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

BigBang- Still Life

A lame emotionally manipulative ballad designed to help you to forgive the boys for all those controversies over the last decade, not that you even cared, you probably just wanted the new song to not suck, right?  Oh well, you can’t always have what you want I guess.

IVE – Love Dive

IVE decide to do something new for them and release an actual decent track, and it’s easily their best so far.  A space-heavy mix and some nice off-the-beat rhythmic choices help lift up the melodic catchiness, the only real flaw is a slightly silly rhythmic breakdown near the end but it’s short enough to be ignorable.

Hong Jin Young – Viva La Vida

Despite the title, once it gets going this is 100% of the trot sound Hong Jin Young has been known for through the years and 0% of that lame Latin shit we’re sick of.  Her best song in years, listening to this really drives it home how much almost every other trot artist gets their songwriting wrong. 

G-IDLE – Never Stop Me

Continuing the rock theme from “Tomboy” with something that sounds a little less machine-driven, and it really suits them far more than anything else they’ve tried so far in their careers.

ITZY – #Twenty

Itzy again rocking rap beats that are far better than anything in actual rap music these days.  Unfortunately it all goes to shit in the chorus which is a bit of a shame, something that combined the verse feel here with the catchiness of “Wannabe” would be legitimately amazing.

GHOST9 – X-Ray

A cool synth riff wasted by just throwing the usual k-pop boyisms over the top.

EPEX – Anthem of Teen Spirit

It’s nice of the Korean special forces to activate to try and save us from this garbage, pity they didn’t have orders to shoot before the chorus started.

Nature – Starry Night

Boring crap that sounds like all those horribly insipid Yukika songs, so if you like that kind of sleepytime crap for mental children then consider this a recommendation I guess.

PRSNT – Take That Back

Why Jiyoon is trying to eat the condensor microphone I have no idea, but PRSNT continues to be great and remarkably consistent.

Choa – Yesterday

All soft focus, fuzzy jumpers and boredom from the ex-AOA singer, this song needed a few random “heys” thrown in to spice it up a little, but then that would probably give poor Choa severe PTSD.

Azer – Trouble

Not awful but just lightweight, generic and not very interesting, very little ‘trouble’ to be found here.

Noir – Happy

You know you’re nugu when you do a dance practice in public and half the crowd around you couldn’t give a shit.

JO1 – Bokura no Kisetsu

It may or may not actually be a first take for real (there’s no way to verify that from the footage here) but the song does still really suck.

Suho – Hurdle

Yeah this disco trend really isn’t doing it for me.  Next time give him a full size guitar and let him rock out for real.

Onew – Dice

One of the better songs coming out of the current disco trend, but the video concept is still way more interesting than anything happening here musically.

Kei, Exy – The Light

Limp tropical-lite, with the performers sitting down and the music as limp and conservative as their postures.

Daybreak, LUCY – Oh Eh

Not enough oh, mainly just eh.

eaJ – Car Crash

What’s with all the falsetto, why is Jae trying to sound like a thot?

Seori – Can’t Stop This Party

Great visual design but I’m not sure why Seori is so insistent on pretending that’s her natural singing voice.  Nobody actually sounds like that.

Ha Hyun Woo – My Enemy

Without some rock guitars and drums to pair with that overpowering voice, listening to the Guckkasten singer going mostly acapella feels a little bit like being beaten around the head.

Kandori – Kodari Love

Minus 43096873245 points for Incorrect fish placement.

Gwangil Jo – Mansae

Not bad but the backing track sounds a bit phoned in, it needed the music to be a bit more dynamic to match the theme.

NaRN – Press Any Button

Thanks, I think I’ll press the “close the window that’s playing this song” button.

W24 – Revelations

Okay, I didn’t expect this.  Rocks a lot harder than most of Korea’s supposed rock bands.  Recommended!

W24 – J♡B=LOVE

Here’s what I actually expected instead.

W24 – Song of Songs

Their third song is completely different again, and it’s not that great, although at least they bring in the rock instruments to provide some impact for the second half.  Can’t argue with the versatility I guess.

Haewon Lee – Jesus in my diary

If Jesus is in your diary surely don’t write a boring ballad about it, just ask him to stop snooping like a little bitch. 

Hucki – Come to me

I love how they’re zooming into that wire fence as if we haven’t already seen it in 10,000 other nugu videos.

Taru – New Way

Dance videos where they zoom in real close all the time on specific performers get a bit seasickening.  I wonder if those splashes of colour on the front of some of those dresses are actually vomit stains.

Yoari – 7

Imagine if Little PSY made ballads instead.  If you don’t click this video I won’t judge you.

BandGUNA – I Miss, I Love You

Players say they feel great to play and maybe they do but honestly I think roasted maple necks on guitars look like shit.  If I want my guitar neck to look like the colour of someone’s asscrack I’ll just shove it up there myself.  Also what is that note choice at 2:40, pretty sure that’s just a fuckup.

Mirani – Pick up your phone

The clothes freaked me out because at first I thought she was naked under that weird diagonal split, like some of the stuff I’ve seen Yua Mikami wear, but even if that was true it couldn’t get me to like this R&B blandness.

VAN – Blu

I saw the text at the end, what “true story”?  Two people in a field holding hands and being boring isn’t much of a story to me.

D Na Ade feat. Jang Wonjun – Moonlight

Yes, boring.

SAGA – Crash-landing

Even more people being boring.  Sorry, your relationship is of no interest to us.

or& – Hey

Look at all the alcohol in the background of that opening shot.  I’m pretty sure I’d need to drink all of that before this song became tolerable.

NOIZ – LALALA

The idea of a mob of suited thugs chasing down shitty Korean R&B singers and tying them up is a good one.  Just remember to bring the gag next time.

ChaMane – Overture

Here’s an even better idea, strap bombs to the Autotuned rappers.  Pity this bomb didn’t detonate quickly enough to save us from the song. 

LAUL – This City

Actually not a terrible song but they really needed to lose the Autotune, he just sounds like a very bored yawning robot.

Vapo feat. Loco – Gone

Not the kind of ‘time stop’ video I want to spend any time watching.

Milena feat. Paloalto – Matter of Taste

All music is a matter of taste and my taste says this stinks.

BONUS RANDOM VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

Eunjung’s favourite casual bags

T-ara’s Eunjung, sharing her bag collection.  Could be important information for some caonimas out there, however be aware that UZA does not like Chanel due to their practice of making bags out of very young animals, so if you want to meet required animal standards maybe just get some cheapo synthetic bags instead.

The C in Dreamcatcher stands for clown

Just thought I’d throw this here for the benefit of Asian Junkie who could probably make a single article devoted to each ten-second clip in this video compilation.  That’s a year’s worth of articles for him now sorted, now he doesn’t have to clone roundup anymore and can get back to what he does best which is listing out k-pop fandom stupidity for the benefit of normal people, click the image header of this post to be taken to the latest example.

Iron Maiden performing “Wasted Years” on German TV

Thanks to the person who sent this in – I’ve featured it before but it was quite some time ago and it’s always worth a re-look.  Singer Bruce Dickinson talks about how incompetent TV crews are when it comes to filming rock bands, and then it cuts to Iron Maiden miming “Wasted Years” on a German TV show and basically just fucking around for the entire thing because they couldn’t even be bothered pretending to play their instruments.  I actually saw this footage on the “12 Wasted Years” video documentary in the late 1980s and its lost none of its relevance, don’t think it’s really any different for your k-pop faves.  They would definitely do this if they were allowed to without getting put in the bad thoughts room.

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That’s all for this week!  This is the last week that the latest Kpopalypse survey will remain open for public submissions, so do it if you haven’t!  Kpopalypse will return next week with more roundup!