체리블렛 (Cherry Bullet) | Cherry Rush

 

One of the first new girl group releases for 2021 in Korean pop comes from FNC Entertainment’s Cherry Bullet. 2020 was a quiet year for the girls, with only two singles that didn’t quite make dents into the market. That being said, both songs were bops (one problematic, but I’ll talk about that some other time), and I continue to appreciate every effort these girls make (especially since I was a big Hayoon stan back in the Produce 48 days).

The girls make a pink-filled return with their very first mini album, ‘Cherry Rush‘, containing tracks that, much like Red Velvet, accentuate both a ‘Cherry’ sound and a ‘Bullet’ sound. The aesthetics for this album are incredible and totally my preference, but will this mini album fare the same? Is this mini filled to the brim with too much cherries for my liking, or will it hit my heart like a bullet? Let’s check out ‘Cherry Rush‘!

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(여자)아이들 | I trust

  

In reviewing ‘I burn’, I suddenly found myself down the (G)I-DLE wormhole, and now I cannot stop listening to (G)I-DLE. Frankly, this serves as a fantastic opportunity to review their work, and since I looked at ‘I burn’, we have to move down to ‘I trust‘, one of two releases from the CUBE Entertainment girl group in 2020. Released following a successful run on ‘Queendom’ (which we’ll touch on later), (G)I-DLE made their return to tackle on the darker concept they explored on the show.

This does beg a few questions: will that success translate well into a new release (and subsequent releases), do they truly suit the darker concepts, and can we trust (G)I-DLE to create a mini album that’s filled with amazing songs? We’ll have to take a look into the review to see!

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(여자)아이들 | I burn

  

‘I burn‘ is the first K-pop release in 2021 for me, crafted by CUBE Entertainment girl group (G)I-DLE. Continuing on the trend of focusing on ‘I’, (G)I-DLE, pronounced I-DLE, kicks off 2021 with a mini album that could potentially melt the woes and wintry cold of the end of 2020 (and what a year that was). Having come off a summer comeback with ‘DUMDi DUMDi’, can the girls bring back the heat to keep us warm in January? Will this album burn with pleasure or is it too painful to keep moving forward?

I will continue my LOONA project series, but I’ll be reviewing other releases in the meantime! Read on for my review of (G)I-DLE’s ‘I burn‘!

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이달의 소녀 | HeeJin

  

Happiest of new years to everyone, and to all my fellow bloggers! It’s been a wild ride, but 2020 has ended. I admit, it’s been a great year for the blog as I’ve gotten more written than ever, rejuvenating my passion for blogging, but it also has been a pretty tough year for myself and all physically, emotionally, and mentally. Most importantly, I want to say that I hope everyone stays safe going into 2021 and that we can get through this!

Kicking off in 2021, I’ve set my sights on a new writing goal, and my J-pop fans might dislike this… I’ll be delving more into K-pop, with my first project on 12-member girl group LOONA. If you don’t possess a Twitter account, you might not be familiar with #stanloona, but boy, did it become quite the phenomenon! Did you know their humble beginnings started out as ‘Girl of the Month’? It’s quite literally in their name. (Translate above!) The first girl is HeeJin, who many may have seen on MIXNINE (and made it quite far). Was this first release pre-debut a great foreshadowing of LOONA’s future releases, or was this a stumbling first stepping stone into the K-pop scene? Let’s take a leap into 2021 and see how this release fares!

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the top 15 k-pop songs of 2020

                

Bet you thought I was never coming back! I kid.

Despite everything that’s been going on in my life, from securing myself a new job and starting school again, I’ve been keeping on track with a lot of K-pop in 2020. In a year that is probably the weirdest, 2020 delivered on the K-pop track with various songs ranging from haunting to straight up wonky. It seems like there was no way coronavirus was gonna bring K-pop down. I’ve narrowed it down to fifteen songs to keep it small, but here is my list of songs from December 2019 to December 2020… and here’s a warning: don’t be surprised if it’s majorly girl groups. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!

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Tommy heavenly6 | Lollipop Candy♥BAD♥girl

  

Are you ready to say trick or treat?

It’s Halloween! Woo! Spooky day. It’s also the big day for the Tommy series! The third single in the promotion of her second album, Heavy Starry Heavenly, ‘Lollipop Candy♥BAD♥girl’ is the actual Halloween single, with promotional art, its music video, and the track itself being all forms related to Halloween. If you thought she was Halloween from her previous efforts a la ‘I’m Gonna SCREAM+’ and ‘Pray’, you haven’t come across this.

It’s a creepy night, but here’s hoping we’ve got some good music by the lollipop candy bad girl herself to comfort us. Let’s check it out… enter if you dare…

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TWICE (트와이스) | Eyes wide open

 

Next up on the Korean artist spotlight series is TWICE’s most recent release: ‘Eyes wide open’, their second full-length album released just shy of Halloween.

I gotta admit, I was hoping that it would be another Halloween-related release, but this concept is just as fabulous for the fall season of TWICEtober. ‘Eyes wide open’ takes TWICE’s image even further with a fashionista concept, evoking the mature growth that TWICE has gone through in a span of 5 years (let’s not forget, they did debut at this time in 2015… how time flies).

TWICE’s eyes are wide open after a long journey in the K-pop industry, but will our eyes ‘open’ to the sounds of the album, or are they going to close because it’s unbearable? Read on…

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島みやえい子 | 奈落の花

 

Next up for the countdown to Halloween, we’ve got the second tie-in for Miss Shimamiya Eiko to the Higurashi no Naku Koro ni anime series. Released as ‘Naraku no Hana’, this single is the opening theme song for the sequel to the mysterious horror/thriller anime Higurashi no Naku Koro ni, based on the game of the same name, which is titled Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kai (which you should watch, frankly, if you loved the first series and wanted answers to your burning questions).

‘Naraku no Hana’, literally known as Flower of Hell, follows the dark themes of her previous single, Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (the fourth time this title has been mentioned here), but is this flower of hell one that blooms beautifully or is it wilted in quality? Read on!

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Tommy heavenly6 | Pray

  

Second up on the artist spotlight series for Tommy heavenly6 is the second single from her second album, Heavy Starry Heavenly, which Gintama fans may be very familiar with!

Pray is the title of the next single, tied-in with popular anime series Gintama as its very first anime opening in 2006. It continues on the Halloween theme that many of the singles from Heavy Starry Heavenly follow, but this time opting for a more humorous vibe but with some ghostly samurais!

Pray is one of Tommy’s well-known singles, but is this prayer worth chanting with or is it just going to be left unanswered? Click on to read more…

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