Song Review:: NEWBEAT: RAW AND RAD- JeLLo {Pre-Debut}

• Release date: 2025 March 24

• Album tracklist: 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 minutes

 The Korean spelling of their name (뉴비트) is kind of like a mix of NU'EST's (뉴이스트) and BTOB's (비투비). So big plus from me. At least four points on principle. They're going to be a March debut, which is when most of my favorite groups debuted (I don't know how I can pick out March debuts like that, but it's a thing). And, AND best of all, Beat Interactive is debuting this group with a full album. We're getting a substantial sample of them and I literally couldn't be more excited for this. I've been waiting for this for months for them to debut. Eldest turns twenty-three this year. Maknae is currently sixteen, turning seventeen in a few months. You may already know of my deep love and admiration for A.C.E, and these are their younger brothers, several of whom were their backup dancers for earlier songs, so they do already have idol stage performance, and they've been doing so much busking for months that I'm cautiously optimistic that these guys are going to be confident and polished on stage. The company shipped them out to the US with A.C.E for KCon and they were wandering around there as well and did some busking in LA. But I also have higher expectations because of how much I love hearing A.C.E live, and I expect the same from their younger brothers. So. With my expectations a little higher than most debuts, shall I introduce you?

Less than three minutes. That's a disappointment.

The instrumentals are weird and quirky, with a lot of off-beat stutters. It feels a lot like 90s hip-hop, which is not a genre I'm particularly familiar with, but I've seen movies. Part of that is the handful of lines that I'll be talking about in the next paragraph, but there's also so much record scratching that I've got skateboarding in my head as well as some old school hip-hop music videos the few I've seen. Big, loose jeans. Converse or the big skater shoes. Oversized football jerseys. Again, I'm not very familiar with the genre. But this is what I've got in my head. The flow of energy is good and highlights the singing well when it comes out to play. I wish I could have more of that, and the song does have room to expand out into the three minute mark, but the genre wouldn't match. There are some big bursts of dramatic instrumentals and quiet, random plinks of piano hiding underneath everything else. But like. 

This song is annoyingly catchy. The more I'm listening to it, the more I'm won over. I haven't ever been a particular fan of the shouting thing, which this song does have, and it takes up the majority of the chorus in predominately English, and I'd love to say it's nonsense English, but since I've heard "bomb diggity" (I think that's what they're saying, I'll have to double check, it could be "bomb diggy diggy") in ENGLISH tracks, I have no room to pretend to be upset. And do you know how long it's been since I've heard a song use that particular phrase? And they definitely say "wiggle wiggle...wiggle wiggle," and it's so catchy. Like, I'm not going to lie here. I wrinkled my nose a little when I realized this was hip-hop because it's not my preferred genre. Or close to it. But the more I listen to it, the more it's sticking to my brain. I'm going to be humming it all day. I've already accepted my new reality. And while I don't normally have a good read on what is and what is not going to go viral, this has all the makings of what could potentially go viral. 

So. That was a thing. 

Yeah.

I...

That was a thing. You need actual words, don't you? Okay. It's about half as long as the actual song, so I'm going to include the audio track with this. I deeply appreciate that it serves as an actual introduction to the members by giving you their names with their faces and what their hair is like and whatnot. I'm a little overwhelmed by that. Like it started and I was like "Oh, that's charming and quirky." And then it triple-downed on that and overloaded my brain to the point that my brain actually got quiet because of how much it had to process. This isn't a cute music video. This isn't a cinematic music video. This is...like the grown-up version of The Magic School Bus, and I'm sorry if you don't know what that is because it's a great educational tool to teach kids about science while also being highly entertaining and weird. But this is that ×3. I think they have a cute little mascot that I want to gently squish a little. There are moments of animation, something I always like to see in music videos. And there is also a lot of a lot. I think technically this falls under a vibes and visuals music video, but also, it's so weird and so much that putting it in the same category as what I normally classify like that feels completely wrong to do so. Music video on top. Full track on bottom.