It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup!  Let’s take a look at some new releases!

BoA – The Greatest

Everything BoA does is perfect and that’s exactly the problem.  Perfection sucks, because it lacks character.  As followers of k-pop we get tedious pristine boring perfection shoved down our throats, a constant parade of flawless models nipped and tucked to within an inch of their life when what we really want is our art class crush with the lazy eye and the weird walk who just “gets it”.

Yerin – Aria

So it’s great when they get the formula wrong.  Ex-Gfriend Yerin trying to be [insert generically pristine k-pop female soloist here] is as uncanny-valley yet oddly satisfying a media appreciation experience as watching “Lisa” in The Room.  You know she’s definitely the wrong choice for the part, but it’s such a fascinatingly wrong choice that seeing how they’ve tried to square-peg the round hole is completely compelling, and ultimately far more entertaining than [insert generically pristine k-pop female soloist here] was probably ever going to be.

JI U – Cherry (Real Miracle)

Ji-U is a dead ringer for T-ara’s Qri in this pleasant enough song that reminds me of the better mid-period Apink stuff and definitely mrds

ATEEZ – Rocky

Generic boygroupisms 101.

ONEUS – Bring It On

Generic boygroupisms 101.

THE BOYZ – She’s The Boss

Generic boygroupisms 101, this one had a good riff though but they certainly didn’t turn it up in the mix far enough for it to compete with the usual boring vocal choices.

AB6IX – Savior

AB6IX dare to do what The Boyz didn’t, placing the more abrasive elements of the backing track front and center.  I’m not sure if the result really works but at least it sets itself apart and has a bit of groove.

Lunarsolar – Do You Wanna Get Down

Of course we get a shit video because this group has already disbanded so they can’t exactly make a proper one now, but the song isn’t terrible and surely a better parting gift than the usual soppy ballads that we usually have to put up with when a group bites the dust.

PSY feat. Crush – Happier

Koreans always gotta think up the most abstract miserable tear-jerking shit to make cartoons about, like they’re not already sad enough and really need something extra to cry about.  Why can’t they just animate porn like normal people.

TRI.BE – A Kind Of Magic

While Queen’s songs are generally great, you don’t realise how heavily they leaned on Freddy Mercury’s very unique and charismatic vocal delivery until you hear someone else do a stilted, squared-off version of one of their best songs that butchers it to pieces.  Extra negative points for substituting Brian May’s amazing guitar work with the usual trap breakdown nonsense we’ve heard a million times and never want to hear again.

ONEWE – Roommate

Oh look Marshall stacks and a drum kit, finally something that’s actually going to rock… oh wait, never mind.

TNX – Move

Surprises with a pre-chorus so good that it needs a completely different song all its own to go with it instead of the nonsense the rest of the track is filled with.

TNX – Your Favorite Melody

Warning sign: sitting down on evenly-spaced barstools.

CLASS:y – Feelin’ So Good

Warning sign: sitting down on evenly-spaced barsto… hey wait, this is an upbeat song, what the fuck happened here.  Oh well be grateful the girls don’t have a choreo so they can get a rest I guess.

TRIGER – No Limit

Times must really be tough at Blockberry, they’re now renting Kim Lip’s missile solo out to the nugu boy groups.

U-MIN – Real Love

And to this girl too.  I hope the money’s rolling in, I’d like to see Olivia Hye do the splits for no reason at least one more time before Blockberry can’t afford replacement stockings anymore.

JUST B – Lights On

When Jiu wears white I’m okay with it but when these guys do it for some reason I suddenly have a problem with it. Maybe it’s because I know the probability of any random k-pop boys being a bunch of ultra-misogynist creeps is reasonably high, and I tend to associate white clothing with nice pro-woman things like Qri’s Instagram, but when I see these boys I remember that the Ku Klux Klan also wore white and I become cautious.

LUMINOUS – Wish You Were Here

There’s something weird about the light in this video where everyone has these strange downcast shadows and they look like they’ve been cobbled together from mechanical parts, I kept waiting for one of the k-pop boys to transform into a car.

NINE.i – Beauty Inside

I’m starting to realise why almost every Korean “beach” themed song shows exactly the same strip of beach, it’s because all of their other beaches have these weird rocky outcrops that probably make them no good for dance routines.

Yoyomi – Cheers (Rock mix version)

Not content with draining my nutsack last week, Yoyomi is back to squeeze the last few residual drops out, but my erection calmed down ever so slightly when I saw her holding the Shure Super 55 the wrong way.  Come on Yoyomi, you’re supposed to be better than that, don’t make a liar out of me.

Verivery – Candle

I’m not sure of having 0.5 seconds of cat makes up for the horrible mobile phone video format, or the shit song in general.

Jeong Eunji – Meet him among them

Ms. Pac Man could have used a few more power pellets here.

Lee Soo Young – Uranus

“Uranus” is looking pretty purple and also it’s sounding a bit weird, I’m not sure what you did with it but perhaps it’s time to go back to the proctologist. 

POYSOFI – DOUBt

Not the best song like this I’ve ever heard ever, but earns points for women playing guitar solos.  Having the guy do all the singing and the girl do the guitar leads is a refreshing twist on how it usually is.

GEMma – You Will Love Me

Wow, if they only kept the sound from the first ten seconds and used that in the actual song.  What a huge missed opportunity.

015B feat. Dawon – Not Bad

Nice retro guitar sounds don’t really help save this plodding downtempo snoozer.

UNE X DAUL – NVM

Hey it’s cool!  The beat gives this a completely different feel to most songs of this type.

Minsung – Fxxk U

Someone should just tap Koreans on the shoulder and tell them the “offensiveness level” of “fuck” because they can’t seem to make up their minds – one minute they’re censoring it out of their songs, the next they’re wearing clothes that say “the fucking dick goes in the pussy” at the airport terminal.

APRO feat. wonvin choi – Voyage

Everyone wants to be Kurt Cobain, but nobody wants to be Kurt Cobain.

Geum San – The Main Role

Bruno Mars style acoustic reggae lite, with tropical sound too… actually not as awful as that combination makes it sound, just because the songwriting isn’t bad.  A good songwriter can save anything.

Obze – Lovers

See, PSY – it’s possible to make a video kind of cute and romantic without also making it depressing as fucking shit.

ZUYONI – Baby Blue

Nothing all that special, and the way she looks at the camera like I’m her partner is disturbing.  Sometimes the acting is too good and it’s unsettling, like I’m about to start getting stalker emails from her.

Witches – okokok

These deros have a better song than most of the actual pop groups this week.  Also mrds

Kassy – Don’t Wanna Leave Tonight

Everyone is so cute and “coupley” in k-pop videos.  I don’t like it, I need more ugly lonely people in these things.

AMONG feat. Mckdaddy – Kill Bill

It would have been good if they took a leaf out of some of the great music in the Kill BIll soundtrack but I guess that’s asking a bit much of the average talentless Autotuned hip-hop warbler.

Z.flat – Choom

“Live performance video” when there isn’t a microphone anywhere in his vicinity, what do these people think live performance actually means.  At least it’s quick.

Ji Hyuk Kang – Fairy Tail

Korean media and their use of the word “co-ed” to describe mixed gender groups always seemed fucking weird to me, like, they’re not in fucking school?  Turns out they are in fucking school.  My bad.

Na Yoon Han – Seo-San Love

You have hair like Seinfeld, go away, you are making me feel insecure.

Kim Siwon with Popping Hyun Joon – It’s Hot

The incredible dancer from A-Force’s iconic disasterpiece “Wonder Woman” is back but sadly wasted with this generic trot song that doesn’t give him much to get his dancing shoes on for.  The best he can manage here is some wavy hand stuff, not a Hitler salute or crab dance in sight.

Keith Ape – Ride With My Dawgs

It’s incredible how trap music is just gradually evolving into Throbbing Gristle and nobody is even noticing.

Kim Siwon – Arari

A rubbish song for your grandparents only, but the video is lovely to look at, I love it when they go next level with the noir lighting, costumes and sweeping camera angles.

Dbo – Don’t Leave Me

Turn the Autotune off and she might stick around.  But then, maybe not, because then she’ll know what you really sound like and that’s probably even worse.

Devine Channel feat. Yellowmane, Sahtyre, Junoflo, G2 – Howl

A beat and some speed/brevity works wonders for these hip-hop collab things.  Nobody wants to listen for seven minutes while you and your crew mumble over some slow ass trap bullshit.

MUL, feelDa, H:Sean – 777

It’s crap but I enjoyed watching it, probably just because I liked the fact that the women weren’t wearing typical hip=hop clothes.

1014 – Small Happiness

My happiness is small indeed.

Choco N Vanilla – Result Theory

Someone trolled this group HARD by suggesting that these girls call themselves “Choco & Vanilla”, no doubt without also telling them about Nekopara, this is worse that when they got that Stellar girl to drink milk.

Rockit Girl – Pinky Pinky Pop

It’s great to see Rockit Girl back in action, plus they have an actual bass player again which is fantastic, pity their new song is kind of bad.  Two out of three ain’t bad.

BONUS RANDOM VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

Steelheart – Trust In Love (Korean version)

This “Korean comeback” is a big cheesy ballad in typical hair metal style with every cliche in the book plus a hilariously over-the-top guitar solo, but it’s not eligible for roundup or end of year lists due to the group being an established western artist in their own right… well, kind of.  For those who don’t know, Steelheart were one of the many American hair-metal groups that were most active just before the advent of grunge.  While their most well known song was a rocker, Steelheart were one of those rare groups that was actually better at ballads, .but a tragic stage accident forced them on hiatus and by the time they were ready to return to the spotlight, their career momentum was gone – music fashion had shifted completely away from their sort of style.  I don’t talk about OH&S compliance so much in my posts for no reason.

Metallica – “Creeping Death” (Cover by Izzyful)

It’s great to see some more Koreans shredding on the guitar, let’s hope some of them eventually get to make it into the music business and beef up some of these pussy-ass k-pop songs in these roundups.

Yuqi – Giant + Bonnie & Clyde – Show Champion

Can Yuqi play guitar?  Yes, she can at least do chords.  Is she playing guitar here?  No.  She seems unsure what parts she’s supposed to be miming, and when the lead happens she’s slightly out of sync with where she’s supposed to be.  You could explain that away as time delay, if it weren’t for the bass player and drummer right next to her who are actually synchronised properly so we know it’s not that.  Oh well, so it’s fake but hey she looks cool.  Strap a guitar onto any girl and it’s always an instant improvement.

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That’s all for this week!  Kpopalypse roundup returns next week!