It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!
FIFTY FIFTY – SOS
Ah, Fifty Fifty, their music is so relaxing, taking me back to a time when all was well in the world, everyone loved each other, there was no global conflict or prejudice and pop agencies could be trusted to act in the best interests of their employees at all times. Okay, so maybe such times didn’t actually exist, but it’s fun to pretend, just like you still do with all your biases, right? It’s ironic that Fifty Fifty sing here “can you hear my S.O.S” when I was the only one pointing out how they were being starved a full year before their legal case happened. Kpopalypse heard it, even if nobody else did.
QWER – My Name Is Malgeum
Not a bad song, but mainly just fascinating because of the video. Watching Chodan arrange flowers is like watching Patrick Bateman feed stray kittens. Also interesting to note that arch-feminist Soyeon from G-Idle wrote the words to this song, I’ll say it again, QWER are the biggest sleeper feminists out there, they’re just trying to actively throw people off the scent so they don’t get their performances at esport tournaments cancelled. Just wait for one of these girls to get caught reading some book called “101 ways to peg submissive men” or accidentally flashing the “one inch penis” hand signal on a livestream, it’s only a matter of time, then the shit will hit the fan. You heard it here first.
Hwasa – NA
It’s not bad actually, even if that chorus kinda had me going “yeah, nah”. At least it’s pacy, a welcome change from the last 234 things Hwasa has done.
Yeonjun – GGUM
Not as bad as hyped, but also not as catchy as it should be either. The main problem with it is that it doesn’t go all-out stupid in the silly sections quite enough. Just a little more leaning into that “Jaws” riff on the piano probably would have done it.
Key – Pleasure Shop
I wouldn’t say 2024 is a better year than previous years for k-pop overall, but I’d say that due to fast beats coming back into fashion, the baseline of what constitutes an average song is better. This song here doesn’t really light my fire at all but it’s average in that kind of good way.
P1Harmony – Sad Song
Agreeably uptempo, but the lack of variation kills it in the end. Not asking for a “change up” but maybe just another chord or two somewhere.
Aespa, Grimes – Supernova (Grimes Remix)
Not really a remix, rather just Grimes getting the aespa vocal tracks and doing whatever the hell she wants with them. The result isn’t terrible but doesn’t really have anything to do with aespa or k-pop at all either. Your friend could have made this with a sample CD yesterday in about an hour of dicking around on Garage Band.
Chuu – In My Dream
Chuu tries for a Dreamcatcher, but unfortunately it’s the soft, shite end of Dreamcatcher, not the go-hard Dreamcatcher that we really wanted. The amount of potential for Chuu as a metal singer is enormous but she sounds uncomfortable and strained when she should be bringing the house down while riding a heart-shaped wrecking-ball.
NCT WISH – 3 Minutes
Really good, reminding me of the better Lovelyz/CSR songs with those keys plus the general vibe of it. If it’s too cheesy and nice for you don’t worry, I’m sure at least some of these kids are misogynist as fuck like most young Korean men are.
Miyeon – Lovin’ My Stay
Miyeon did pretty damn well in the Objectification Survey this year for a girl who I know nothing about and who I wouldn’t even recognise if she passed me in the street. I guess Macao really turned out for the voting. By the way there’s an all-new Kpopalypse survey out this week that you can do if you’re bored. Love what I do? HATE what I do? Think I’m a COMPELTE CUNT? Well I can’t do jack shit about if you kids just circle-jerk about how you hate me on social networking instead of fucking telling me, can I? Grow a pair and do the survey, caonima.
Kang Daniel – Electric Shock
f(x) outsold and that’s that on that.
RESCENE – Pinball
It sounds like pinball alright, it accurately recreates that feeling when you get a multiball and all three of them go out of play straight away before they even reach the flippers.
xikers – Bittersweet
It’s legit impressive how Xikers have been not sucking lately given their past track record of turkeys. They are definitely in the running for the “most improved” award of 2024 (which doesn’t actually exist, but if it did, they would probably get it).
ZEROBASEONE – Kill The Romeo
Just another album track that shouldn’t have been performed live for some lame TV thing.
Hi-Fi Un!corn – Butterfly
Hey the male QWER are not bad this time around.
NINE.i – I Am
Why do they think we care what they are? IVE might have had the best song last year but they also have a lot to answer for concept-wise.
DKB – Let’s Dance
Let’s not.
Yurisa – Paldo Nuguri
I know you’re wondering “what is that pretty guitar?” and it’s the TM series from Shijie guitars. I like it how they actually make a colour of guitar that matches Yurisa’s preferred hair colour. I feel like she’s starting to hit it style wise now.
Nam Woohyun – Boyfriend
Speaking of which, while Epiphone have a lot of good models to choose from, I really do not recommend the EB-1 bass as shown here. Too heavy, dull sound, kinda uncomfortable unless you have the weirdest body shape ever, they’re so shit that Epiphone recently stopped making them. Looks like Woohyun’s band bagged the last one, shame.
Shin Euijin – Girl, run to the light
If you like the Dreamcatcher thing and just wish they rocked more while still keeping the same melodic focus and don’t mind trading off a bit of a drop in production standards to get the extra guitar crunch, than Shin Euijin should hit the spot.
eaJ, Salem Ilese – Burn
What is he doing singing in the middle of the open sewer drain, he looks like a thot. Just asking questions, man. (I deleted his other songs out of roundup because they were just too thotish)
Jueun feat. Moon Sujin – 1,2,3,4
Look at the comments thirsting over the guy in shorts. That’s the way! We need more shorts-wearing in k-pop from the men. Let’s encourage this objectification, all objectification in k-pop is always good. Let’s remember him next year.
Lena – Blame The Summer
I don’t blame the summer, I blame your songwriter.
Donna Goldn – Grape Wifey
It might not be much better than Henry Bloomfield musically but it has one big advantage which is that it mrcs
CAMO feat. Leellamarz – Only You
Imagine using Autotune and… well, just imagine using Autotune. For any reason. In 2024. Yes there are still people using it, actual musicians ask themselves why every day (even though we damn well know why).
J.Fla – Idea
This song was poop so let’s have our weekly Asian-but-not-Korean not-pop not-world-music feature here instead! This week it’s Deathpact, a technical death metal group from China. Would you believe that at the time I found it, this video had less than 200 views, and it was uploaded three years ago? Anyone would think they’re under a Fifty Fifty style boycott, because we all know how effective those are (S.O.S has ten million views at the time of writing by the way). Anyway back to Deathpact and they’re pretty ridiculous. Oh and their guitarist is at 0:34 in this video too, just in case you were wondering if he could play.
Wildberry – Sugar Thrillz
This is NewJeans’ “Hurt” video but if they exaggerated the creepiness of it just a little bit. If you were wondering why you got icky vibes from that thing but couldn’t quite figure it out, watching this will probably make it click for you.
Alice Longyu Gao ft. Mega Mongoliad – Korean Girls
This is the banger I wanted from Mega Mongoliad, thanks Alice for dragging it out of them, and kicking my gay heterosexual ass. BADING!
HOA – Push Man
The Korean Beatles clones are back, and once again it’s pretty authentic sounding. Personally I can’t wait until they get into the long-haired drug-taking tantrum-throwing era of The Beatles, not that I liked them in that phase but I just want to see what their take on it is. Until one of these guys does a three day bed protest for peace with his new wife I feel like they haven’t realised their destiny yet.
CLOUDIAN – You’ll See
I’m not sure how I feel about this weird orchestral happy-metal. It’s agreeably punchy but there’s something about those major arpeggios that just feels wrong.
CLOUDIAN – Start Over
Their other song sucks total balls, but credit to them for showing a Shure Super 55 microphone being sung into THE RIGHT WAY on the thumbnail. Let’s leave it here because thumbnails won’t improve after this.
RANDOM BONUS VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
HeeJin – Algorithm (rock version)
There’s some shit hot guitar solos here but you don’t get to see the actual guitarist play them, we just get HeeJin flouncing around on stage instead and no credit to the actual musicians, what a shame. I mean sure she looks good doing it but I don’t know it just sits wrong, like they’re saying “you don’t care about the music we’ll just show you HeeJin”. Oh well, what do I expect from a shitty lyric video.
UNIS Gehlee goes viral for being an unbothered queen
There’s an entire gender studies thesis to be written on the very weird treatment of Gehlee in the media at the moment. Mostly positive but it’s hard not to see the elephant in the room… let’s see if you can pick it? Good luck readers, put your first drafts below! (Or just pissfart around on social networking like usual, whatever floats your boat I guess.)
Skarf – Oh! Dance
Not many people remember Skarf, a k-pop group that only existed for two short years (2012-2014) but I was reminded of them because Singaporean ex-member (and now reasonably successful actress) Tasha Low has a new song out and it’s not too bad actually. Hana from Skarf also found her way into Secret Number more recently where she’s called Lea (probably to give police the slip). Skarf were actually okay too, they never really had a shit song but they were definitely also overshadowed by a lot of other groups from around the same timeframe doing similar stuff, they didn’t have anything about them that really set them apart from the pack. Anyway enjoy this slightly above-average song of theirs.
That’s all for this week! Kpopalypse roundup returns next week! And don’t forget the latest Kpopalypse survey is now live, you could CLICK HERE and do it if you wanted! Stay safe, caonimas!
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