Just A Little Fangirl Love

Release date: 2025 March 26 Album track list: For Real? , Perfect Danger, What If, At The Moment, By My Side Album runtime: 16 mi nutes The album didn't come out until after ASC and then the car accidents messed up my schedule and so here I am finally getting to it. The name seemed familiar but I couldn't remember the group, so I did my usual sniffing just to double check and add to my mental folders, and the results I got were really validating for my memory. They used to be called The New Six! They're Psy's kids! Also, the maknae turns twenty this year, so we are good to go on that end. And they were funny on ASC, what with their near constant "We didn't ask the company for permission. Oh well." The song has a strong, driving beat and the type of energy that you find in pop-rock. It's familiar enough that I'm trying to figure out precisely what I'm reminded of here. Blink-182 maybe? Barenaked Ladies? Green Day? Jimmy Eat World? It definitely ...

Release date: 2025 March 20 Album track list: Silent rainfalls , Ballad seems to be your taste, Stuttering, Convenience store girl, Twinkle twinkle, Boy, A person who can only think, In the phone, Conversation while drinking with Hangjune, Accept my heart, As you wish (Remastered ver.), Can't Sleep (Acoustic ver.), Silent rainfalls (Eng ver.), Ballad seems to be your taste (Eng ver.), Deli girl, Keep my heart, Shampoo, Nuna Album runtime: 61 mi nutes  Look, I've never heard of this artist before. But the album title? Obviously I'm going to be taking a look because that's hilarious. So for everyone else's awareness, Jang Beom June is a singer-songwriter, married to an actress and they have two kids. He debuted in 2011 as part of the indie rock trio Busker Busker and were also on Superstar K3, where they were the runner-ups. Though they haven't been active as a band in over a decade, I would like to mention that they did get a Daesang at the 2012 Melon Music Award...

Release date: 2025 March 18 Album track list: BA BA BYE , BA BA BYE Instrumental Album runtime: 6 mi nutes  So I'm over a week behind. This is fine. It's fine. But this is also my first Rocky review, though not the first song of his I've heard. I've got at least one in one of the bigger playlists I've made. I think I'm only missing Eunwoo now for a review. And I know Rocky's not technically with the group anymore because he left, but I haven't heard of it being a situation where he should be excised from the group because of horrible, terrible choices that were made, so I'll keep him there, because I'm inherently nostalgic and sentimental, until such a time as that changes. Also, a song that's over three minutes. Well done, Rocky and/or whoever wrote the song. I love when I get the instrumentals as tracks on their own. This is kind of a seducing nightclub kind of track with what I'm almost positive is an acoustic guitar (the electric acou...

Release date: 2025 March 17 Album track list:   High Horse , KNOW ABOUT ME , Slingshot (<★), Golden Recipe, Papillon, Ocean Album runtime: 17 mi nutes  They weren't up next, but they did have a music show win recently, so I'm going to bump them up in my draft queue. Congrats to NMIXX! I am deeply peeved at the average song length as that's less than three minutes, but that seems to be my standard emotion when finding new album releases these days. I'm very much feeling this to be an industry-wide problem, rather than an individual company problem (though there are certainly some companies I find to be a bigger problem because they combine the short songs with other things that frustrate me), and unfortunately for you all, no, I will not stop pointing it out. But with that being said, I did enjoy High Horse , so I'm tentatively hopeful with this one that I'll like it as well. I really liked High Horse . Please don't sleep on it, y'all. Okay. I'm ab...

Release date: 2025 March 18 Album track list: BEBE , DIAMOND, PIPE DOWN Album runtime: 8 mi nutes  Doing this one now because of the music show win, so congrats, STAYC! I was going to get to it eventually, but now is as good a time as any for this. I haven't found a song I really like from the group, though also to be fair I've only heard like four songs by this group, so I cannot definitively state that I am ambivalent towards their songs. I assume I'll find one. It just hasn't happened yet. Maybe it will be this one! There's a weird disconnect between the vocals and the instrumentals. I like them separately, but they don't seem like the same song together. There's a lot of synthy goodness going on in this song and some bright disco overlays to the percussion. There's also somewhat of a twinkling vibe going on here. I will say, and this is going to follow over into the vocals, that there's a part where both are going in a rolling staccato, that I ab...

Release date: 2025 March 17 Album track list: Intro : My, Only One , Memory Film Album runtime: 7 mi nutes  Still can't listen to this group until the maknae turns eighteen (next year) because he was fifteen at debut. Which stinks because they've put out songs I really want to have on regular rotation and songs I had  on regular rotation but had to remove when I learned this. This also means that I'm annoyingly excited to see what they're going to bring to the table so I can add it to the Playlist Of Songs I Can't Listen To Yet But Want To Because They're Just Good. I don't know it that's precisely what I called it, but I did title it like a Fall Out Boy song and that's the general gist. And I'd be upset about the runtime, but Only One is really close to three minutes, Memory Film is almost four, and if we remove the intro, we're still left with almost seven minutes for the single. I'll take it. There's a little bit of a jazzy vibe ...

  Well, all sorts of groups got wins this week, along with a Triple Crown! Congrats to all the groups for their first win for the songs! There isn't a single song that won on more than one show this week, which I like for the sake of diversity, and that means lots of different stages to share with you all. Also, three of the wins were with YG affiliated soloists/groups. After School Club had TNX (the group formerly known as The New Six) on, which was cool for them to talk about their new song before it comes out. Also, the amount of times they said something like "We didn't ask the company for permission, but it's fine" was hysterical, and one of the five of them is an absolute character. He's a delight. Also, the MCs on ASC announced this was the final episode of season 1 of ASC, which has lasted for twelve years, so they'll be going on hiatus for a little bit before the next season. So rather than just not include an ASC performance at all, because I can...

Release date: 2025 March 24 Album track list: Intro : RAW AND RAD, Sounds like Money, JeLLo(Sleepers) , HICCUP , You Me + -, Flip the Coin , F.L.Y (Fu**ing Lovely, Lonely Youth), Wonder, We Are Young, Outro : ZERO-SUM GAME Album runtime: 26 mi nutes  They'll have about a week to be with their older brother group before A.C.E leaves Beat Interactive. In the meantime, congrats on your official debut, NewBeat! It's been a long time coming! Just as a recap on the group, even though I'm ludicrously behind again, the eldest turns 23 this year and the maknae turns 17. They've been very active in public leading up to their debut, with most of them involved in A.C.E music videos or stages, as well as months worth of busking, which is very good to get them the performing-together-in-front-of-an-audience experience they need to really hit the ground running. And the JeLLo music video introduces them with their names, so if you wanted to help get that locked in, that's a thing...

Release date: 2025 March 17 Album track list: Feel the Bass, VVV , Starry Night,  Ain't Salty, Rose, Rock and Roll, Nothing, Miss Demeanor, Cross Over Album runtime: 31 mi nutes  Sangyeon has been added to my enlistment wall as I picked up a photocard of his specifically for this purpose. Congrats to The Boyz for their successful move over to One Hundred! It's been a few days since they dropped this, but from what I can tell, things seem to be going well. There's some big competition right now for those first place wins on the shows, but I wish fans and group good luck. I just swore in my head in about three languages seeing the run time on this song. Be still my soul. Do my eyes deceive me or is there only one song under  three minutes long? One Hundred Label. This is an excellent sign. Note: I didn't get this finished when I was going to and also, I was in a car accident ( again , this time  on my way home after work. Neither of them have been my fault. I am simply...

Release date: 2025 March 13 Album track list: XOXO; 1,2,3,4; ShaLala ; For My Dream; He told me Album runtime: 16 mi nutes  This group debuted in October 2024 with their maknae having just turned fourteen. She's still fourteen. I'm still deeply opposed to this, so we're running my Underage Protocol. Also, it looks like they're keeping up with the cat concept, and I remember thinking the music video was very clever in that regards. Good news, the average is over three minutes a song, so at least it has that going for it. And I love that the names of the albums are on brand as well. So the song is ballad-esque with soft piano and a dreamy synth, both of which nudge the song towards the prevailing trend, but there's something about it that's a little grounding. I don't think it's the percussion, because it's very gently and a little skittery, but it's a little more grounded. We also get some nice, unexpected water droplet sound effects in the latte...

Release date: 2025 March 15 Album track list: Unbox, WHAT YOU WANT Album runtime: 6 mi nutes  After learning that Under 15  is still a thing and being both flabbergasted and nauseated by this, I really, really appreciate that these three are both adults and also experienced idols, all three having been in the project group Tan and two being in a duo together and formerly from another group. Also, the leader of the group was the vocal guide for some BTOB and Pentagon songs, which honestly tells me everything I need to know about the quality of this man's voice. Two of the members, Juntae and Jaejun (who also debuted previously as part of C-Clown back in 2012) are part of the 97z with Chan and Mingyu and Jungkook. The maknae is part of the 00z with Jongho, Seungmin, and Chani. That does mean that Jaejun debuted at the age of fifteen, which isn't okay, but it's been thirteen years and once he hit eighteen, C-Clown's discography opened up for me according to my rules anyway...

  Well, that was a clean sweep. VIPs and FAM, congrats! This is roughly as I expected to happen, so thank you for not disappointing me, but I'm only including the music video because there were no performances except for MCountdown two weeks ago. The Show has disappointed me for not airing anything, I'm assuming there were some extenuating circumstances. On After School Club, we had OT5 again with 100 . They're hilarious. Also, as I was watching the portion where they play the game, I found the perfect gif to describe one of the members. This was a funny episode. Also, Aron mentioned that he'd celebrated his thirteenth anniversary over the weekend and when asked a question about his members, I was unsurprised by his response and I still laughed. via GIPHY And as always, the links in the graph go to the reviews. Show Champion: G-Dragon (BIGBANG) "TOO BAD" MCountdown:  G-Dragon (BIGBANG) "TOO BAD" Music Bank:  G-Dragon (BIGBANG) "TOO BAD" Sho...

Release date: 2025 March 14 Album track list: Born Fire, HOT , Come Over, Ash, So Cynical (Badum) Album runtime: 13 mi nutes  It's been interesting watching the past year or so for LE SSERAFIM, watching how they've handled the various accusations leveled at them and watching how they've responded to other groups in the industry. It was somewhat of a tumultuous year, to be sure, but it certainly feels like they've lived, they've learned, and now they're moving on with their story with more XP to level up with than they had before, which is exactly as it should be as we go through life.  And once again, HYBE, why are all of your artists putting out albums with songs that are barely two minutes long? I was upset about Enhypen, flabbergasted by TxT, baffled by Seventeen, infuriated for BSS, HxW, and Baekho, and I've now swung back to appalled for LE SSERAFIM. Stop making your artists have samples of songs as the full tracks! If it was one group, maybe two, I...

 Sentimentality here. The fifteenth was their anniversary, and Baekho left Pledis on the fourteenth, and I had my car accident on the thirteenth. It has been a rough few days emotionally and while I had a plan to do another group, the car accident confirmed for me that I should just do this for their anniversary, even though typing for long periods of time (such as doing this) hurts my wrist. And I picked a NU'EST W song, because the W stands for waiting, and that's what we're doing: waiting for them to come back. And I'm not masochistic enough to do Where You At , which got them their first win at all since debut, or Deja Vu , which is so beloved that it also got performed as five later. NU'EST W is the subunit formed after their appearance on Produce 101 S2 until 2019 with the return of Minhyun to the group. The album, Wake, N, hit number on the Korean charts, and this song got a win on Music Bank, which makes it the subunit's fourth win. In 2018. In December ...

Release date: 2025 March 14 Album track list:  OFF-ROAD Album runtime: 2 mi nutes ...I would have done this sooner, but the car accident put a slight damper on my productivity. In other news, coloring is really nice when you're having a lot of emotions and you don't want to actively do anything about them.  Happy Thirteenth Anniversary, Baekho. I hope you find a good home. And this is just over two minutes. Baekho. My dude. Why. Okay. We've got a very warm set of instrumentals here. It actually feels like sunshine, and I'd think that even if the cover art didn't look like it does. Even though the the percussion is quite prominent throughout the song in a rather repetitious way, it's soft enough that the song feels comforting rather than exciting. But the problem, and I'm noticing that it's particularly infectious among HYBE artists to have songs that round to two minutes long (I'm thinking specifically of TxT, Enhypen, and Seventeen because I remembe...

Release date: 2025 March 24 Album track list: Intro : RAW AND RAD, Sounds like Money,  JeLLo(Sleepers) ,  HICCUP , You Me + -,  Flip the Coin , F.L.Y (Fu**ing Lovely, Lonely Youth), Wonder, We Are Young, Outro : ZERO-SUM GAME Album runtime: 26 mi nutes  This is the second of their pre-debut singles and I'm not going to lie, but when I saw the teaser for this song, and the title reveal, I was a little concerned that they don't know what a hiccup is. Or the creative team doesn't. But it's fine. It didn't dissuade me from being curious, especially after how catchy JeLLo was. This song is almost three minutes long, so I appreciate that. They have a former member of TOO/TO1 in the group, by the way, as well as a former Boys Planet trainee. Maknae turns eighteen in July. So I was initially disappointed because the over the last little bit of music from a few artists, when I've heard something cool or interesting in the intro, it's been relegated to only the intro...

Release date: 2025 March 11 Album track list: Love Race , Suited, Side by Side, Waruru, No No No, Love Puzzle Album runtime: 19 mi nutes  Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that SF9 is having this comeback with the return of one of their members from the military. Do I know for sure? No. I mostly pay attention to Dawon, who is currently up on my enlistment wall, but I thought I'd seen something to that effect. If it's true, then yay! SF9 is one step closer to their full reunion. Also, I was in a car accident this morning. So. I'm doing this instead of thinking about it.  👍 Nothing beige about this. I'm reminded a lot of some old timey vibes on a crackly vinyl in the beginning, and while I love the old timey vibes, it feels more like a gimmick than adding anything substantial to the song as this is the only place where we get to hear it. The song shifts to rock, or rock-adjacent, through much of the song, though it does have moments where the instrumentals softe...

 Coming up as we are on March 15th, I'm starting to get emotional. Between certain anniversaries, and a certain member leaving his company on the group disbandment date, I'm not doing incredibly well. So, for the dopamine hit, I picked a group that has very little connection to my boys, other than having two more 95z and their maknae being born within days of one of the members, but also one that I already love. MAMAMOO is the girl group version of my emotional support group, BTOB, and I'm into the emotional support right now for myself.  So I picked an emotional support song because I need it and I'm sure that someone else out there needs it. Starry Night  is, as the post title suggests, the title track for their EP "Yellow Flower" from their Four Seasons, Four Colors series (which serves to highlight each of the four members, beginning here with Hwasa). It kind of feels like half the album got a music video of some sort, something I think is super cool, and ...

Release date: 2025 March 10 Album track list: Air ; Invasion; Can't Slow Me, No; 258 Album runtime: 12 mi nutes  So, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Yeji is the first member of ITZY to debut as a soloist, which is super exciting for her! Congratulations! GOLD  from last year was my absolute jam, and I'm curious to see what statement Yeji makes with her solo debut.  I had initially resigned myself for this to be a delicate addition to the milquetoast genre, but was pleasantly surprised to discover there's more strength to the instrumentals than I was expecting. Even in the parts where it's relatively quieter, there's a deep thrum courtesy of the bass. In general, I'm reminded a little of Stranger Things , so that's fun. Genuinely, I'd be unsurprised to discover this song in the show, even though I know quite well that it far, far too young. But it's got a lot of the same traits as songs from the third and fourth seasons especially. Also, that...

Release date: 2025 March 10 Album track list: Baby, Not Baby ; Better Dayz, Rollin' (With My Homies), Whatever, Praying, Weakness Album runtime: 18 mi nutes  Next on the list of soloists to cover their new release is Seulgi! Several of her songs came onto my radar as I was building my Halloween playlist last year, so this? Yes, I'm curious about, and I'm very much fully on board with all of this. And as a side note, Rollin' (With My Homies) ? Yeah, it definitely makes me think of the movie Clueless,  and I can't wait to finish this review so I can go listen to that song specifically. My initial thoughts on the song was that it was cosplaying as something soft and fluffy. But then, the more I was thinking about it and chewing the song over in my mind, the more I decided against even that. This song is a sister song to the debut hit from Britney Spears, ... Baby One More Time . It's got some of the exact same grindy guitar chords, like, to the point that I think i...

  As expected. As much as I'd like BTOB to get a win for their new song, it was bad timing with everyone else who is releasing songs around that time. Case in point, we got two first wins for a song. And one of those was a first win ever. So congrats! NouerA was on After School Club, and they made me laugh. For example, here are two little quotes that I caught during the chaos of the games in the last part of the show, prompted by the chaos of the members. One of the MCs said, "What in the hell is going on?" And I laughed. And then not even three seconds later, another MC goes, "This is a chaos." Which made me laugh harder. NouerA are cute, adorable dorks who remind me a little bit of second gen groups in early days. And the starry eyes from the members when they see dance covers of their  song for the first time is what I live for with the newly debuted groups. We have that moment here. Starry-eyed rookies having all of these firsts. I hope they do well. As alw...

Release date: 2025 March 10 Album track list: Can't Help Myself, WHEE! , Make You Lala, Switch Off, Lost Paradise, Love is U Album runtime: 17 mi nutes  I'm going to do the soloists in age order since there were a significant number of soloists releasing music today. This way, it can be orderly. There's a little bit of controversy regarding this release which I'm not going to get into, but I will frown disapprovingly at a certain former company of his. In other news, I've kind of enjoyed the individual members releasing solo material because that's made it easier for me to get to know each of them individually. And given my predilection for 2012 debuts, I fully anticipate EXO getting added to my list of groups I really like, that plus my soft spot for groups that have been mistreated badly because the company is garbage and knowing a little bit of EXO's history, it's an inevitability for me. So, this is nice ahead of their reunion once the maknae is disc...

Release date: 2025 March 10 Album track list: PINOCCHIO (feat. So!YoON), 96ers , STUPID IDIOT Album runtime: 7 mi nutes  My level of coherence for this one might be a little low as I'm going to be waking up for it. This part I'm writing before I go to sleep so that I'm not trying to do all the things at once. So. I think this is one of the subunits that has been so deeply hoped for from the fanbase that I'm happy for the older fans who finally get it. And also, now we've got something of a pattern getting established for the enlistments. We'll have that confirmed depending on who the next subunit is. It's a lovely farewell-for-now present from them. That's all I'm saying. Although the run time is making me twitch a little. This is the most Hoshi and Woozi thing I've ever seen or heard in my life. And I'm deeply amused by the fact that this is the performance leader and the vocal leader, and this is a hip-hop song. The energy level through the...

Release date: 2025 March 07 Album track list: YELLOW; SARURU; WHATEVER, WHENEVER; LAST NIGHT Album runtime: 13 mi nutes  And TREASURE is back, bringing with them all the capital letters they've stolen! This is a joke, but alternatively, that's a lot of capital letters this album has. I'm very excited for them. It doesn't look like they've dropped a Korean album since 2023, which makes this long overdue even if it is only a four song special mini album. Now that YGE has remembered they're supposed to be promoting their artists, I hope this is only a prelude of more music to come, and that some of those singles get added to mini albums or full albums in the near future. But the song length? Absolutely yes. The instrumentals are delightfully minimalistic. And by delightfully minimalistic, I mean they're so bright and cheerful that even though there's not much going on even as the song reaches the climax, I find myself irresistibly drawn to dancing a little...

Release date: 2025 March 07 Album track list:  Sweet Dreams Album runtime: 3 mi nutes  I always get a slight moment of anxiety when I start anything related to one of the really big groups, because I see good and ugly interactions between fans of all groups, and it's one of the only moments where I have a touch of imposter syndrome and uncertainty, but I also speak the truth as I hear it in these songs without hate, and I hope that sincerity carries through because even when I don't listen to groups, I still wish them the best and that they will be successful in their endeavors. And in J-Hope's case, I woke up early and gave up sleep last week despite his being a rapper and my general "I don't typically prefer to listen to rap" deal and watched his concert livestreamed because I was curious and I always want to see if I can find more music I like. And I found a couple that I want to take a closer look at. This song was on the setlist, so I, like many others, h...

Release date: 2025 March 07 Album track list: Intro : JANE with FKJ, like JENNIE, start a war, Handlebars (feat. Dua Lipa), with the IE (way up), ExtraL (feat. Doechii) ,  Mantra ,  Love Hangover (feat. Dominic Fike ) ,  ZEN , Damn Right, F.T.S, Filter, Seoul City, Starlight, twin Album runtime: 42 mi nutes  Well, I'm pleased that this album is finally coming out. She's been releasing singles for months, and now we get the culmination of those releases. Congrats to her in this endeavor! I hope the fans enjoy it and that it continues to be a source of joy for them. Okay. Full disclosure. I'm not a huge fan of this song, which is fine. It's a genre/stylistic thing. I don't have to like all the songs ever released. But I'm not going into this with an abundance of enthusiastic giddiness. Now, that being said, I also don't think it's a bad song. So there's that. The instrumentals are minimalistic, punchily driven with the beat building the energy through ...