It’s time once again for Kpopalypse roundup!  Let’s check out some new releases!

AOA – Come See Me

AOA finally get back to the four-chord Bravesound-style tracks that initially brought them their fame.  This is really good even though I can’t recognise any of these girls any more except for Jimin.  Who the fuck even are these people.

EXO – Obsession

An unusual but pretty catchy song driven by a sampled loop which is about 80% subs, this is their 2013 material if Hitchhiker rewrote it all.  (I have no idea if he wrote this by the way, but it certainly sounds like it.)

J.Y. Park ft. Superbee, Bibi – Fever

JYP shows his commitment to the old school by not only having a rock-and-roll influenced track, but by lusting after someone above legal age in the video – YG take notes!

Bol4 x Wh3n – New York

Complete trash that doesn’t do either artist any favours.

Sandy ft. Vinxen – Spark

I guess the days of “Teen Swag” are over and Sandy has morphed into the horrible R&B rapper that I knew she would eventually transform into, because in Korea that’s what everybody does.  Sometimes it sucks to be right.  However Vinxen manages to be even worse on the track than Sandy with that horrible Autotune that sounds like burping in time to the beat.

TXT – Angel Or Devil

While BTS can’t seen to write a good or a bad song to save themselves, TXT’s songs are oddly a lot more polarising.  This one’s in the “bad” camp, by the way.

IZ – Memento

Big-sounding rock that is just a bit too pedestrian and smooth to be interesting.

Kang Daniel – Touchin’

Eww, keep your hands to yourself thanks.

Newkidd – Come

Someone made the synth line in Blackpink’s “Forever Young” into a chorus hook for a different and really average song, and the results are – average.

Limitless – Wish Wish

I don’t know if it’s Moonbok himself or someone else associated with him but the songs he’s involved with seem to be consistently better than average.  The stomping drums, cool keyboard pad rhtyhm and some catchy melodic choices compensate nicely for all the trendy squirt-squirting and toot-tooting.

Dynamic Duo ft. Penomeco – MSG

I had hope because of the video’s grimy look, but the beat is that weak nu-school bullshit so it really doesn’t matter who raps over the top of it or how.

ONE – Stone

Not much of a song but at least they get the rhythms right.  If Dynamic Duo did something over this beat instead maybe we’d have something really cool.

feeldog – Feelin & Chillin

You can tell exactly what this is going to sound like from the clothes he wears.

feeldog – No Excuse

That synth riff is just someone just hit random notes for ten seconds and said “who cares I got my session money, that’s a wrap, put it out there”.

Got7 – Thursday

What’s this “be original” shit and why aren’t Got7 taking their own advice.

Got7 – Crash & Burn

This isn’t much better but that oddly farting bass-synth does help a little.

Guckkasten – Your Name

Guckkasten are going in some odd directions lately.  This song threatens to bust out into something truly spectacular but never quite gets there, they need to meld some of their old rock punch with this type of sound.  Maybe it’d be better live.

Blue.D ft. Mino – Nobody

Blue.D’s hair is great and actually looks like a blue D, magnificent.  And that’s the only good thing about this one.

kayLa – Closer

Everybody wants to be IU, but nobody has quite the jawshave or the hate-stare to pull it off.

Yoosanseul – Hapjeong Station Exit No.5

The music unfortunately falls a bit flat due to being pushed too far into the background.

Kim Yuna – WBWY

Smooth and dull.

hyangni – Reconstruction

If this is her livestram I think it’s probably better than mine, it’s just missing cats.

hyangni – Exploration

She looks like the guy from Candlemass recincarnated as a k-pop.

hyangni – Hot Sauce

Hyangni’s best song out of her new bunch captures her weirdness in the correct way, with a song that is genuinely unusual and perky rather than just shitty R&B with space noises added.

Ashmute – Blue

Potentially good, just a bit too normal to be worth caring about.

eunoo – Radio

It’s not unacceptable until 1:30 – THAT’S A FURRY DON’T DO IT EUNOO NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Zinu – Anxiety

Techno didgeridoo action is not something I expected, I guess it beats another R&B ballad.  In before someone complains about cultural appropriation, but I don’t think it’ll happen because all the aboriginal people I know have got way too much sense to listen to k-pop.

M To M – Only You

Vocals are generally neither here nor there for me, but there’s something about this guy’s voice that seriously bothers me.  I want to ask if his prostate is okay.

“Hi” Temperature – Feel It

They’re holding guitars int he thumbnail, but that’s a Gibson ES-335 which is usually only ever used to make bullshit jazz music so don’t get your hopes up.

Swan – Not Fine

Girl if you can’t even stay awake while playing this song on the piano, how the hell do you expect us to stay awake while listening.

MBA and some losers – Lambo

Oh dear this is crap.  Who even listens to this.

Life Of Hojj ft. Kim Seungmin – Baby

Is he copying anyone else’s dance moves?  Can we sue him to try and make him stop it?

Yong Yong ft. Ash Island – Heart Mur-Mur

Wow, would it have killed them to double-time the beat on this.

Young Sky ft. Kangjun – Coldblood

This could have been good with the churning acoustic guitar in the backings but those typical R&B rap style vocals ruin all possible potential.

Suran – Wait For You

That’s not how you use one of those microphones, either.  People don’t usually fuck this up, even in Korea.  I guess she’s never been in a studio before.  Maybe they recorded this by attaching piezo microphones to her ass.

Atone – Ballade

It’s good when they give it away in the title that you can basically skip this one.

V.O.S – Live Well

Do you think these guys have any introspection going on whatsoever with regards to how boring they are?  I bet they’re huge fun at parties.

Banhana – If We Never Met

The only Bahnana I want to see here is Oh My Girl Bahnana, this dude can fuck off.

Ko SangWon – Flying Start

Flying start, my ass.  This song hasn’t even learned to crawl yet.

Jukjae – Letter

This entire video looks like they dipped it into a vat of acid for a month, which is not a bad idea, maybe they could have done the same to the song.

Jin Minho – Half

Warning sign – standing in fields of grass in a suit.

Rorin – Flower Dance

All I can think of when watching this is, wouldn’t those stupid lights in the background totally get in the way if you were trying to play the piano?

Yu Seungwoo – The Road You Take

You know that your neighbourhood is really a run-down shithole when some dickhead makes a k-ballad drama video in your area because they want a “parts of Korea technology hasn’t touched yet” vibe for their boring acoustic slop.

Seong Han Jun – Walking On The Moon

One small step for shit Korean R&B, one giant leap for Kpopalypse roundup puns.

Bursters – Savage

Well this song just made my laptop speakers shit themselves so I guess that’s a good sign.

Jo Dong Hee, CaptainRock – Love Poem

If you’re going to call yourself CaptainRock you’d better come up with something tougher-sounding than this.

Seung-un – Love Alone

The fuck is it with the boring acoustic guitar crap this week.  This song makes me want to get the new guitar I just bought and smash it.

Jehee – A Still Slow Dream

Some nice sounds but it’s not worth a damn when the song is so sleepy.

C On Bin – Sometimes Fall In Love

The guy’s hands on the bass guitar don’t really match up to the tone he’s getting and it’s really bothering me.  Where are all those high-string pops coming from?

H.M.Moon – Baby Tooth

Fuck, he looks bored.  I can relate.

SolAh – Why Was I Born In Korea

Identitiy politics are so mundane.  Instead of caring so much about where you were born, why not care about what you actually do with your life.  Might I suggest making boring as fuck acoustic ballads isn’t the most optimal use of your existence… although to be fair, blogging about such absolute shit probably isn’t either.

Mind, Body & Soul – Homecoming

Blues is a lot of fun to play because the structure of it is so loose that you can do just about anything, but oh boy it’s so boring to listen to, because the entire history of the blues is literally only one song that every single blues performer plays with slight variations.  It’s the most generic music style by far.

Sloe Jean – Amour

This video set looks like someone aimed at them with a bomb from an aircraft and missed.  Aim better next time.

Hwang Hwi-hyun Band – Fly

I own one of those Vox amplifiers and they’re pretty good for the price.  I promise that it’s possible to make better music than this with them.

Kwonssun – Gettin’ Over

Nothing says hip-hop in 2019 like hanging out at the beach and jumping around to trap bullshit.

Park Boram, Jae Jung Parc – Alone

Warning sign – coffee in the video.

RetroCity – Love

Oh wow it’s a really nugu version of the “street harassment video“.  I like it when she whips them with her hair near the end.  Girls don’t talk to boys who make boring slow songs that pollute the lower end of Kpopalypse roundup.

Yoyomi – Vitamin C

I am here for Yoyomi dressing like a throat lozenge that’s been dropped on the carpet and turning today’s trendy bullshit sounds into something good.

IMPORTANT OLI LONDON UPDATES

Oli London ft. Sten – Butterfly (Anxy remix)

When I interviewed Oli London earlier this year, I asked him why he didn’t have any dancing in his videos yet.  Well, hang onto your seat because Oli has taken on board this feedback and he’s here to rock!

Oli London – Heart Of Korea

Actually I don’t mind Oli London because he impresses me as some kind of Genesis P. Orridge style figure of k-pop, a real fly in the ointment of just about everybody who takes it all way too seriously, he almost sounds as insane as Splinter Test already.

BONUS RANDOM VIDEO OF THE WEEK

I Hate Tweeted A K-Pop Band *BTS* (and this is what happened)

This guy puts a VERY positive spin on the awful borderline-illegal cyberbullying behaviour of the more extreme elements of the BTS fandom hive-mind, clearly out of pure survival instinct so he doesn’t get lynched and lose his career as a YouTuber, obviously.  It’s a bit cringe, but I get it – self-preservation is important.  However his assessment of the role that fandoms play, in helping people who feel lost in life emotionally connect with something, is spot-on, and is exactly the reason why fandoms are never rational – they’re thinking emotions-first, always.

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That’s all for this week!  There’ll be one more Kpopalypse roundup for this year – expect it fondly!