Song Review:: sunwoojunga: Beyond [2. White Shade]- please be greedy

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  • Release date: 2024 October 18
  • Album tracklist: Used Star, please be greedy, Jealous, Too Late, PRAY
  • Album runtime: 19 minutes

 In terms of working behind the scenes with music, she has worked with some very heavyhitters. IU, 2NE1, G-Dragon and TOP, Sandara Park, and IVE are only some of the names she's worked with. Which is really cool. It's always fascinating when artists become producers, that also continue to be artists.

This song is a black-and-white film, possibly a musical during the requisite Sad Song, but it definitely feels 1960s. It's simple. It's subtle. It's very cinematic. The instrumentals are so subtle that they're almost not noticeable most of the time, but oh, they're unbelievably gorgeous.  There's a harp. A harp! This is a masterful song. It also sends me to sleep, but that's a feature, not a bug. She's got an incredible ear, and I know that because her name is there as the sole writer, arranger, composer, and lyricist.

This song sounds French. This song sounds so French that my brain is going "No, that's not Korean. That's French." I'm looking at the Hangeul lyrics and my brain is still insisting that she's speaking French. I am struggling. Oh, she's got an amazing voice. She keeps it soft and breathy for quite a lot of the song, which matches the instrumentals and the feel perfectly, but she still has very specific moments where she switches to the supported tone. This song lingers.

You know, I appreciate that it just straight up says that the music video was created using AI (which I didn't realize until partway through when my brain just rejected what I had just seen, and I went digging a little). It started sweet, turned into full horror that the analytical part of my brain is like "You know...from a thematic viewpoint...", and I'm left with this unsettled feeling of "What in the everloving heck just happened?" I still really like the song. If you choose to watch the music video, please be strongly aware that it contains body horror. Wow. I just...wow. Normally I like the music videos. I think I like this song much better without the music video, so I'm going to include both. Mostly for my sanity.

And now for the more sensible 1theK live version, and the song goes really, really well with the rainy day when this was filmed. It may take me a minute though before I can listen to it without thinking of...the music video though.



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