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Song Review:: RESCENE: Pretty Girl

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Release date: 2026 July 08 Album tracklist:  Pretty Girl Album runtime: 3 minutes  We are on Underage Protocol for this group until November, so they're so close to being taken off the list. Also, congrats on the win! It did not take ong for me to add this song to the playlist I keep to keep track of which song get released this year that I really enjoy. There's a bright intensity to the instrumental that is slow enough that it doesn't feel aggressive or frenetic. Most of this is due to the electric guitar and the drums being as steady and present as they are, and honestly, even though there isn't a lot of variation going on in the instrumental, it's not gratingly repetitive in a way that makes me twitchy, which is a good thing. I'm loving the rock. I wish that there was either a big uptick in energy or a very soft downturn, but what's here is still good. What flow in energy that there is for the song allows both instrumental and vocals to match well in term...
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Song Review:: Picheolin (Dino) (S: 吉BOARD- Love Sick {Pre-Debut}

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Release date: 2026 July 15 Album tracklist: Love Sick (narr. Lee Moon Sae) Album runtime: 3 minutes  I genuinely don't even know how to title this. Congrats, Dino! And also, congrats to one of possibly the most successful inside jokes to come out of any group! It's a bit odd, but at the same time, knowing Seventeen, Dino debuting as his old man character before he debuts as Dino properly (listen to Wait , y'all) is very on brand for them. The "S" in SVT stands for "strange." Ah, drama. Ah, saxophone. This instrumental is a hot cup of chowder on a cold day. I'm struggling so hard to not actually listen to his voice here for this section. I hope you all appreciate the effort. But that saxophone, y'all. I'm a little surprised at the audio balancing, because there are a couple of spots where the instrumental almost overpowers the vocals, which is a problem and makes me a little grumpy when the vocals are this good.  His vibrato. Dino. My dude. I...
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Song Review:: fromis_9: Glow ME- Vitamin ME

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Release date: 2026 July 21 Album tracklist: ETERNAL, Vitamin ME , Pocket Treat, Blue Heart, Screen Time, Teacher, Cold Blood, Why do I cry?, Day 1, Wonderland Album runtime: 29 minutes  Y'all are probably going to get sick of me saying that I don't care that they left Pledis, that they were at Pledis, which means I will continue to love and support my girls. But I am nothing if not loyal and it takes very little to trigger my sense of loyalty at all. Also, the title track is over three minutes long. I told you I loved them. We've got a very Latin summer sound going on for this, which is perfect for a July release. This is fun. There's a little bit of a cowbell in places and the Spanish guitar is a lovely combination I wasn't expecting. This is so laid-back and chill even though there's a little bit of a disco energy going on with the strings. It's very pretty, and almost a little flirtatious. I love their voices, and we get a beautiful belt that leads into t...
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Song Review:: xikers: ROUTE ZERO : The ORA- Outsider

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Release date: 2026 May 19 Album tracklist: Ghost Rider, OKay , Graffiti, Trophy, Outsider Album runtime: 14 minutes  I'd been thinking about doing this when the video came out, but then I didn't do it and forgot it as I do most things. I have the memory of a sieve but I never know what's going to fall through and what's going to stick. And these are my kids! This was my first rookie group! And they're one of my March debuts, so of course I'm going to shout about the kids (I recognize that they're all adults, but they'll be the kids until they get their own younger sibling group) to anyone who will listen and into the Void if I must about how amazing they are live. The music is good. The performances are better. Spray can sound effects are fun. It's been a hot minute since we got a song with that, ignoring the fact that this is a b-side and not a title track, but I won't say anything if you won't. I love how we get softer songs for their b-sid...
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Battle of the B-Sides:: Baek Z Young: carefully closely

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 We're apparently having a slightly controversial little month. It's fine. You can't do anything in any industry without running into a scandal or two because people are people, and people are flawed. Not that she did anything wrong because she didn't. However, I added her to the Roulette Wheel candidates because she's released so many OSTs that I absolutely adore and because I, and probably many others, know her best from the song she did with Taec because of how many of the idols have covered that song, which was released a couple of years after she released this album. Baek Z Young debuted in 1999 as a soloist and she is now wonderfully married with a daughter. Good for her. Genuinely love that for her. Also, I just need everyone to know that she has a song called "Sad Salsa" and if this weren't b-side month, I'd be doing that because color me intrigued. Also, I found out that she was one of the performers in Pyongyang, North Korea in 2018. She...
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Song Review:: U-Know (TVXQ!): Time's Tickin'- Time's Tickin'

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Release date: 2026 July 20 Album tracklist:  Time's Tickin' , An Ordinary Story Album runtime: 7 minutes  I've actually already seen the music video because I let YouTube just play music videos for about an hour and this was one of them. Also, I was mildly surprised to see him so active on Weverse this last weekend, but when I saw he'd dropped a new song, it suddenly all made sense. Those two usually aren't very active unless they've got something going on. During SM Town last year, Changmin was commenting on posts for about five minutes right before TVXQ! was performing. Literally stopped as the group ahead of them finished. This song is oddly clangy, and it sounds like there's a cowbell involved, which I'm always surprised by, though to be fair, I think it's been several months at minimum since the last time I heard a cowbell, or something that sounds like one in a song I was reviewing. Everything else going on in the song is oddly dramatic in a wa...
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Song Review:: Wonho (Monsta X): CORE- Don't Wake Me Up!

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Release date: 2026 July 21 Album tracklist: Answer, Don't Wake Me Up! , Can't Get Enough, Summer Blue, Down, Test Drive, Promises (feat. BrotherSu) Album runtime: 20 minutes So I don't get insanely behind, I try to do at least one July release a day right now. I've been not doing so well with this goal, but here we are. I have jumped both times that I've hit play on this song. That's such an aggressive start. We've got a strong dance tack for the instrumental with a skittering beat that drives the song like a war chariot. Underneath the skittering is a heavy bass drum of some sort and a grungy electric guitar. This honestly feels very movie soundtrack, but it has to be a movie like Rocky . There needs to be high intensity with the action.  Vocally, this reminds me a bit of the Twilight soundtrack, which is strange for two reasons that are closely related but not the same thing in my head: 1) I cannot actively recall any of the songs from that soundtrack and ...
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