It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!

Dreamnote – Wish

There’s a good song in here trying to get out but it’s swallowed up by too many boring synthy discoisms.

ANS – Say My Name

Blackpink lite, basically. The problem with nugus attempting to be “in your area” Blackpink style is that without YG’s high production sonic crafting, this sound isn’t exactly the revolution.

SF9 – Good Guy

Just the usual average boy thing, nothing much going on here, good or bad.

SF9 – Like Hands Held Tight

Like almost everything that people insist I cover because it’s “a B side featured on music shows omg omg Kpopalypse has to write about it” it’s a complete fucking waste of time.

Ateez – Answer

When I first heard the name “Ateez” I thought they were going to be a 1980s concept k-pop group, which would be a great idea and certainly more promising than whatever this is.

Verivery – Lay Back

All beat and nothing else.

Ong Seong Wu – We Belong

I wonder what all those books are, I guess there aren’t any on songwriting in that lot.

Amber Liu – Stay Calm

This is where you’re supposed to remember all the things you loved about Amber over the years before you cancelled her over 15 seconds of oopsie on a podcast. Pity the song doesn’t really quite have the potential to generate forgiveness musically. I know Amber’s all keen to release stuff these days because SM previously wouldn’t let her, but maybe some more quality control of the weaker tracks would be better than pumping out a new indistinguishable R&B song every two weeks.

Bigone – Last Night

Imagine having to drive behind yolo dickheads while they hold up traffic like this.

Younha – Dark Cloud

A potentially good song completely ruined by Korea’s usual sledgehammer approach to ballad writing.

Sleepy ft. Mckdaddy, Bassagong – JusticE

Starts off awful but by the two minute mark mullet-head has stopped Autotuning the track to death and some actual rap happens, it gets a little bit better then.

Suzanne – Can’t Hang

Yes this is dull.

B.O.Y – My Angel

Not much of a song but anyone upset about the lack of male flesh in the most fappable list, this is your memo that the man-meat has arrived.

Voisper – Keep Going

This video looks like one of those viral collections of men’s 1970s knitwear that do the rounds on Facebook among boomers who actually remember dressing like that.

pH-1 ft. Yerin Baek – Nerdy Love

Some of the animation here is really good and way too impressive to waste on a song like this.

Colde – Don’t Leave Me, My Love

In Australia a “colde” is what you’re drinking about 50 of when you’re listening to a boring ballad and have had enough of life.

MDD Pink Fantasy – Not Beautiful

Song is shit but this is a good video for checking out the extremity of Yechan’s jawshave.

Hee ft. Yehana, Eillie – Carry On

The tape in front of the amplifier isn’t working, we can still read what it says you know. Not sure why they even brought it out onstage anyway as neither it nor the guitar are plugged in.

BLSG – Player

The ballads are so lame this week that they make dull funk like this sound interesting just because it has a beat.

Lunch – Love Forever

I think I’m going to lose my lunch if I have to hear this again.

LoveSong – Windletter

Wow Seoul really looks dirty and ugly when nugus film it.

SGO – Waiting For You

This is the first time I’ve ever seen it in a Korean music video, but that particular keyboard angle is supposed to be far more OH&S compliant than the traditional flat keyboard when playing standing up, even if it looks a bit weird.

Orange Fang Fang Boys – Fire Noodles

Some okay instrumental stuff I guess, if nothing else they can certainly play. Whose idea was this boring video though, a camera in the corner of their band practice room would have been far more interesting than this.

The Black Underground – In This Life

This is music to overdose on heroin to.

Ramyeonboy ft. Kang Ho-dong – Eating Eating Eating Song

Sing about what you know, I guess.

Ramyeonboy – The Great Jiri Mountain

Now it’s time to work it off. Who is this person. I feel like I’m missing out on a completely uninteresting backstory.

Nemesis – The End Of The World

You know it’s a pissweak start to the year in k-pop when even the metal sucks.

Hara – Hello

Actually it’s kind of good that this is more of a power-ballad than a funeral-ballad, seems more appropriate to remember her even if something like “Midnight Queen” would have obviously been a far better send-off song. Always better to go out punching, I think – when I die fuck k-pop, my funeral music is going to be all Slayer, S.O.D and Anal Cunt.

BONUS RANDOM VIDEO OF THE WEEK

Samsung Galaxy A: #danceAwesome with Blackpink

Random videos will also continue at the end of roundups because I enjoy the freedom of being able to pick anything, but this one was a highly-requested reader selection. I generally don’t do requests for these but happy to do so in this case given that even though this is beyond cringe it’s probably still the catchiest thing in roundup this week, even if I mainly replayed it just out of morbid fascination the first ten times. You’d better enjoy this bullshit because you’ve no doubt got a few months yet to wait for that Blackpink comeback and also anyone who goes and sees a Blackpink concert from now onward is going to have to put up with this ad during intermission, no doubt. Also have this bonus video of them pretending to be completely blown away by a phone in a box with their name on it:

I swear one of them is saying “holy fuck” at 1:08 (probably Rose, you know what Australians are like, we’re rude cunts). Anyway someone let me know if this phone is any good because my last couple of phones have been Samsung and they sure as hell didn’t have “long lasting battery life”. I wouldn’t mind a pink phone as at least it’d be easy to find when I misplace it in my area.

That’s all for roundup – Kpopalypse will return next week with more new songs!