Welcome to comeback season hell
New releases from BTS, LOONA, Everglow, and GFriend on the horizon
Hello, and welcome to maybe if you stanned, a K-pop newsletter with a focus on new releases and fan culture. Happy new year! After a brief hiatus while I got my life in order (I’ve recently transitioned to freelancing full-time and it’s kicking my butt!), I’m ready to dive back in. On that note: I’m shifting this newsletter to Mondays instead of Saturdays!
Despite the fact that we’re only three weeks deep into the new year, there’s been… so much to keep up with. I’ll be ghosting over some of the highlights of the past few weeks — think of this as the catch-up issue with an eye towards upcoming releases. No essay at the end, because this would have turned out to be over 2000 words and no one wants that.
As always, here’s this week’s playlist.
BTS’ Suga — “Interlude: Shadow”
EXO’s Chen is getting married and is a soon-to-be father
Arguably the biggest K-pop news of January, EXO’s Chen — real name Kim Jong-dae — announced on Jan. 13 that he has a girlfriend who he intends to marry in the near future. You can read a full English translation of his letter over at Soompi.
SM Entertainment later confirmed that Chen’s girlfriend, who is not a celebrity, is pregnant. The two will marry in a private ceremony for family only.
Dating news is always fraught with a bit of controversy. Fans, particularly those who are Korean, are stereotyped as not being able to take dating news very well. That’s due in large part to the fact that part of an idol’s marketability is the potential for fans to imagine being in a relationship with them — once they start dating someone, that possibility is cut off. In this moment, it’s hard not to think about this clip from JYP’s Party People where EXO sits there as fans scream that they don’t want them to date… ever. Yikes!
That being said, EXO-L’s around the world have been working to vocally express their support for Chen and his fiancée even in the midst of some (not to link to Koreaboo, but) very small protests to remove him from EXO.
Big Hit is… maybe acquiring Pledis Entertainment
After a report published by Korean news outlet Sports DongA, there was buzz earlier this week that Bit Hit Entertainment, home to BTS and Tomorrow by Together, was in talks to acquire Pledis Entertainment, which houses Seventeen and NU’EST. Big Hit, however, downplayed rumors on Jan. 12, stating that “nothing has yet been decided.”
Big Hit Entertainment most recently acquired Source Music, the home of girl group GFriend, in July 2018. Per the original report, Pledis would continue to act as an independent label under Big Hit in the same way that Source Music currently does. In any case, even a lack of concrete information can’t stop everyone from coming up with minor fantasies about group members running into each other in the Big Hit building.
BTS is coming back
I don’t think there’s anyone who follows K-pop and doesn’t know about this (except for, perhaps, some poor Facebook ARMYs). BTS will make a long-awaited comeback Feb. 21 with Map of the Soul: 7. However… there’s a whole lot of stuff to go through before that point. I am very excited but also very tired!!!
Big Hit Entertainment released a comeback schedule for the group that features over a month of promotion leading up to the release of the album. Kicked off with the release of the first comeback trailer, “Interlude: Shadow,” the five or so weeks leading up to the album feature a number of single releases, comeback teasers, and artistic events taking place worldwide.
Perhaps most interesting is the “Connect, BTS” project, which brings together five different cities (London, Berlin, Buenos Aires, Seoul, and New York) and 22 artists under a collective banner. The website for the project reads:
“This project aims to redefine the relationships between art and music, the material and immaterial, artists and their audiences, artists and artists, theory and practice. Connect, BTS may be described in terms of a collective curatorial practice by curators around the world who resonated with BTS’ philosophy.”
LOONA is finally coming back
I think the months of January and February have been specifically engineered to send me over the edge, because BTS and LOONA are once again coming back within the same time frame (Loonarmys ate good in August 2018, and also I died). Almost a full year after their most recent full comeback, “Butterfly,” LOONA will return on Feb. 5. In the meantime, the group is currently in the process of releasing individual member teasers on Twitter, and they’re absolute serves.
LOONA had a bit of a topsy-turvy first year as a group, experiencing massive popularity at events like KCON LA while also… not releasing any music for nine months. The dearth of content has been typically attributed to the departure of creative Jaden Jeong, who spearheaded LOONA’s lore. In the process of Jeong’s departure, LOONA’s ballad album La Maison LOONA was scrapped.
However, vocalist Haseul will not join the group for this comeback following a decision with family members and BlockBerry Creative to take a break from promotions to treat her anxiety.
Everglow is also coming back
One of the rookie girl groups that took 2019 by storm, Everglow will return on Feb. 3 with Reminiscence, the group’s first mini album. The group has been somewhat hit-or-miss for me with their previous two singles “Bon Bon Chocolat” and “Adios,” but I’ve vibed a lot more with their less aggressive, poppier b-sides like “Hush” and “Moon.”
And GFriend too!
In the group’s first release since Big Hit Entertainment acquired GFriend’s label, Source Music, GFriend will return on Feb. 3 with the EP Labyrinth. Most recently, Big Hit released a teaser connecting the group’s previous MVs together under a single story.
In any case, the week of Feb. 3 is going to be… very busy.
New music
I don’t have the time to go deep on everything that’s been released these past few weeks, but here are some of my favorites.
ATEEZ — “Answer,” Treasure Epilogue: Action to Answer
If there’s any group I think is worth really paying attention to in 2020, it’s ATEEZ. Hot on the heels of their first full length album, the group rounded out the Treasure series with Treasure Epilogue: Action to Answer. The title track, “Answer” picks up with a theme introduced at the end of their previous album. Driven by brief exchanges between rappers Hongjoong and Mingi and anchored by power vocals from San and Jongho, it feels like a resolution to the Treasure series.
One of my favorite things about ATEEZ’s first year is the attention paid not only to establishing a plot through line across the group’s music videos, but also a number of musical themes that come into play across the albums themselves. B-side “Precious” is a resolution of the “Treasure” theme introduced in the group’s first theme, harkening back to previous releases like “Utopia” as well.
Despite the fact that they didn’t manage to pick up any Rookie of the Year awards, ATEEZ arguably has one of the strongest discographies out of any 2019 rookie group. After seeing them perform at KCON this past summer, I’m convinced that they’re the real deal.
BTS — “Interlude: Shadow” and “Black Swan”
BTS took the entire world by storm in 2019, finally cementing their place in Western pop culture with what was arguably their poppiest album to date. Now, the group is poised to return to the kind of high-brow, artistic, emo content that made them a highly successful group in the first place.
My favorite thing by far about the Map of the Soul series is the fact that it’s directly referential to BTS’ earlier, hip-hop focused albums. Just as “Intro: Persona” was a redux of “Intro: Skool Luv Affair,” “Interlude: Shadow” harkens back to “Intro: O!RUL8,2?” in its instrumental, while also invoking a melody from fan-favorite B-side “Let Me Know” off of the group’s first full-length album, Dark & Wild. With Suga at center stage, it’s deeply emotional, grappling with the fear and loneliness inherent in massive stardom.
Then, there’s “Black Swan,” the first single off of the album. Rather than a performance video or comeback trailer from BTS, Big Hit Entertainment released an “art film” performed by MN Dance Company, featuring gutting choreography and a lush string-driven arrangement of the single.
The track is centered on the moment when passions fail to resonate anymore. “The heart no longer races when the music plays,” Suga sings. “Oh, that would be my first death, I’ve been always afraid of.”
Other things I think you should listen to but don’t have the bandwidth to write about:
Younha feat. RM — “Winter Flower”
Worth nothing here that Younha was the first Korean female soloist to hit number one on the United States iTunes Top Songs chart in addition to this single debuting at number one on the Billboard World Digital Song Sales chart.
Dream Note — “Wish”
Zico — “Any Song”
That’s all for this week! Looking forward to getting back in the groove here.
Until next week,
Palmer