Song Review:: Big Ocean: UNDERWATER- Attention

• Release date: 2025 April 20

• Album tracklist: SINKING, FADE OUT, Attention, END OF TIME

• Album runtime: 13 minutes

 I kept sending the concept photos for this album to my Stay friend, complete with key smashing and insane gibberish. That's it. That is the note I have for this song, other than the title track is two and a half minutes long. I had hope from the album runtime. Alas. That does mean that the other songs have some heft to them in the length department. Happy one year anniversary, Big Ocean! I've been enjoying watching you on your journey, and to celebrate them and TWS who released the next day, I painted my nails blue.

The song is best enjoyed in the context of the rest of the album, for the record.

This has moments where it gets rather slinky, but it doesn't stay there too long, because that build in energy through the pre-chorus courtesy of the drums and the guitar stepping out to take some spotlight does well to come often enough to provide some much needed extra oomph and texture to the song, but not so often that it overwhelms the song. I also appreciate the addition of both the "shh" and the whistling, which are prominent enough that they also add to the diversity of the instrumentals. The song could have had an absolutely gorgeous dance break, or, even more indulgently, a dance break and a bridge, but that run time is deeply prohibitive to anything more. The songwriters crammed a lot of different textures in, which is very helpful, and it doesn't sprint at breakneck speed, leaving no time for the audience or members to breathe, but if it's this good at this length, imagine how much better it would have been with more.

If you'll pardon the water metaphor here, the echolocation motif is lovely and surprising. It's a total call and response during the pre-chorus that I really enjoy and am pleased we're starting to get some interesting vocal things happening with the group, evidence of their growing skills. I don't expect a group of members that haven't been trainees for five years or more (especially when two of the three had regular jobs or were in college to get the regular job) to come out of the gate being able to pull off complex vocal layering and a wide range of dynamics and tempos flawlessly, but I do expect to see growth, which is what I'm seeing with Big Ocean. So I am pleased.

I don't know that I'm old enough to watch this music video, I say as an almost thirty-year-old. Well, they went with a more mature concept for this one. There were a couple of moments where my brain short-circuited a little bit. Chanyeon in the leather pants? That was one of them, right off the bat. Basically the entirety of the pool scene, which I should have expected a little, but in my defense, when Seventeen posted water concept photos, they didn't include pool scenes in the music video for Love, Money, Fame. If I had to be more specific, when Jiseok is in the pool doing the sign language. Goodness me. I feel like I should comment on something else, but they did a really good job of pairing the slinkiness of the song with the shots and scenes of the music video, so I'm a little distracted. And misspelling things badly, so I'm having to really focus on my typing in a way that I haven't had to do since I was learning to type properly when I was twelve or when I have to type in Korean. The cool mood lighting, the outfits, the white shirts in the pool made translucent by the water, one of which is fully unbuttoned. I'm sorry. I'm really very distracted right now. And I should mention Hyunjin because I had to pause for him too because there's a scene with his red hair where he looks kind of like the child of Hui and Joshua. So it's just all visuals. This is a vibes and visuals music video that has caused this Fangirl to completely short-circuit. I have blue-screened. I need to go reboot because...yeah.