Song Review:: Cortis: COLOR OUTSIDE THE LINES- What You Want {Debut}

• Release date: 2025 September 08

• Album tracklist: GO!, What You Want, FaSHioN, JoyRide, Lullaby, What You Want (feat. Teezo Touchdown)

• Album runtime: 17 minutes

 I can jive with this one a lot more than their pre-debut song. Instrumentally, it doesn't quite feel full or complete, but on the other hand, with what we have of the song, it feels a lot like a teen song from the 90s. We're talking skateboards, surfers, the chill California vibe. This feels like a summer song, which is a little bit of a bold move to go with for a debut, but I'm actually fully supportive of this move., because while it matches seasonally, it doesn't quite match the current fifth gen sound. Because it does feel rather bare-bones, I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it being the debut track, but from a sound and genre standpoint, it's an old enough sound that I have to remember that this isn't an American boy band from the 90s doing a stripped out version of one of their songs, but a freshly debuted boy group that is quite young. Not as young as they could be, but still 80% of them are minors. 

That 90s band sound carries through to the vocals with that very specific echo you get from like indie bands recording in the garage. It's genuinely fascinating. We also get some indie band coming through on the vocal fry you hear occasionally on their held notes. It's an interesting concept to be going with, I'm not going to lie, because they're obviously not an indie band, nor are they old enough to have lived in the 90s. But here we are. And you know what? While normally I'd be grumping or whining about this not being a good display of vocals, blah blah blah, because this sound is unlike what we've been hearing out of the boy groups debuting recently, that actually makes it stand out more. I'm actually kind of chuffed about this, which validates my belief that even if a song or two or even ten don't speak to you, you shouldn't toss the whole group out with the bathwater. I'm mixing my metaphors here, but the point still stands. If they weren't 80% minors at debut, I'd be adding this to a couple of playlists, not least of which would be one of my summer ones. I'm also actually kind of curious to see if T'Challa likes this song as well, so I'll have to play it for him later. Let's see if this one is T'Challa approved™️. Or PJ, but PJ usually likes the harder sounds (he really likes early BTS and specifically J-Hope, if anyone cares).

Okay, now I get to actually watch the video instead of hitting play and switching to a different tab because it's not available for me to stream on music platforms yet. 

So, if anyone cares, this looks like it was filmed in the salt flats outside of Salt Lake City, UT (where part of the movie Independence Day was filmed). The choreography is a little silly, but it's shaggy without being particularly bragadocious, which matches the song. And we have a dance break, more or less, so I am down for this, you know? We may get a proper music video for the album release, but if not, that's okay. This also looks like it may have been filmed in one take, and if that's true, then that's pretty impressive of the group at debut and they deserve a compliment on that.