Song Review:: TIOT: The Long Season

• Release date: 2024 October 02

• Album tracklist: The Long Season, The Long Season (Inst.)

• Album runtime: 6 minutes

I recognize the name as a group, but otherwise know nothing. So, I'll take a gander at them so I know what I'm working with.

I'm hyper aware of young groups right now because there's a debut coming up with a maknae who only turned fourteen (14) this year, and I cannot support that. As in, she just turned fourteen. Like, last month. But I already have a plan in place for the review of their debut track. 

It seems TIOT is a 2024 debut, and this is their second single, first since debut back in April. They've been busy bees the last year. That's good. The other good news is looking at their ages, only the maknae is a minor, and he had already turned seventeen before they debuted. The maknae is also the only one who was not on Boy's Planet, so that's interesting. I actually liked some of them when I watched the show a couple of months ago. So if I like their sound, they qualify to be added to my list of rookie groups to pay attention to. 

A lot of their fellow fifth gen idols, and some of the older ones following the trend, are going for bright, high energy dance-pop sounds, and because of this, there are a lot of similarities I'm hearing with groups from the middle of last decade. The fact that these guys are using a guitar to achieve the same bright effect, but making it dance-rock instead of dance-pop is intriguing. Essentially, we're getting a band sound without them actually being in a band. It'll make for a great live-band performance, but I'm not sure how well it will hold up as just an instrumental, which leans too far away from rock toward pop even though it clearly is trying to be. The song makes me want to dance instead of head-bang. There is no head-banging here. Is that the point? I don't know, but I wish the song would be a little bit more fearless and in your face about its cheer.

The rappers have a very nice tone that helps to ground the higher vocalists and provide a counterpoint the rock song requires. There's a growl to one of them that I'd love to hear developed more, but as they haven't even hit their six month mark yet, they're still in that precious rookie stage and hearing it would be a surprise at this point. Regardless, I like the way they sound like they're inviting us in on their fun. One of their vocalists also has a touch of a vibrato and I'd love to hear that developed more as well. Give me more vibrato. Give me sustained notes. Let the vocalists flex beyond just being able to hit the impressive high notes. 

Well the good news about watching a music video without subtitles is that I'm forced to pay full attention to the actual video instead of partially watching the subtitles. The bad news is I still don't know what the song is saying so I have no idea if the music video matches the message of the song. The music video makes the song a lot more melancholy than it is when you're just listening to it, and I don't think I like that. But there is a storyline, and it's a pretty strong one about taking chances and rediscovering old joys/loves even if it doesn't always work out, so I know I like that. I have no idea about the choreography because this is one of those music videos where it lacks any hint as to the stage performance, which is kind of funny because Changsub of BTOB's album released the same day and his music video also lacks the same thing, opting instead for pure story. I'm kind of curious to know if this is going to be a more common thing, because as much as I like seeing previews of the choreography, without it, the music video feels more like a movie and the immersion is much higher.