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

Taeyang ft. Jimin – Vibe

The vibe here is mediocrity. At least there’s nothing mediocre about Taeyang’s torso-flashing, he’s come to regain his crown from Wonho as the k-pop objectification O.G.

Dreamcatcher – Reason

Even when she’s an anime character Dami can’t escape that damn Hillary Clinton hair, but the song rocks hard enough and sits well enough with all of Dreamcatcher’s rocking-ish songs to not sound too shameful I suppose.

GOT The Beat (Girls On Top) – Stamp On It

I know I already reviewed it, but this is why I hate reviewing “live stages”, such a fucking waste of my limited roundup-writing time. The thing is going to get a video anyway usually, and if it doesn’t it probably sucks. Hey, even if it does it probably still sucks. Who gives a fuck.

Yena ft. BE’O – Love War

Not much happening here of interest, I can’t even think of any good offensive jokes for people who’ve blocked me on social networking to copy-paste.

Boa, Wendy, Ningning – Time After Time

They’re doing Sam Brown’s “Stop” for like the 256987th time in k-pop, lucky us.

Kangta, Yesung, Suho, Taeil, Renjun – Happier

When the makers of an SM box video couldn’t even be bothered hanging the lights on the box properly, you know that the song is even more boring than usual.

Primrose – Primrose

Oh look it’s Primrose in our area. I love their fucked up logo where they’ve tried to combine a P and an R and it just ends up looking like an R because an R is basically just a P with an extra bit, they really didn’t think that one through.

Primrose – Play

Their other song is better, it’s that nu-school acoustic guitar thing where they still make it kind of dance-oriented and it’s not great but I can tolerate it.

Alexa feat. Moonbyul – Star

Alexa and Moonbyul have quite a height difference between them so I guess Alexa didn’t want anyone else appearing in her video and showing the world how short she is. Short is cute though so she shouldn’t be worried, and anyway Moonbyul is taken. Did you know T-ara’s Boram is almost half a foot taller than Alexa? That’s probably a lie but go look it up anyway just to amuse me.

Moonbin & Sanha – Desire + Wish

If you watch closely at 0:36 you can actually see those flowers wilt and die slightly in real time from the shit music.

Henry – Moonlight

Probably the most semi-acceptable thing the Korean Rick Astley has done in years. If only his music was as consistent as his haircut.

Chad Future, Kyung Dasom – Good Vibes

Did you know that I did a whole retrospective post about Chad Future’s career where I reviewed every single one of his songs? Of course you don’t, because nobody cares about Chad Future, even if you did read that post you’ve probably forgotten about it’s existence by now. The “first western k-pop idol” is so eternally nugu that even Oli London didn’t know who he was, I literally had to tell him about Chad Future and “no you’re not the first person to do this, dude”. Here’s Chad anyway, doing a song with Dasom, no not that Dasom, some other Dasom you don’t give a fuck about either. In other news Andrew Tate has wrecked sports cars for an entire generation, young people used to see those cars and think “cool wheels dude” now they just think “the driver is trash and probably owns a rape dungeon”, if you own stocks in racing car companies sell now while you can, those things will be worth ten cents soon.

WayV – Good Life

Mandarin is a sexy langauge, if I was gay and didn’t care about music I could probably cum to just the sound of this.

VERIVERY – It’s You

Ballad, white fuzzy jumpers, sitting down – three strikes you’re out!

TO1 – Troublemaker

“In the studio” and it’s literally not a studio but the back of a theater stage, whatever I guess. Not a lot of honestly in advertising in k-pop is there.

Cherish – Bloom

Future Idol groups aren’t eligible for roundup any more but I’m just putting this one here to remind you what they look like, because…

Hana – Bla:ze

…this other group here look just like a Future Idol group, but aren’t. Imagine waiting all that time and going through all that training to debut in k-pop and the result turns out like something some university kids did over a holiday weekend. I think they’ll change their name or disband quickly after my book comes out just to maintain their image.

Cheetah, Eunice, Doyeon, Heya – Want

Ehhhh it starts kind of promising but it’s not that good, Cheetah wasted as usual. It needs to go harder.

DJ INA – Night Sky

She might know how to use DJ decks but if you’re going to play the organ don’t sit so low like that, you’ll fuck your wrists. Oh well at least the video mrds

Ste – M.O.N.S.T.ER

I’m not wild about the song itself once it kicks in but the heavy riffs is appreciated. BC Rich Mockingbird > Gibson.

Dive feat. BIGONE – Heart Emoji

More Autotuned punk rocking, yay us. Can’t help but feel this type of thing is missing the point a little.

015B feat. Dongha – Diary of a broken heart

It’s such a shame that 015B are great at recreating all sorts of genres and then just choose yacht rock all the time.

Yunsae – Youniverse

It didn’t work for Loona and it’s not going to work for your nugu ass either, I’m sorry.

Levan – Mellow Movie

I was just going to slap an irrelevant video over this but then the song turned out to be alright…

Naul – I Still Love You

…so I’ll do it over this one instead. Since k-pop fans claim they are sooooo interested in black music, this week’s history lesson is Bad Brains. Far and away the most musically accomplished of all the groups coming out of the DC punk scene, Bad Brains influenced all your sexy uwu 80s punk biases like Black Flag, Dead Kennedys etc. Check out the great “I Against I” which has more style change-ups than an NMIXX feature track and actually pulls it all off. Since this is black music, if you don’t like this song that means you’re racist… but then if you do like it you’re homophobic because Bad Brains were also pretty openly anti-gay back in the day (not noticeably more anti-gay than your favourite rappers mind you). So just accept that you’re problematic no matter what and join me in the cancelled club, the music is better here.

Fantamony – Let’s try new music

Actually a better funk song than… most of them.

Xooos – Naked

A song called “Naked” with a chorus that says “let’s just get naked”… wait, how about you go first? I don’t see any naked people in this video. Lead by example, don’t be such a hypocrite. Is a little integrity too much to ask, fuck.

Kim Yuna – To be honest

This is boring. Here’s a good place to end roundup. People have been asking for roundup to be shorter and I agree, let’s cut the chaff in 2023.

BONUS RANDOM VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

Jackson Wang speaks out against inaccurate reporting on China at his London concert

Not going to argue with a guy in a mesh shirt holding a bottle of liquor, that kind of thing always ends badly for me.

Leezy – Beethoven Sonata No.8 in C Minor Op.13 “Pathetique” (cover)

Here’s something artistic and aesthetically pleasing, unless you hate classical music like I do in which case sorry Leezy I’d prefer a Gangkiz comeback honestly.

OSSC – Koreans tell their parents they are gay

Never mind punk and rap bands, how homophobic is the general Korean population? Well I guess this video won’t tell you since it’s only a few people but enjoy hearing people being freaked out by something other than my writing for a change.

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