Song Review:: AND2BLE: Sequence 01: Curiosity- Curious {Debut}

-

  • Release date: 2026 May 26
  • Album tracklist: Curious, Aura, Sugar Rush, Bed, Happy &
  • Album runtime: 15 minutes

 I'm so close to being able to repair some of my laptop keys so I can properly type again (my s is currently just the rubber bit and I have to keep sticking it back on if I type too aggressively). As bittersweet as this debut is, I am happy that they get to re-debut this quickly. Okay, so these are the four members of ZEROBASEONE who left WAKEONE earlier this as well as a former member of EVNNE late last year. The other former member of EVNNE left YueHua Entertainment as well, which is why he isn't part of this group. 

Starting off a cappella. That's interesting. There are a lot of interesting things happening in this instrumental. Honestly, this feels like it's about four or five different songs in a trench coat, and I'm here for it. It's actually really soothing for my brain, and I'm not sure how I'm supposed to feel about that. We've got some spots with a skittering beat, but it doesn't overwhelm the entire song. We've got some spots where it's just a slow, heavy beat. But there's so much going on. I'm fascinated.

We've got a variety of vocal textures and events going on here. Much like with the instrumental, we've got what feels like several different songs spliced together, and we've got a surprising amount of harmonies and unison singing. Those are some high notes in there, but the general quality is as I'd expect from five already debuted idols that had all been on the same survival show back in the day. Because three years ago count as back in the day in K-Pop years. I know this sounds like I'm dunking on the song, but I've already added it to the playlist. I love this. 

They did a smart thing with keeping the styling matching closely with just some individual bits to it, and by marking Zhang Hao as the leader by putting him in the white shirt underneath the red jacket. And it feels like we've got a bit of a storyline going on, which makes me smile. And the dance break at the end with the glowing white outfits is very nice. 



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Song Review:: Daesung (BIGBANG): Falling Slowly

-
Image
  Release date: 2024 March 05 Album tracklist: Falling Slowly , Light Album runtime: 7 minutes Ah, a proper song length. I'm writing this before the frantic rush of the next few days in terms of releases, because competition there will be fierce. And also to start to pad out the March releases because somebody had to get a win on a music show months later. I joke. I'm actually very happy for them. And I picked this one because I scrolled randomly, and his was the one my cursor was on when I stopped. I feel like Daesung needs very little introduction. He is the maknae of BIGBANG after all.  The instrumentals for this song are absolutely gorgeous with a lovely acoustic guitar that gets to spend time at the front of the song, before it hands over the reigns to an electric for very strategic sections. But seriously, that beginning is one of the most soothing things. There's a sense of the bittersweet to it, because at no point is there a strong bass driving the song, and the ho...
Read more

Song Review:: BABYMONSTER: CHOOM- CHOOM

-
Image
Release date: 2026 May 04 Album tracklist: MOON, CHOOM , I LIKE IT, LOCKED IN Album runtime: 12 minutes  We are on Underage Protocol for this group, which is annoying but fine, because five of the seven were under eighteen at debut, and the maknae was all of fourteen, which means both conditions for Underage Protocol were triggered. It's not an achievement for the company. For shame, YGE.  It's even worse because I could fully vibe with this group. Next year. We've got kind of an Indian sound going on here, which provides an interesting counterbalance to the rapping parts of the vocals, but it's still a lighter sound than I would have expected. We've also got a few different sections for variation, so I'm pleased that the song is as long as it is. I'm really curious about the other songs they've got. I mean this in the highest compliment possible, but this sounds so YG Girl Group. The company bloodline, metaphorically speaking, is strong with them. The b...
Read more

Song Review:: SF9: About Love- Love Comes Slowly

-
Image
Release date: 2026 March 25 Album tracklist: Love Comes Slowly , Fade Into Memories, You Think Too Much, Last of Us, Hurt & Hollow, By Your Side, Broken Way Album runtime: 21 minutes  I was very happy to be able to pull Dawon's photocard off my Enlistment Wall a couple of months ago, so I'm hoping that he was involved in this comeback. There are a couple of track names on this album that I'm definitely interested in, and so I'll be listening to the whole thing after I'm done with this. "So" is apparently my word for today. This song would be very easy to turn into an acoustic version. I mean, we are talking laughably easy. I haven't heard a song where I could hear the non-existent acoustic version this strongly. Anyway, there's actually a pretty big chunk of this song that has effects to make it sound like it's a 40s lacquer disc, particularly with the piano. I'm in love with the sound of this instrumental, by the way. It's wonderfu...
Read more

Song Review:: Irubin (1TEAM): Foolproof {Debut}

-
Image
Release date: 2024 December 11 Album tracklist: Foolproof Album runtime: 3 minutes  Okay, so! Irubin is part of the 95z along with SCoups, Gon, and Minhyun, and he's actually a week younger than the latter. He was on a couple of trainee survival shows the same year NU'EST was on theirs. Almost made the debut team on BOYS24 and was the first boy trainee to be TOP1 on MixNine (where we also had a bunch of future ATEEZ and Treasure members), ended the show as the third ranked so he made the debut team, but that never happened. I actually remember him. Obviously I was focused on ATEEZ when I watched it this summer, but I do remember him. He went by the name Rubin then, and he was really good. He did finally debut with the group 1TEAM, which unfortunately disbanded within two years, and then he became a tattoo artist. Irubin is multi-talented then, and part of me is curious about why he decided to come back to music almost four years later, but I hope he has better luck as a soloist...
Read more

Song Review:: Seventeen: SPILL THE FEELS- Eyes on You

-
Image
Release date: 2024 October 14 Album tracklist: Eyes on You,  Love, Fame, Money (feat. DJ Khalid) , 1 to 13, Candy, Rain, Water Album runtime: 18 minutes As excited as I am to see them in about two weeks, I really wish their schedule wasn't as packed as it currently is so they could give some time to their second promoted track. Well, and so they could properly promote their first  title track, but I think I've accepted that part of the unfortunate circumstance. Hopefully they get a little bit of a break at the start of the year. I don't remember if I said this on LFM's review, but I had to round out to get to the 18 minutes. Some of these songs are worryingly short. I'd really like Woozi and Bumzu to not be following that  specific trend. There's a specific b-side from NU'EST that honestly was the first thing I thought of when I first heard this song when it came out, because while this is very  reminiscent of early NU'EST,  it's actually BLACK  fro...
Read more

Song Review:: Cortis: GREENGREEN- TNT

-
Image
Release date: 2026 May 04 Album tracklist: TNT , REDRED , ACAI , YOUNGCREATORCREW, Wassup, Blue Lips Album runtime: 16 minutes  So many capital letters from these guys. As a side note, I was deeply amused by James's valid crash out over the new-and-false version of the alphabet song. Fun fact, the ememememoh problem kids can have is easily fixed by instead singing it to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star until they get it, and then switching to the correct version. We didn't need a new version. I don't know what role James takes in the group, not a clue, but I have a feeling that this may take up some of their next album, HYBE permitting. Speaking of HYBE, two-minute title track. Alright. This had better have something big if this is going to be two-minutes long. And, it doesn't. The instrumental goes nowhere. It sounds nice. But it just is there and it fades into the background so fast that I'm wildly disappointed. I didn't even notice that it disappeared ...
Read more

Song Review:: Sungmin (Super Junior): UNLIMIT- Godsaeng

-
Image
Release date: 2026 February 02 Album track list:  Godsaeng , Dancing under the Stars, Godsaeng(MR), Dancing under the Stars(MR) Album runtime: 12 mi nutes  It's so nice to be able to be properly creative again instead of administrative and editorial. You have no idea. So I'm going to get some of the songs I've been majorly neglecting done. It's a substantial list unfortunately, so I'm going to get some of the ones I have a good idea that I'm going to like out of the way first to minimize the mental load. And while I couldn't tell you which member Sungmin is right now because I only recognize five on sight and he is not one of them, I'm tentatively hopeful about this. (I am actually vaguely familiar with him as a name and what happened to him, but I didn't remember that until I started digging into the song a little.) I'm very intrigued about the whole MR tracks on this single, but I'll have to take a look at them when I'm done with this. ...
Read more

Song Review:: The CrewOne: Hit the Floor {Debut}

-
Image
Release date: 2024 November 1 Album tracklist: Hit The Floor Album runtime: 3 minutes  Considering Ace of Ace  has been over for weeks, I had no intention to do any reviews on the final tracks. But by the time this gets published, The CrewOne will have been on ASC, which means that I have to follow my rules. For the uninitiated, The CrewOne was a team put together for Ace of Ace  consisting of the fourth gen boy groups ATBO and JUST B. Apparently disbandment was in their future before the two groups got put together, which is completely ridiculous as JUST B debuted in 2021 and ATBO debuted in 2022. I'm sorry, there are a number of groups that went on to be very successful after three not-successful years and if their companies had disbanded them, the face of K-Pop would be radically different. And yes, one of those groups I'm talking about is in fact BTS, though I wouldn't be me if I didn't also mention NU'EST here. But, I digress. If The CrewOne are going to be an...
Read more

Music Show Wins:: Week of 05/06 - 05/12

-
Image
  So many first wins for songs, and, I think we may have a first win for a group? I think so? If that's the case, then an even bigger congrats!  I miss back when After School Club was active (yes, I'm still in denial) because then I didn't have to pick an artist. And then I didn't miss seeing those three every week. It was nice getting to see what Aron is up to. Sigh. Don't let my melancholy stop you from enjoying Ep. 576 from back in 2023, featuring ATBO, though! For The Show, I went with Cravity (and it was actually my first time hearing that song; whoever is doing the ad-libs there at the end, yowza) in 2020. I grabbed three extra stages for y'all this week. First up, I went with 82MAJOR, then ILLIT, then Xnghan&Xoul, so I hope you enjoy those as much as I did.  As always, any links in the spreadsheet go to my reviews, and then down with the ASC episode, that link goes to the entire episode, which gets a bit wonky when I try to embed it, so I don't tr...
Read more

Song Review:: Xiumin (EXO): Interview X- WHEE!

-
Image
Release date: 2025 March 10 Album track list: Can't Help Myself, WHEE! , Make You Lala, Switch Off, Lost Paradise, Love is U Album runtime: 17 mi nutes  I'm going to do the soloists in age order since there were a significant number of soloists releasing music today. This way, it can be orderly. There's a little bit of controversy regarding this release which I'm not going to get into, but I will frown disapprovingly at a certain former company of his. In other news, I've kind of enjoyed the individual members releasing solo material because that's made it easier for me to get to know each of them individually. And given my predilection for 2012 debuts, I fully anticipate EXO getting added to my list of groups I really like, that plus my soft spot for groups that have been mistreated badly because the company is garbage and knowing a little bit of EXO's history, it's an inevitability for me. So, this is nice ahead of their reunion once the maknae is disc...
Read more