Song Review:: MJ (Astro): Why so pretty?

 

• Release date: 2024 September 24

• Album tracklist: Why so pretty?, Why so pretty? (Inst.)

• Album runtime: 7 minutes

I didn't know this was happening! I'm excited about this.

So the song starts with a very playful organ, and then snapping. The snapping makes me so happy, because it's one of those things I can just do without having to pay much attention to the song, and since I spend a lot of time just vibing and not actively listening to the music I'm listening to, . It's also very upbeat and funky, though very minimalistic compared to what it could be. I'm not hearing much bass, if any, but there are enough interesting things and instruments happening that I can forgive it for not having that grounding sound. The fact that he included the instrumental track on this single brings me joy, because the instrumental, despite being surprisingly minimalistic, is definitely vibe-worthy. Actually, this reminds me of a musical, where this is the male lead taking a song to pine after the female lead after she left to go do something. Like a happier Sandy from Grease. 

I didn't realize he has such a good voice. Granted, I haven't spent a lot of time with Astro, and really, I'm lucky if I can remember all the member's names, former and current (funny story, there for a while, I thought MJ and JinJin were the same person until I mentioned it to my friend who actually is a fan and she had a laugh at me while correcting me. Astro is not the only group this has happened with. My friend laughs at me every time). MJ has a boyfriend voice, but not a recent boyfriend voice. He's got the kind of boyfriend voice that comes from being friends for years and then becoming the boyfriend. He spends a lot of time in his upper register, which is fine because it matches the song, but this is my first time listening to his voice on its own. I'd have liked a little more depth to his voice, but I'm not counting it against the song. That's like wanting depth from a Christmas song, which is something else that this sounds like. It's the wrong genre for that.

Okay, so the only version of a music video I could find was from 1theK, and it's a third as long the actual song. But it also shows behind the scenes of the recording., something I really like in general. But my cat came over while I was listening to this song, and he likes very specific K-Pop artists. So, this song gets the T'Challa stamp of approval! I'm also including the track because the music video, such as it is, is not the full song.