Battle of the B-Sides:: Stray Kids: Pacemaker

 So I realized while I was writing the previous post (link down at the bottom) that their anniversary was actually on a Wednesday, which is one of the two days that I try to post on. But I had a plan and I wanted to follow the plan, and while I was making said plan, I temporarily forgot what day they debuted, which is silly because it's ten days after NU'EST. Also, this was a request from my Stay friend...quite a bit ago, but because of MEGAVERSE, I wanted to spread out the Stray Kids posts a bit, which is why this has taken me so long (I apologized when we went to Hannah's concert together). I feel like I've heard this song before, but I can't recall what it sounds like by the name. Also, I'm taking a break from the planning and going wild and random for April, so unless someone has a time specific post for me to do (like an anniversary or birthday or other celebration of some sort), I have no idea what you're getting for April nor what I get to do. It'll be fun!

Stray Kids is one of the 2018 boy group debuts from JYP Entertainment. They debuted as a nine-member group but have been eight members long enough that it's barely worth mentioning. And since this is not one of their originally-nine-member songs, this is the last time I'm mentioning it in this post. 

Pacemaker is the fourth track from their first album, GO LIVE, which was released in 2020. This is a 3Racha song, with the duo Glory Face (GOT7, Kep1er, ASTRO, TWICE, WJSN, IZ*ONE, Sistar, Apink, Chung Ha, triple!, MOMOLAND, LOONA, ARTMS, ggudan, Suzy, Yeeun, Turbo, Infinite, Pristin, DRIPPIN, EVNNE, Weki Meki, DIALIGHTSUM, JO1, MC MONG, Seola, LABOUM, BTOB, INI, Golden Child, Alice, Verivery, Girl's Day, Cravity, CLC, Lovelyz, LUN8, Brown Eyed Girls, SPEED, IS:SUE, KARA 4Minute, Bestie, Sunny Girls, NouerA, Boys Republic, and 2PM) and Jinli (GOT7, Nayeon, Taeyeon, IVE, TWICE, KiiiKiii, Kep1er, Jin, ASTRO, Enhypen, NCT, WJSN, Yena, IZ*ONE, &TEAM, KickFlip, Chung Ha, ILLIT, tripleS, MOMOLAND, ARrC, LOONA, ZEROBASEONE, Super unior, gugudan, Infinite, DRIPPIN, EVNNE, NiziU, Weki Meki, Kep1er, DIA, Apink, T-ARA, Kwon Eunbi, Rocket Punch, LIGHTSUM, Seola, JO1, BTOB, INI, Golden Child, Lovelyz, Alive, Verivery, Laysha, Cravity, LUN8, IS:SUE, Sunny Girls, NouerA, and Bambino). They've worked on a few of the same songs together, which is pretty cool. 

A lovely Stay (@1AmethystDream) provided an English translation in the comments, which you can find here. And then another one (@lucasilabee) provided romanization for the lyrics here. I appreciate fan efforts, and while things like color-coded lyrics have their place (I use those often, especially when I'm not familiar with a group or if I need to hop into comments to get a feel for where the fandom is for a song), I do appreciate the fan translators, especially when they're translating directly into the official content, which is important for comeback time. This one is six years old now, or close enough, and numbers don't matter anymore for the fans who care about numbers, but I still appreciate their work all the same.

So the interesting thing about a pacemaker is, other than the device implanted to keep hearts beating regularly, it's the lead runner in a race that is often used to set the pace to maintain a high-speed. Also, fun fact, they're sometimes called rabbits.

Which would make Lee Know the pacemaker of Stray Kids, and given that he also is the one regularly in charge of dance practices, it's surprisingly applicable. 

You know, the song has a surprisingly heavy feel to it. It sounds like it should be a fast-paced song, but I don't think it is because there's a lot of weight here. There's a song that this reminds me of, with that same fascinating mix of weight and perceived speed, and I'm going to chew on it while I work on the rest of this post. Let's see if I can figure it out before the end.

The beginning of the song sounds like Han is in the process of saying "Stray Kids Everywhere", you know, the typical shout that they have, but the music cuts him off. Like the music is going "You took too long. Let's get going." According to the lyrics, that's not what he's saying, but it is what it sounds like.

We also, fantastically like with My Pace, get Changbin doing the "na na na" part. Even at the age of twenty or twenty-one, whenever this was recorded, he had such a nice grit to his voice that makes it so suitable for that kind of line. He's also a lot softer in this song than he tends to be, which makes me a happy camper. 

Chan has a line in here, "I'm always with you, never ever nonstop", and considering the last six years, he's still been consistently showing that's true, both to the fans and the members. As leader, he is the pacemaker for the group and for the Stays. The example, the guide, the...well, the leader. So the fact that he has that line is such a soft moment.

I really like Felix's part at 2:25. He really has such a low, settled voice, though this part isn't quite as low as some of his other parts, but then the way it flows into I.N and then Lee Know, then Seungmin in quick succession creates such a good sense of movement. 

I think this may be the only live performance this song has had, and it's from their first fanmeeting in 2021. Which means, if I'm doing the math correctly, should be shortly before Kingdom started filming? Shortly after? Was that really five years ago?

Remember how I said that pacemakers are also called rabbits, and how that makes it a little amusing because of Lee Know? That's him leading the pack at :10. Perfect. That's so satisfying from just a writer standpoint to have that line-up like that. Actually, he killed it pretty much every time that he was on camera. 

Han sings, like, almost the entire thing. As per usual. It's one of my favorite things about him (exhibit a: 2:03). This is why he has to have a hand mic. 

I love the choreography at Changbin's part at :40. It's so smooth and chill with some very fun footwork. I also love that he kind of gets a dancing solo at his "na na na" part (1:17). You can hear the other members hyping him up, and that loosens the performance up a little, and I really like that. You know?

Right after that part, we've got Felix doing his Felix thing, and there's a really cool transition from him when he drops down, to Hyunjin kind of rising up being him like a second-wave boss. We get a lighting change from red to purple to help with that transition from Felix to Hyunjin. It's so cool.

Also, I happened to pause it at 1:51, and that's just the cutest thing ever. You've got I.N at the back doing a heart. You've got Lee Know and Seungmin making a heart together in front of him, and then you've got Han peering through the window formed by Chan and Hyunjin. I.N is the foundation of that formation, and he is the maknae on top just in general.

He has a whole song about it.

So the fact that he's the background and backbone, completing that very cute formation is on brand and proper.

There are so many hearts being thrown around in this choreography. By the way. You could probably play a game of count the hearts for this performance, and I love it when you can make up a game for yourself.

It really is such a satisfying song.

Happy anniversary, Stray Kids! Even if I was late for it!

Everyone, I hope you enjoyed the song. I had in fact not heard this song before when I started working on it, but I'm glad my Stay friend recommended it, even if it took me a hot minute to get to it. Sorry, again. But! I did finally figure out what song it was! Fire by BTS. And, fun fact, out of curiosity, I checked their BPMs. They are in fact both 100 BPM, which is actually pretty slow considering how fast they seem.

If any of you Dearest Readers have a song you'd like me to cover, feel free to drop a comment or you can always use The Form for submissions. Unless I get something time dependent, April is going to be wild and unpredictable and unstructured. I have no idea what the next song is going to be until I have finished the post I'm working on.

Previous: "Catch the Stars" by woo!ah!                                                            Next: "Paper Heart" by f(x)