Song Review:: Monsta X: THE X- Do What I Want {Pre-Release}

• Release date: 2025 September 1

• Album tracklist: Do What I Want, N the Front, Savior, Tuscan Leather, Catch Me Now, Fire & Ice

• Album runtime: 19 minutes

 I was actually really excited to see them at KCon. They're on my list of groups I want to get into, and now I can identify and put names to most of them. I'm not sure that I can recognize them outside of the context of "Monsta X" but as long as I have that, I think we're good. I think this may also be their first post-military release? We have two weeks until the album comes out, and also, happy tenth, Monsta X! I'm a little late because they're about a week older than Seventeen, but this is the first song they've released in at least a year given that this is my first review for them. Unless I missed one somewhere. Also, they have a pretty big discography and if anyone wanted to send me a song to cover via The Form, that would be great. Oh! That's right! They re-recorded a bunch of songs and released them! I remember this happening. It was a big deal because it was like "They're back! Whoo!"

There is a lot going on with the instrumentals at the beginning, almost overwhelmingly so, which also show up fairly often throughout the song, mostly underneath the chorus. Good, quick beat that also gives the song a lot of weight.  There's one rap section specifically where the instrumentals back off, letting whichever member that is prowl through those lines without distraction and I think that's an incredibly effective little bit for the songwriting. Well done. That's very nice.

So you know how normally I'm all grumpy about the swaggy lyrics? It's mostly because the groups don't have the clout or street cred to warrant it. Monsta X has been around the block a time or two and with most, if not all, of them back from the military, they have the industry cred to be able to say "I do what I want" and be believable about it. These are grown men, and their younger brothers are getting a younger brother group. They've got the age, expertise, and experience. Lyrics aside, this song could have benefited from more, vocally. The chorus is frequent enough that it feels a little bit like it takes over the song, but we also have moments, especially with the later choruses, that they could have been really cool if there weren't just ad-libs going on, but if one of the vocalists were to harmonize with the rapping. It would have been a great vocal mic drop to flex their skills and such at the very end. Even though I did just say that the song sounds like it's a little taken over by the chorus, I think, realistically speaking anyway, that it's actually pretty fairly balanced. It's just the amount of repetition. By the end of the song, does "I do what I want" contribute anything new to the song? Even with that amount of repetition, I've got a couple of playlists that I think it'll do well in, as long as I don't listen to it too often. Moderate doses.

This is a surprisingly 90s, garage band-esque music video. Maybe 00s. And by that, I mean, it's really weird. In a good way. The random zoom-ins. The patterns. The clothing where none of it looks like it matches. The copy and paste of the people dancing. If I didn't know this had just been released, I would have thought that this song was my age. Maybe a little bit younger. You know what I mean? Also, is Shownu wearing a shirt at all? I assume that's Shownu. I'm a little bit distracted from his face whenever that member is on camera. I know that he was the one washing the car in the angel wings, which is an entirely separate... I really don't know what to do with this music video. Not in a bad way, and I do also have to say that it matches the song so well, that the song suddenly stopped irritating me, which it was starting to at the end there. This is actually a really good music video. It's just a lot for you to take in that first go around. Or twelfth go around.