It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!
Rose spends most of her time lying on the ground in this video, because that’s where the bar is for k-pop these days. As it happens the song’s alright, sort of a corny but catchy Riot-Grrl-lite that wisely adds just enough melody between the shouting to make it more memorable than annoying. I don’t think this is an APT-beater but it’s good enough to keep her relevant, at least to me, plus the styling is dead-on.
IU’s best song in years seem to be inspired by the “gave over/high score screen” ballad themes in 80s computer games, with its synth textures and bass drum gating recalling the days when you couldn’t write a song on a computer with too many different sound layers because the machines back then only had a few audio channels.
I’m not wild about this fairly average funk thing but it’s just good to see one of the KDH girls doing anything at all, they’ve been a lot quieter than I’ve expected this year.
I still remember when a new Infinite song was something to look forward to and not some “for the fans” slop.
The girl group version of the same thing isn’t any better, but Fifty Fifty have been pretty poor lately so this lighter-waving junk actually represents a slight step up from recent material. Maybe at some point they’ll return to the days when they were putting out songs like “Starry Night“, now that’s a somewhat above average song that you could listen to, if you wanted.
This looks and sounds reasonable enough. Pause the video at 2:29 and look at all the people responsible for this thing. This is why your bias can’t make any money, all those folks need to be paid first. Pray for these nugus.
Open or closed, which one is it? Please make up your minds and then let us know. Although I’d recommend closing your ears instead rather than listening to this horrible “Spinal Tap Mark 2 Jazz Excursion” take on k-pop.
The usual “fuck the haters” type song that most of these groups release at some point, it’s pretty generic but it’s not as thuddingly awful as this group have been in the past. It’s not a terrible effort but I wouldn’t exactly play it loud enough for my neighbours to hear.
Boy groups really suck lately, everyone’s now suddenly doing this dull Autotuned garbage. I guess it’s the “Cortis effect”, one for the Lexicon maybe.
Well, it’s nice that at least they like it.
Just after Riot Games’ crossover k-pop project K/DA came out, I noticed a lot of male characters being added to the League Of Legends roster, especially ‘pretty’ ones like Aphelios and Yone. It was pretty obvious that they were laying the groundwork for a boy-group version of K/DA even back then. This song doesn’t do the usual power-fantasy silliness that seems to comprise all other League Of Legends songs, but it doesn’t do anything else of worth either.
A great video with a killer concept but such a dreary song, any lame Autotuned rapper could have done this, we don’t need Youha adding another one to the bonfire.
Listen to the very first sound in the backing track. As soon as you hear that noise, you know nothing good is going to come from the song.
The daily direction is apparently “up”. Up what? Up to no good? Up yours? Up the duff? Up shit creek without a paddle?
I totally get why groups do this avatar thing but here’s a thought: how about we all consistently challenge Korea’s obsession with very rigid beauty standards that’s necessitating girls doing avatar groups once they hit a certain age in the first place? Oh who am I kidding, this is k-pop that’ll never work. Avatar away, I guess.
Not sure why they want me to delete my number, but if it’s a data security step to prevent getting spammed lame ballads then I’ll gladly comply.
Enough, indeed.
“Friendly fire” always struck me as an odd phrase as being shot by your own side isn’t very friendly. Anyway song’s not good.
I do like the speed-up near the end (reminds me of E.via) but there’s not much of a song to go along with it.
“I rented a car and played some acoustic-driven R&B so I can look smooth.”
This slaps. Finally a k-pop tries to emulate the good period of Michael Jackson (up to Thriller), not the latter-day “dangling a baby out of the window for lolz” period.
Completely chaotic and bizarre which is definitely not a bad thing. I certainly prefer Bryn when she’s being strange to when she’s being generic Autotune up the ass.
Are there any sober people left in Korea, this I wonder. I don’t think there much sobriety going on when this was written.
Kind of like a mid B-track from a decent 90s hip-hop record. Which is poor by rap standards in 1996 but good by rap standards in 2026.
A little bit too conservative to be interesting, but it’s got one hell of a good change-up which is integrated pretty seamlessly. Worth trying to see them pull that off live.
Dbo collabed with some actual rappers and they said “dude, try getting some beats”. The result is decent. He can be alright when he wants to be, I think he just enjoys fucking with us.
Some rock sassiness gets this one over the line in a style that’s usually played a lot more boringly.
I didn’t mind this song either, it has nice vibes and I think it deserves a good write up just because their guitarist is playing one of those horrible new Fender acoustic electrics and having to endure that thing is punishment enough.
The main issue here is that the vocal approach just doesn’t suit the music. Rock with constant overdone fucking vibrato vocal plus that little hiccup thing she does at the end of nearly every damn note, it just isn’t the right feel.
This is a little better in the production department and a little worse in the songwriting department. Those stickers on the bass guitar scratch plates are removable, you know. You might want to do that or you’ll end up with an ugly discolouration just saying.
I’m told this is a group of all non-binary members. While their sexualities might be unconventional and interesting, the same can’t be said of the music which kind of sounds like a lot of stuff now.
Nowhere near as good as J-rockers Caramel Candid’s solo output, this one’s ruined by a slow pace and an irritating chorus hook which isn’t characteristic of their better material.
Here’s this week’s non-Korean feature of the week. The song is decent but the real star of the show here is the video which is fantastic.
A much better song from Rockit Girl this week than last. We all know they’re never going to top “Little Cat” but that’s hardly the objective at this point. No group is required to get more than one #1 placing on a Kpopalypse best list anyway – you’ve paid your dues, Rockit Girl.
Oh my god what in the slop
This one’s a little less shameful, it does look like someone at least tried to make it look good. Also the song isn’t bad. Over a million views on one of these atrocities has to be some kind of record, clearly this song was already popular before the visual accompaniment came along.
Yes AI slops are getting better and this one looks decent – right up until the point she starts playing guitar, then it all falls apart. Once thing AI hasn’t learned how to do right yet is consistently paint the correct fret spacing and dot inlay patterns on an electric guitar.
Ash B is great and has a big time caonima attitude – here she talks about her career path and her struggles with finding income and her identity as a musician. Refreshingly, she admits that she became too influenced by comments in the past and now she doesn’t give a fuck and does what she wants. Certainly this explains the general uptick in the quality of her music over the last few years. An example for us all. Never let comments influence you. No matter what you do in life, someone is always going to hate. Just be true to yourself, it’s the way of the caonima.
Girls909… sorry I mean Girls Planet 999 trainee Judy Kim tells you all about her audition trainee experience. Might be interesting to some of you out there.
The hype around Wings when they first appeared was big, but died very quickly afterward, and the group are barely more than a memory even for most veteran k-pop fans these days. “Hair Short” had a neat concept and some great visual ideas but the music lagged behind, with overpowering vocals and drums that waste the concept’s potential to hit hard. The song would have done much better with more dynamic range in the mix, but that wasn’t the trend in 2014.
That’s all for this week! Kpopalypse roundup returns next week!
