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Song Review:: AND2BLE: Sequence 01: Curiosity- Curious {Debut}

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Release date: 2026 May 26 Album tracklist: Curious , Aura, Sugar Rush, Bed, Happy & Album runtime: 15 minutes  I'm so close to being able to repair some of my laptop keys so I can properly type again (my s is currently just the rubber bit and I have to keep sticking it back on if I type too aggressively). As bittersweet as this debut is, I am happy that they get to re-debut this quickly. Okay, so these are the four members of ZEROBASEONE who left WAKEONE earlier this as well as a former member of EVNNE late last year. The other former member of EVNNE left YueHua Entertainment as well, which is why he isn't part of this group.  Starting off a cappella. That's interesting. There are a lot of interesting things happening in this instrumental. Honestly, this feels like it's about four or five different songs in a trench coat, and I'm here for it. It's actually really soothing for my brain, and I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel about that. We've g...

Song Review:: HEART OF WOMAN: Heart Byte : LEGACY- Lost in Proof {Debut}

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Release date: 2026 May 28 Album tracklist: ALIVE, SHOW H.O.W, Told U So, TEA, My Vision, Skit.exe, Lost in Proof , ($.$), Close To Me, One Beat, Dive With Me Album runtime: 28 minutes  You know, it's not every day that a group debuts with a full album. It's also not every day that a group debuts with an album that has only a single song that is over three minutes long. And it's not the title track. No, the title track is barely over two-and-a-half minutes. Good news, though, the maknae turns nineteen later this year, so we don't have to worry about them needing to be on Underage Protocol. Yay! At least something was done well! The company they're at was co-founded by Wheesung (who had gotten a lot of big awards over the course of his career, and I may be tempted to do one of his songs as an Expanded Offerings), so even thought I'm more familiar with him in a connaître rather than a savoir sort of way, if the statement from the company that he was very involved i...

Greatest Hits:: Yezi: Cider

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 Welcome to June, where I'm going to be stepping outside my comfort zone a little bit! It's also going to be majorly sentimental here at the end of this month because I've got two discharges that I'm looking forward to. But that's in the future, and we're going to start the month off with a me kicking myself off a cliff. I touched a solo rapper (metaphorically, please don't come at me with the pitch forks because I have never actually been close enough to RM to touch him and unless something really weird happens in my life, I never will) back in March, but I picked a soft, comfortable-for-me song that wasn't too far away from something I normally would vibe with. When I was looking for songs to put in June, I decided to do a female rapper, because I thought that would match the Woodz submission coming up in a few weeks and force me out of my safety zone. And I listened to a few songs with none of them giving me that "Yes, I need to do this now"...

Song Review:: XIA (TVQ!/JYJ): GRAVITY- GRAVITY

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Release date: 2026 June 02 Album tracklist: Intro : Drawn, GRAVITY , Homage, Forest of Memories, What About Your Goodbye, Beat's Knockin, eXtreme Love, Slowly, Like Like Like, Outro : Reached Album runtime: 30 minutes  So this song popped onto my YouTube algorithm, and I went "Huh. I don't recognize that name or the Korean name he seems to have. I'd better look him up." Former member of TVXQ!. He's one of the former members of TVXQ!. Obviously you know that now because I tag the titles of the post with the artist's group, or former group, as applicable. And even though the intro and outro songs are under a minute-and-a-half, the average runtime for he whole album is over thirty minutes. He's got a five minute song on here. I'm eternally amused when a soloist, even after it's been years since they were in a group, still manages to have that group in the soloist's DNA. There's a strong, grungy sort of feel to the instrumental. I mean, we...

Song Review:: SHINee: Atmos- Atmos

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Release date: 2026 June 01 Album tracklist:  Atmos , HOURS, Possibility Anti Believer, Still Raining, Thousand Miles Away Album runtime: 20 minutes  Happy eighteenth, SHINee! That is a fascinating use of a stereo sound system at the beginning. I really appreciate when you can hear the audio engineering in a song because it increases complexity so nicely, which is especially useful in a song that's relatively stable. The moments when the song cuts out and gets a bit grungy and sparse are important for the balances in the song. If I had the time, energy, or inclination, I'd be curious to see how much of the song is louder versus sparser.  Taemin has moments where he sounds like Jonghyun. The thing I like about SHINee, as well as a lot of other groups, especially the older ones, is that the members have distinct vocals where you can tell who is who pretty easily, which makes it easier to learn a group. This is also a full vocal song, where you get Minho approaching a proper ...

Song Review:: Catch the Young: Baby, Why Do You Leave Me {Sanullim's 50th Anniversary Collaboration}

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Release date: 2026 June 01 Album tracklist: Baby, Why Do You Leave Me;  Baby, Why Do You Leave Me (inst.) Album runtime: 7 minutes  How did they know I was thinking about doing one of Sanullim's songs in the next few months? How did they know? How did Catch the Young know? In all honesty, I love how they've carved out a little niche for themselves by remaking a bunch of older songs. And in the case of this song, if I found the correct song, this one was originally from 1979, which was decades before even I was born and I'm older than all the members, and is part of a 50th anniversary collection wherein a bunch of other bands were apparently invited to cover or remake their songs. This is super cool, everyone. I'm not going to cover all of the songs because there are at least three albums worth, but I really like this band. Some of the artists that are part of this, I've never heard of. Which is fabulous. Also, in case anyone cares, on Sanullim's Vol. 1 album fro...

April 2026 Wrap-Up: Party in the Desert

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 It's not that I delayed this on purpose, but I needed to settle from the 3/10 star weekend I had at the beginning of the month. Sixty hours of stress, anxiety, and frustration. I will also never be going back to El Paso. NU'EST could literally come back and do a single concert, only in El Paso, and I would not go back. I would be begging Aron to add literally any other stop, but I would not be going back to El Paso. The city hates me. The people are lovely, but like I said. 3/10 stars. One of those stars was the pizza I got, because wow that was delicious. Okay, debut time. Group debuts I covered: KEYVITUP , hertz.wav , MODYSSEY , UNCHILD . Soloists who debuted that I covered: Somin (APRIL/KARD) , ALL'N , Kangin (Super Junior) , Vari (NINE.i) . Songs I was looking forward to: TOP (BIGBANG): TOP IS BACK, BABY! KickFlip: I was a little shaky with them on debut, but they have since won me over strongly. I like these kids. TOMORROW X TOGETHER: Do they get songs of a decent len...