Song Review:: ONEWE: Secret Santa- WE X MAS

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  • Release date: 2024 December 23
  • Album tracklist: We X Mas, Actor

  • Album runtime: 8 minutes

Do I need to do a review of the new Christmas single from ONEWE? No. Do I want to? Yes. I really like the band, and this falls under my principle of trying to focus on smaller groups so that they can get more attention. Plus, they're a band, and I've been vocal about my love for bands.

There's nothing particularly Christmassy about the instrumentals, or at least nothing that particularly invokes the season. If I weren't looking directly at the name, I'd suspect this to be a regular single. There is a sense of nostalgia, or at least fondness, but it's not necessarily seasonal based on the instrumentals. The guitar solo however is my favorite part. It's nothing that's grand or groundbreaking, but going up the scale like it does reminds me of rock ballads from the 80s. We get that same thing in miniature a couple of other times during the song, which makes it even better, because what could have been just a normal feature becomes a preview of that guitar solo, and the foreshadowing instantly marks this as being well-written.

So because the instrumentals weren't as I was expecting, I had to take a look at the lyrics, which do mark it as a Christmas song since it's a love song set at Christmas time. It's actually very sweet and full of nostalgia and fondness, which is echoed in the instrumentals, so well done on the reinforcement. I was most interested to hear that there's a section of melodic rapping because I've been feeling nostalgic lately myself and that style reminds me of Ilhoon. There aren't any big blasts of vocal sound, but there are vocalizations where the members just harmonize beautifully at the end, and that's something I can really appreciate. 

The music video is part live performance and part holiday-edition slice of life. Both of these things make me smile and settle in for metaphorical comfort food. I just enjoy seeing members of the groups look like they get along well.



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