At the end of each month, I look back at my three favorite title tracks by K-pop artists. I take my own ratings into account, but there’s a bit of wiggle room as certain songs tend to grow or fade.
April 2024 Overall Thoughts
K-pop years aren’t always frontloaded, but January was so strong that its fumes kept me optimistic as more underwhelming months wore on. At this point, most of those fumes have worn off and left us with a pretty uneventful April.
April was a weird one. Lots of acts I tend to love released new music, yet the output was quite hit-or-miss. Looking back, the month might be most notable for its oddly premature summer songs. In many parts of the world, it’s still quite early for summer music, yet RIIZE and ZEROBASEONE seem to have differing opinions. I’m looking forward to playing each of these tracks throughout the warmer months but wonder if much of their buzz will have already dissipated by then.
April opened with a couple of big-name acts. BABYMONSTER sheeshed their way off my playlist almost immediately and TXT delivered a solid but unspectacular comeback. I liked ONF’s song well enough, but my bar for them is really high and it just didn’t click with me in the way their best material has. Instead, highlights came from unanticipated places. I wasn’t expecting to enjoy EPEX and Kiss of Life’s title tracks as much as I did. The month closed with another volley of big-name comebacks, but these were similarly mixed (mostly various shades of “underwhelming,” though).
When it comes down to it, the driving force of April didn’t have to do with the songs at all. The whole Min Hee-jin/HYBE/ADOR situation has sucked up most of the oxygen and made for a month highlighted by controversy. It will be interesting to see where things go from here. As far as I’m concerned, anything that could loosen HYBE’s stranglehold on the marketplace is a welcome development. No industry is healthy when dominated so much by a single corporation.
When it comes to my top three songs of the month, one stands far in front of the others. This was an obvious choice and quickly joined the ranks of my most played tracks of 2024. There are a couple of big highlights in my J-pop selections, too. I’m particularly fond of the top two, which have become instant playlist staples.
With K-pop summer arriving early this year, I’m curious how the next few months will pan out. Will we be getting more summer fare than usual or is the industry just exhausting its supply early — perhaps in anticipation of the Olympics stealing promotional airspace this summer? Either way, we’re about to enter the months that usually deliver the bulk of my year-end favorites, so I’d like to be optimistic!
Month Cumulative Rating: 7.9
(compiled by averaging the scores of every K-pop review from this month)
J-Pop Highlights
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week One
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week Two
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week Three
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week Four
TOP J-POP SONGS OF THE MONTH
3. Ae! group -《A》BEGINNING (review)
2. Queen Bee – Super Memorial (review)
1. Bullet Train – Steal A Kiss (review)
K-POP
Honorable Mentions
BOYNEXTDOOR – Earth, Wind & Fire (review)
DRIPPIN – Beautiful Maze (review)
EPEX – Breathe In Love (review)
ILY:1 – IMMM (review)
IVE – HEYA (review)
ONF – Bye My Monster (review)
PICKUS – The Little Prince (review)
QWER – T.B.H (review)
RIIZE – One Kiss / 9 Days (review / review) — not technically title tracks, though
Rolling Quartz – Stand Up (review)
TXT – Deja Vu (review)
Unicode – Let Me Love (review)
Xdinary Heroes – Little Things (review)
ZEROBASEONE – Sweat (review)
Zico – Spot! (ft. Jennie) (review)
This Month’s Risers and Fallers
This Month’s Global Pop Round-Up
TOP THREE SONGS
3. Kiss Of Life – Midas Touch (review)
2. EPEX – Youth2Youth (review)
1. RIIZE – Impossible (review)
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of March 2024
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of February 2024
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of January 2024
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of December 2023
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of November 2023
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
this month was a hit or miss for me. My favs are Deja Vu, Little Things, HEYA, & Earth Wind and Fire
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I was pretty sure RIIZE’s Impossible would be your #1; it’s mine also. My #2 is NewJeans’ Bubble Gum. Those nicely weird industrial synths and blowing air sounds are like what Brian Eno might’ve done if given a bubblegum song and asked to get weird on it. My only complaint is that they’re not louder in the mix – I’d have gone shoegaze on it and really blasted it louder in the mix.
Speaking of the HYBE fiasco, I’m really starting to loath that label. What a weird turnaround for a label I used to love, back in the halcyon days of early BTS. That Hitman Bang must be a Trump-like egomaniac and control freak. The best blog post I’ve read on the topic: https://kosicoso.substack.com/p/why-i-think-min-hee-jin-is-_____
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Listening to Bubble Gum, it’s really like two songs layered together. On one level, it’s an IU/Taeyeon-type little song; but those synths and the ‘beat’ at around 1:40 in the MV are like something you’d hear on Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark’s Architecture & Morality, a deeply Eno-indebted masterpiece from the 80s.
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This is indeed a very level-headed writeup, thanks for sharing.
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April was alright. Some decent highlights (like Youth2Youth, HEYA, Little Things and Midas Touch), while others not so much (ahem, Sheesh), but the good songs did overshadow the… bad side, ehe. I don’t have much comments on this month to be honest.
Well, I wonder what May has in store for us, given aespa’s finally coming back with their first full album (hoping for a Girls-esque or Drama-esque track or a similar hyperpop track), and with other similar big acts like ENHYPEN, NewJeans and ZB1 releasing new music as well. (Now I realized that aespa and NJ will be coming back on the same day, and I can imagine it might be a bit… awkward to say the least, hehe)
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Wait, aepsa’s May 27th and NJ’s 24th! My bad, but still around the same time 🫠
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Midas Touch, Impossible, and T.B.H are my picks! Deja Vu would have been one as well if the remix had been the single.
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My faves:
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Your insight into the effect the Olympics might have on promotional airspace this year makes a lot of sense, though I also wonder whether Impossible and Sweat will still feel fresh to play during the summer months by the time those roll around.
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Sheesh was the only song from this month that I liked LOL
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Some songs I liked this month:
Deja Vu (Anemoia remix) by TXT
Midas Touch by Kiss of Life (this really grew on me)
Jump by NXD (RBW’s new boy group with Hiroto from Boys Planet and a few Fantasy Boys, it’s very TWS-sounding)
Maybe by &TEAM (this just came out and is a very lovely, melancholic-sounding ballad)
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tbh i havent been rlly following the ins and outs of hybegate (which is what im deciding to call it) but i do know this for sure: newjeans needs to get the fuck away from min heejin. and fast.
seriously. the second i read that the members were calling her in the middle of the night sobbing trying to comfort her all my alarm bells went off. that is not a healthy relationship for a group of teens and a 40 yo woman to have whatsoever like its the same kind of energy as being 13-14 and having to talk a 30 yo stranger on the internet down from trying to off themselves. and to make matters worse shes stated that she invited the girls over to her house to “bask in their youth” or some shit like that and claims that minji in particular was “prettier when she was younger” (mind u minji is almost 20 meaning that shes referring to her 14? 15? 16? year old self which. i dont even think i need to explain to yall why thats textbook groomer shit)
and thats not even counting some of the other shit shes gotten the girls into in the past (dressing danielle up as the girl from leon the professional + everything w cookie + etc) her history of being a creep towards underage/barely legal idols that dates well before this (seriously go look at the concept pics for shinees sherlock ep specifically minho and taemins photos if u wanna know what im talking abt) and her WELL documented history of being inspired by pedophilic media (pics of naked underage ppl on her walls her borderline obsession w brooke shields and probably more im forgetting)
so yeah. that woman is going to hell. and say what u want abt this idc im not gonna argue abt this
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I ain’t got nothing this month.
As far as the NJ-Illit-LeSS thing, I don’t have any opinions. Frankly don’t really care. I have noticed however that Nick quietly removed all three from his alphabetical artists listings to minimize drive by traffic from the stink show going on. Also, I have learned that it is pronounced “ee leet” as in elite, and not ill-lit as in a room that needs more lamps in it. Or ill-it rhymes with billet. Or other variations. IllIt when one gets creative with upper and lower cases.
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I have also noticed how Nick deliberately doesn’t show some reviews on twitter to avoid unnecessary people on the blog. Huge respect honestly, to choose to have a decent blog over a bunch of potential readers who could bring unneeded noise.
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my top 3:
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ONF’s Bye My Monster is my No. 1. The song is just beautiful.
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HEYA swept the floor in 2 days
Magnetic and Lucky Girl Syndrome are right behind.
Not a fan of Impossible, it’s like a Troye Sivan reject to me 😦
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*Pretends to be shocked at Impossible being #1*
Honestly, for me, the rest of the year has to be very good to top that song. It is SOTY so far.
My other picks for this month, in no particular order, include ‘Deja Vu (Anemoia Remix)’, ‘Midas Touch’, ‘Magnetic’, and ‘SWEAT’.
That’s like, 5 songs in total! Not bad, April.
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I was wondering what your opinions were on Siren, since the ‘full’ version of the song has been released
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There have been a few very nice releases that caught my ear, but January is far too superior still. The other day when I saw TWS is having a comeback soon, I was like, all these groups having releases waiting to be swept away by these kids😆. But ngl the 5th generation is the driving force right now, it feels like any month they release something, that’s the month that counts.
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I’m so hyped to hear what TWS come back with. At this point it feels like they’re basically a lock to become my rookie of the year.
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So glad to hear that!
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I’m optimistic to the upcoming May releases from most of my favorite group!
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ONF’s Goodby My Monster is my #1 of the year so far. I can’t even describe how much I like that song.
EPEX’s Youth2Youth is such a mood lifter, loved it!
Beautiful Maze by DRIPPIN stayed strong througout the month with it’s chorus and outro.
Honorables: Impossible (Riize), Earth,Wind&Fire (BND), Midas Touch (KoL), Beautiful Ashes (Onewe), Good Mistakes (Ayno)
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