It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!
I’m still not convinced that NewJeans won’t regret being forced to sing “take it, don’t break it, I wanna see you taste it, sugar, got sugar, bet you want some yeah yo” later in life, so here’s a picture of my cat.
TWICE – Talk That Talk
Twice return to form which is great to see, and it’s even more great to see Jeongyeon knocking the visuals out of the park, even if she gets even less screen time than the cat they had to beam in from outer space just to make this video mrcs
Rocket Punch – Flash
Rocket Punch are actually good and if I was about to be forced to eat my own shit at gunpoint in some weird hostage situation or something I’d say “okay, but can you please put on that Rocket Punch song while I eat these turds” and it would make the experience slightly less traumatic maybe I dunno.
Wonho – Don’t Hesitate
Wonho may be the strongest man in k-pop, but are his muscles buff enough to negate the inherent shittiness of the Universe App? Not when he doesn’t show them, they aren’t. It’s simultaneously Wonho’s worst song and Universe App’s best song.
Key – Another Life
Probably the best SHINee solo project ever made, with punchy bass and some catchy vocals. Not sure what took them so long to do something like this but I guess I won’t complain too much now that we have it.
IVE – My Satisfaction
One of those “not really a video” things that I really shouldn’t include here at all but I will anyway because about 57 of you asked me about it and you’ll keep fucking asking me about it until I boringly throw down my useless opinion on it so here you go. The song is a bit undercooked, it really need a bit more stomping bass register (compare it to Key above), but that might be an artifact of the video itself, it’s still pretty good and IVE are still going up sorry Kim Garam
Youha – Last Dance
I really like it when we have a week with not just one but a whole bunch of songs that don’t suck and Youha’s is certainly the most unique out of all of them. I shit on R&B a lot and that’s highly deserved because R&B is bullshit music for fuckheads, but if it sounded more like this more often, I wouldn’t hate it so much. Of course you could say “well this song really isn’t R&B at all” and that’d just prove my point, as soon as R&B songs start steering away from R&B stylistically, that’s when those songs can actually sound good.
Ha Sungwoon – Focus
Even this boy-group rando has a half decent song this week. Sometimes you wait forever for a bus, sometimes all the buses come at once.
Yeri X Sam Kim – Nap Fairy
Okay that’s the end of the quality run this week, however your grandparents may disagree. The nap fairy definitely visited the recording studio for this one.
AB6IX – Chance
I love how they make a big deal of showing all the headset packs at the start of the video, like they actually bother to turn those things on while the boys are miming.
TEMPEST – Can’t Stop Shining
I was a little tired when I wrote this roundup and initially read this song title as “Can’t Stop Shitting”. I guess that was pretty accurate after all.
DKB – 24/7
And this is what DKB came up with this week, pathetic. Did they not know what else was coming out this week? Clearly they had no clue. Outdated Autotuned-to-death slow pussy music is at least 15.2% of the problem with society right now.
BLANK2Y – Fuego
Look at these kids trying to carry the ‘badass concept” on their skinny shoulders. That kid at 0:38 really needs someone to step in and tell him how to throw a punch properly before he breaks his hand fighting over someone’s lunchbox.
SKYLE – Bye Bye Bye
Here’s the female equivalent with the “badass girls breaking hearts” or whatever, and it’s no more and no less cringe when the girls do it. Hey it’s not bad musically though, certainly about as good as this useless “Latin” style or whatever gets these days.
Rocking Doll – Drop Down
Sometimes, Rocking Doll’s songs are great, and sometimes they sound like they were written by an algorithm going through all your favourite albums, grabbing short samples and presenting them at you out of order and out of context. Like that section here where it really sounds like it’s building up to some kind of change at 0:43 and then it totally doesn’t happen.
Rocking Doll – Pom Pom
A better song, although the choice of having the snare drive the chorus and having everything else be really sporadic is really weird. It doesn’t really fit with “we’re bringing the hook home, baby”… although they do anyway, which is a plus.
Secret Number – Hola
And here’s the bland-as-shit version from someone else.
TRI.BE, Allu Arjun, Armaan Malik – Memu Aagamu
This collaboration made me become a Pepsi drinker.
Kim Chaewon – Tomorrow
This is one of the girls in April who gave hell to one of the other girls maybe or maybe she didn’t I don’t know, I wasn’t following that shit closely because I don’t really care about drama and “mess” like a prurient asshole, I’d rather spend my time telling you how it’s stupid to care about those things. Anyway here she is to put pineapple on your pizza whether you like it or not, and this song plus her full tilt aegyo has got such “power electronics” energy. What do you mean you don’t like pineapple, take the pineapple from Chaewon, take it you fucking cunt
Honey J feat. Lil Cherry – Honey Drop
It’s funny how the song is actually really great but they changed the backing track up to be total shit just for Lil Cherry’s bit so she’d feel more comfortable.
Lee Jinhyuk – Crack
This song actually needed a bit more crack involved, crack junkies write great music. Horrible drugs are always good for creativity, this is why I keep pressuring Han Seo Hee to form a group, let’s go k-pop.
Jinny – Do not say
If Rose from Blackpink really left YG, this is what she’d probably sound like. Be careful what you wish for.
INI – Shooting Star
Why do songs have to be so slow.
INI – Stride
It’s weird how their slow song is faster. Anyway fuck this group.
TAN – My Heart
Fuck these fucking groups, man. I’m not aggressive or mad or edgy or whatever bullshit people want to say, I just hate bad music. Is that a crime?
Black Rose – Rip Up
Hey it’s the obligatory weekly Future Idol entry. There’s many great moments here to reflect on, my favourite is the girl at 1:09 who seemingly was told behind the camera “can we get an innocent smile… oh wait, no sorry I mean girl crush” and she just changed her facial expression on the fly and they kept all of it, she has a big future in this business.
JAY B – Rocking Chair
This song is about 80% string squeak noise from changing acoustic guitar chords.
Mark Tuan – Far Away
I actually really like that strange guitar noise at the start, pity that I don’t like anything else about it.
Junji – Be Mine
Shit song but if you’re after the typical OnlyOneOf gay fanservice just go straight to 1:30 you’re welcome. You can bet these guys understand Blackpink’s “Ice Cream”.
Soohyun, Niel – My Friend
Remember U-Kiss? I’m pretty sure whoever wrote this song doesn’t.
Jang Woohyuk – Echo
Speaking of people in k-pop you’ve forgotten about, this guy used to be in H.O.T who probably still haven’t officially disbanded according to SM Entertainment.
Leo – Losing Game
Terrible song but at least he has the courtesy to have a decent bass guitar tone and dance with his shirt off.
Yoon Seobin – 100%
Wow, Primary on the receiving end of plagiarism for once.
Apoki feat. E-40 – West Swing
Most rap guys are actually broke, and there’s reasons for that, so I won’t make too much fun of veteran rapper E-40 being reduced to having to rap with budget ae-Winter just so he can pay down his mortgage – times are hard, man.
Jo Gwangil – Metamorphosis
It’s very rare when I listen to a Korean rapper do rock music and my gut feeling is “actually you’re a lot better when you just stick to rapping” but there it is.
Silica Gel – No Pain
Why does this band have so many members in it. This music sounds like it would take three people to make yet there’s 25 of them, why. Whoever is the band leader, think about this – if you sack a few people you don’t have to split your pittance of earnings from gigs so many different ways.
Flint – Flint
If you can get past the annoying Cranberries-ish tone of the lead singer, the music here is actually half decent.
Do Haneul – Netflix
I didn’t care about the song much but it’s a cute video.
San E, Rocoberry – It’s sunny today
San E is still doing stuff, I guess Raina didn’t want to do a thing with him anymore so he’s now with paper mache Raina. I’m not sure how I feel about San E. Where’s Kerrigan May’s dog, I want to take it for a walk.
Beat Someone X San E – Champion Belt
Apparently he’s in this one too, but I can’t tell. Is that really him on the mic? It can’t be, he sounds almost semi not-shit.
JUSTHIS – Red Pill
Lots of swearing for a song with such a wimpy beat. If you keep swearing at the machine it won’t speed up, you know.
Sohyang – To The World (Hope Song)
My main hope is that the song fucking ends.
Homies – K-LAND
Imagine having the choice of any name for your rap project and calling it “Homies”. It’s a pretty accurate indicator of the amount of imagination used to make this song.
KISU with Jinhong – Cheeseburger
Holy shit this is bad.
Seoria – End And
I only hate most songs because they’re boring and stupid. I dunno man, I think those are pretty good reasons.
BONUS RANDOM VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
Loona’s Vivi falling asleep during activities on Loona’s US tour, 28/8/2002
Actually falling asleep on tour schedules isn’t something unique to k-pop, I can’t say I haven’t taken a snooze in a few backstage rooms here and there while on the road (the support bands definitely helped). However when it’s happening while you’re supposed to be actually doing a thing as opposed to just in downtime, then you know it’s a bit extreme. Isn’t it lovely how her agency are joking about this and playing it off as cute instead of the massive red flag about their shitty management that it is, onstage accidents so aegyo uwu heart shape boing boing splat
Jessica Jung – on “haters”
If there’s anyone who knows about dealing with unfair hate, it’s Rachel Kim. Be silent while the teacher is speaking.
Seoul Magic Club play an entire live set in your lounge room
Seoul Magic Club had one of the best songs of last year, and that song is here along with a bunch of other stuff that you’ve never heard before, here’s a thought maybe instead of shovelling money to some dicksucking corporation that is at worst molesting and torturing young men and women for ten cents per year and at best at least showing complete disregard for their mental and physical health as they are squeezed dry for every last penny, perhaps you should listen to this charming lo-fi home lounge room gig instead and support Seoul Magic Club and enhance your life. I dunno, just a thought I had.
