICK HERE to participate!
Chuu finally get gold button
Now that Chuu has saved all our environments, she gets a gold button for one million YouTube subscribers! Did you know that’s over half as many as Loona’s official channel, and over a thousand times Kpopalypse’s channel? Now you do!
I N V Ducks
Just because. Oh by the way last week’s quail video was age-restricted, apologies for that but it was something YouTube insisted on. I don’t know why, so I appealed the decision, and…
