It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!
Lisa feat. Doja Cat & Raye – New Woman
Lisa finally gets it right… but then does she really, because musically she’s barely even in this at all. It’s essentially a Raye/Doja Cat song where Lisa feels like the walk-on guest, as she’s been given the least demanding and most minimal parts to sing while the other two do almost all the heavy lifting. Praying for a future Lisa song that is actually just Lisa (and hopefully also not shit).
BABYMONSTER – Billionaire
YG are absolutely lost in the woods with BabyMonster, they just don’t know what to do with them, so they’re just randomly trying anything, flinging mud against the wall and hoping something sticks so they can make that their “sound”. This amateurish nonsense is the type of song that I’d expect to see from a group in the Z tier of my girl group tier list, not BabyMonster…. oh wait
RESCENE – Glow Up
Rescene head for Illit/Fifty Fifty territory and it kind of works pretty well actually. Pity about the occasional puke AI visuals but I guess companies are lazy and on tight budgets so we’re just going to have to put up with this crap.
MADEIN – Saturn
Speaking of garbage AI visuals ruining k-pop, the queens of shit AI and getting sexually assaulted are back. Isn’t it just lovely to know that if you complain about sexual harrassment in public in a k-pop group, you’ll just end up having to leave and the group will keep on trucking like nothing happened, hey. We know the Shin Hana stories are actually fiction (or at least “fiction”) because if they weren’t, some CEOs would have been dealt with by now.
Moonbyul – Hoshiakari
Moonbyul is back and she’s definitely throwing a bone to the sapphics here. Not really into the song but the effort they’ve gone into here to lean into Moonbyul’s ideal types of look is outstanding.
ALL(H)OURS – Gimme Gimme
I’m not sure what I liked more here – the silly looking CGI gunplay, the tyres screeching on dirt roads like a 1960s Bond film, or the punchy fast-paced song that took me back to early 2010s k-pop when the boy groups weren’t afraid to go hard and crank the BPMs occasionally.
EVNNE – Hot Mess
Accurate song title of the we…. actually it’s not that bad, seriously. I mean it’s not great, but this probably would have blown my tiny mind when I was 12.
YB feat. Xdinary Heroes – Rebellion
I guess someone had to show this group how to rock. Now we just need to teach them about songwriting and we’re good.
ONE PACT – Confession
Kind of a poo song but I like it becaused it’s in 6/8 and it’s always good to have examples of that for when people ask. Also I like the name “One Pact” because it’s backhandedly acknowledging that k-pop is actually a dangerous cult full of brainwashed fuckwitted morons, something we all know is true but it’s not often made quite this obvious by the groups themselves, only by their fandoms on social media.
OnlyOneOf – Stay
Have fun sifting through the video to this dreary song looking for all the BGP skinskip.
Ferry Blue – Love Again
Ferry Blue are one of those Z-tier doomed-to-failure groups and they are probably never going to get it right because they just don’t have the people behind the scenes who are music-savvy and media-savvy enough to make it happen. Having said that, this is by far their best effort yet, it actually resembles a real song to some degree. Keep at it, Kpopalypse is cheering for you! (Also it might help if you let people embed your video properly, just saying.)
Angel Noise – White Letter
Not bad and definitely on the better side of ballads, featuring of all things an Yngwie Malmsteen style dual guitar/keys solo, cheers to the invisible guitarist, bass player and drummer for their efforts.
Even Though – Seiren’s
This horrible song isn’t even worth unzipping my pants to piss on, so let’s have our weekly non-Korean LGBT feature here instead, yay! This week it’s Angel Vivaldi, who is living proof that shred isn’t just for boringly straight people like Kpopalypse. He has plenty of stuff online which is great in all sorts of ways, but I love the video for his collab with Nita Strauss because of the hilariously (and deliberately) misplaced dancing. You’ve seen people play guitar this fast before, but you haven’t seen people play guitar this fast before AND bust out dance moves like Angel Vivaldi does. I think if there’s a western shredder ripe for a k-pop dance collab, he might just be the guy.
015B feat. Jeong Dayeong – Our Way
The latest in the endless stream of 015B collabs is just a bit too plodding for me to care.
BLASÉ feat. Jay Park, Coogie, Oygli – Blaséoul
This sort of music doesn’t feel right when they rap about how they don’t do drugs. Although I reckon Jay might be struggling on some downers because it sounds like he’s having a little trouble keeping up here.
NOWIMYOUNG – Swagger
Just another song out of the dozens of ones released each week that could have potentially been alright if the Autotune was switched off.
RANDOM BONUS VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
T.O.P. Reacts to Thanos’ Best Scenes
I mentioned in my review of the series that T.O.P knew exactly what he was doing with the Thanos character in Squid Game 2, and here’s the proof. He definitely gets it. My not-giving-fucks-about-kpop partner thought the Thanos scenes were some of the best parts, and they are.
Viviz something something hey they’re in suits and they look fantastic
If you’re wondering why this roundup is short it’s because I have to watch this video a lot for research.
Rainbow Blaxx – Cha Cha
These days they’re almost forgotten among the avalanche of newer groups, but Rainbow were once queens of the “sexy concept” as their Rainbow Blaxx subunit proved. This song isn’t really all that exciting musically but it certainly was a good enough vehicle for the girls, it allowed them to attach themselves to the “sexy” branding, and they did well in the objectification surveys for many years after Rainbow stopped making music as a result (although personally I prefer the Viviz video above for sexiness but to each their own). The members of Rainbow later were asked about sexy concepts and how they felt about it, in response they talked about how the “Blaxx” subunit did well and the cute “Pixie” one nobody gave a crap about, and “like, what do you expect us to do, of course we’re going to push the sexy side because we’re idols and we have to survive and that’s what you’re buying, so that’s what we’re selling”. It’s very relatable and reminded me of how I make fifty posts a year that aren’t roundups and out of those maybe 2% of them are about tits but they’re the only ones besides roundups and end of year lists that anyone outside of my small hardcore following ever clicks on or talks about. Guess I’ll have to keep doing them forever seeing as how you all secretly love it.
That’s all for this week! Kpopalypse roundup returns next week!
No comments:
Post a Comment