It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!
BABYMONSTER – Hot Sauce
Okay so Babymonster doing 2 Live Crew actually sounds pretty good if you ignore the implications thereof. Fortunately they play the song light and breezy enough and don’t Cookie-fy things too much, definitely the right decision.
KARD – Touch
Definitely the most visually entertaining KARD video ever, they’re certainly gunning for those Kpopalypse objectification survey placings. Pity about the music but I guess you can’t have it all.
RESCENE – Deja Vu
Rescene do the usual thing that everyone is doing now and it sounds not a bit different to when everyone else does it.
RESCENE – Mood
This is just their other song at half the speed.
Jeon Somi – Extra
The chorus to this song is literally one note. Whoever’s in charge of this shit just isn’t even trying.
MEOVV – Lit Right Now
No.
ITZY – Kiss & Tell
Not wild about the 2000’s era dance textures here but at least it forces the tempo up a bit to have that stuff in there (because what else can you even do with it). It’s not bad overall.
Jvcki Wai x Vangdale – Narak
Jvcki Wai is one of the only people who actually makes the stupid robot noise work, because she doesn’t try to do shit-ass R&B warble but tries to create some form of actual melody with it. I don’t think this is her best work but I’ll take her over almost anyone else doing this shit.
TWS – Hajimemashite (Nice To See You Again)
This is boring so this is just a PSA that the Kpopalypse Objectification Survey will be released later this week, don’t forget to vote for your favourite men and women of k-pop!
dearAlice – Drums
SM’s EXP Edition have their decent moment that nobody will notice because they’re already a few singles deep in bullshit so we all know to ignore them now.
AHOF – Rendezvous
One of the better boy groups lately, mind you the bar for boy groups has been pretty much on the floor this year. Be prepared for an almost completely female-dominated 2025 favourites list at this rate.
1VERSE – Multiverse
Another slightly not-shit boy group song from some new group.
WitchX – Run Baby Run
A super improverished production where they couldn’t even afford to light the set correctly, this is as generic as it gets. Let’s hope these girls have a career exit plan.
HITGS – Charizzma
Light fairly floss beats in the verses, slow dragging boredom in the chorus, it’s like a very average mix of all the recent crap girl group trends in one song. At least there’s no shouting.
MYNAME – Bad Bad Higher
Song name is 66.6% correct.
ENHYPEN – Helium
This definitely feels like a song that should have gotten a fast dance routine to match the music, but just didn’t. I guess the choreographer was sick the week that they had to get this ready.
MOMOLAND – BAAM (EDM Remix)
Apparently “Baam” is having a viral moment so the agency are moving quickly to cash in with this remix, but it’s fucking crap that wrecks almost everything about Shinsadong Tiger’s great original, so let’s just forget that this exists.
TRIGER – Hope
What’s with the weird filter they’ve got on everything where it all looks like it’s smeared very lightly in shit. I’m not sure but pondering this was way more interesting than the music.
BLINGONE – Mister
It must be the week of shit remakes, KARA’s “Mister” gets a rework here and the original’s punchy straightforward backings have been removed and replaced with the kind of weak fairy-floss shit that’s trendy now, what a shame.
You Dayeon – Oh My!
Oh my this is fucking boring.
Baekho – Rush
“Visual piece” basically just means “he takes his shirt off” I guess. I think he’s going to do well in the objectification survey this year, don’t forget to vote for your faves when it opens!
Han Seungwoo – Stop It
Stopping it sounds like a good idea so instead let’s have our weekly non-Korean LGBT feature here instead, yay! This week it’s Grant MacDonald, truly one of the great gay musicians of our time. Apparently this song started off life as a protest song because Nashville country radio wouldn’t play his other equally gay-themed songs, and I’m sure he didn’t get any closer to radio play after “Ram Ranch” came out but at least he gave us this gift to music, plus literally dozens of sequels.
Jung Yonghwa – Night Runner (Shooting Star)
Is Korean music really that boring that rock band singers need to have shit solo songs with a swing feel, I guess it is.
B.I – Free Fall
Jesus what is that keyboard patch, that’s even worse than the one in the trot song last week.
Moon Sujin feat. Woosung – Tight Rope
Not much of a song but video mrcs
HOSOO – We Don’t Cry
The horrible CGI creations just keep coming. There’s a lot of unemplyed ex-idols out there so I guess we’ll be getting a ton more of these.
Bae Ahhyeon – I’m Gonna Hang Out
I was going to put this in the next trot Nugu Alert but then I noticed it had half a million views plus she’s dancing on a yacht, guess she doesn’t need my help. Song is actually on the upper end of trot lately mind you, which is to say it’s not amazing but at least the instrumental choices don’t suck for once.
Itzel – Clementine
This girl nobody has heard of has a backing track that’s better than 90% of the soft Newjeansified shit infecting k-pop right now.
Zivenew – Noctilucent Cloud
For someone playing with a basically clean electric guitar sound she has way too many pedals on her pedalboard.
Lang Lee – Bear Bear Bear, Open the Door Door Door
There are bears in this video so if that’s your thing, be advised (and I don’t mean the kind of bears Grant MacDonald is into).
Rockit Girl – Silence (Acoustic version)
They might not have gotten a Waterbomb invite this year, but they still have better visuals and better ballads than your bias. Leeseul practices her Eunha-grade bitchstare a lot in this video, it definitely works for her.
RANDOM BONUS VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
aespa “Dirty Work” MV behind the scenes
“Dirty Work” really wasn’t much of a song but it did have some pretty outstanding visual elements so here’s a 35 minute behind the scenes video so you can appreciate it.
Kwon Eunbi “Rumour” at Waterbomb 2025
Just remember, Waterbomb is all about having fun in the water and having a big water party and feeling the summer vibe and nothing else in particular, it must be true because TikTok told me so and people on TikTok are never wrong about anything ever. Don’t make it sexual, you weirdo. Also, the idols must be on a first name basis with fancammer DaftTaegnk at this point. Look at her, looking right at him. He’s definitely getting preferential treatment, as he probably should.
2NE1 – I Love You
From the last days of 2NE1’s relevance, “I Love You” wasn’t their best song but it did retain enough of the core sound that they were known and liked for to at least keep the show afloat for a little while longer until their “Crush” album came out and everyone just gave up.
That’s all for this week! Kpopalypse roundup returns next week!
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