Just A Little Fangirl Love

  Welcome to the third quarter of 2025, everyone! I almost typed 2015, so if anyone wants to know how I'm doing, that's how I'm doing. Hilariously, this week also features a whole bunch of first wins for songs (and possibly two first wins for groups), as well as three of the four categories of K-Pop artists. We've got boy group covered. We've got girl group covered. But you know what I find the most delightful? A co-ed group is covered. They used to be a lot more common, so any new ones, I'm generally supportive of on principle, though restrictions may apply. With After School Club still on hiatus, and I'm still being patient because they went twelve years in a single season, here's your weekly rerun! Now, I know that the video says the group is called "Elris", but this was their last release under the name Elris. Following this one, they'd spend roughly the next two years or so on hiatus, before returning rebranded as Alice! This is why I ...

  You know what's kind of cool? This week's music show wins cover three of the four categories I classify K-Pop under. The only one missing is a co-ed group. Boy group? Check. Girl group? Check? Soloist? Double check.  Nice. The ecosystem is flourishing. With After School Club still on hiatus, I'm still giving a rerun. This one comes from a boy group that debuted back in 2011. Episode 20, guys, gals, and nonbinary pals! And you know what's really cool? They're having their first comeback since 2018 this month! I'm really excited about this even though I previously had no previous knowledge of the group! Now, granted this is their first Japanese mini album and not a new Korean mini album, but you know what? I'm just happy to see them releasing new music. But, back in 2013, they were young and cute, and I think I really like this song. As always, the links to my reviews for these songs are found in the graph below. Show Champion: Kang Daniel "Episode...

Release date: 2025 June 23 Album tracklist: On My Way; SWISH; SET NET GO?! ; Rendez-vous; PARANOIA; Straight Up To Heaven (Sung by Jungmo, Woobin, Seungmin); Stadium (Sung by Allen, Wonjin, Hyeongjun); Marionette (Sung by Serim, Minhee, Taeyoung); Underdog; Click, Flash, Pow; Love Me Again; Wish Upon A Star Album runtime: 35 minutes  I don't know how similar Kingdom 2 will be to Kingdom , but I'm going to guess that this is their "We're going to release a song and promote it on Kingdom before we have to do the new one" song. Congrats once again on winning Ace of Ace ! It's very exciting for the lot of them. Genuinely looking forward to that when it decides to get announced. I am also a teeny bit annoyed about the runtime.  So I don't know about you, but I kind of love the specific flavor of songs that feel sporty, specifically basketball flavored songs. This one may have a sample in there with the wooden blocks, but I don't actually know the name of...

Release date: 2025 February 10 Album tracklist: Jelly Bean Album runtime: 3 minutes  You know, this is likely a contributing factor to why Allen and Taeyoung weren't on ASC this last week. Huh. I'm glad that I have an explanation now, even if it's not the correct one. I don't like not knowing things. I love things like whistles in songs. They bring me a lot of joy because they add an element of audience participation to the songs, and I love places where that occurs. And, honestly, I'd slotted this song into being representative of the genre, despite those lovely whistles, but then the big, dramatic bursts of instrumental happened. That's exactly the kind of music I particularly like, even though I know that not all music can and should be like that because diversity and variation is good in any ecosystem. But that part is so much in my wheelhouse that I was immediately reevaluating. So there is quite a bit of bias here.  We've got some interesting vocal lay...

End of the year, I'm assuming we're having fewer music shows because of end of the year shows, which is fine. I anticipated this happening, but we've still had a couple, and this week were some surprises! TWICE got a their first win for Strategy  and G-Dragon got a win on Inkigayo. ASC had Cravity on, which is always entertaining. That phrasing feels like it was a little British, but in my defense, I like to watch my British video gamers while I work on these kinds of posts. It also was apparently "gang up on Taeyoung" day, which was entertaining. At one point, his embarrassment bypassed his ears and went straight to his whole face. Show Champion: N/A MCountdown: N/A Music Bank: TWICE "Strategy" (note: this is from 20241206) Show! Music Core: N/A Inkigayo: G-Dragon "Home Sweet Home" (note: I would be surprised if he actually performed this on a music show, so this is the MAMA performance) ASC Performance: Cravity "Now or Never"   (not...

Release date: 2024 December 05 Album tracklist:  Now or Never , Secret, Horizon Album runtime: 9 minutes  Post-survival show is always one of my favorite things to watch with groups as they deal with going back to their normal lives, hopefully with a few more fans. With their win on Ace of Ace , I hope that it works well for them, as with the other groups that competed, and things work out better than as hoped. Plus, I've got a special fondness for them because of ASC. This is a hard driving song where really the only soft place to the song is the very start. The rest of the song is flung forward by the guitar and the drums, and even when neither of those instrument is actually present, the ticking clock does a great job of increasing at least the tension, because I don't know many people for whom that sound doesn't immediately bring stress. The quiet is used well to make the loud louder. This is just a really good rock song. Even without their voices, I'd be tempted to...