Kpopalypse roundup – new k-pop releases 24/11/2025
It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!
ILLIT – Not Cute Anymore
Cruisy, consistent, generally very likeable. Not really exciting enough to be song of the year or anything but it’s definitely catchy and a grower. I already want to listen to this again and not whatever other bullshit is lined up for me in roundup this week.
BABYMONSTER – Psycho
A real mixed bag – a great pre-chorus and reasonable chorus is offset by stupid raps and horrible scotch-snapping, the balance of things is about average in the end.
Stray Kids – Do It
Do what exactly? Not listen to this boring song again I hope, because that sure ain’t happening.
RIIZE – Fame
Pretty unexciting stuff, they won’t have to worry about fame too much if they keep putting out stuff like this… wait, who am I kidding, this is k-pop, nobody gives a shit about the music, they’ll be just fine.
tripleS msnz sun – Bubble Gum Girl
This song is also not very interesting, so I’d just like to use this moment to say that my end of year lists are coming along nicely, thanks for asking. It’s been a pretty sad year in k-pop (2024 was better) but the top ten songs or so are all certified bangers that are as good as those in any year, so look forward to some positivity from Kpopalypse soon… or check out the worst list if you’re more into me shitting on things, which a lot of my readers seem to love for some reason, probably because I can say the things that they wish they could say without being cancelled. Oh and this song here won’t be on any list of mine except if I do one called “top 30 songs least likely to appear on a Kpopalypse list”.
tripleS msnz moon – “Cameo Love”
Another miss for the same reason as “Bubble Gum Girl”. For a group so clearly crafted to a specific concept, you’d think the brains behind tripleS would know better than to just boringly follow k-pop’s current musical trends and would instead try to find a way to make them stand out a bit more. The revolution we were promised isn’t here.
tripleS msnz neptune – Fly Up
This one really isn’t any better or worse but it’s a bit more on-brand for the group overall, featuring one of their usual “la la la” choruses and the same kind of disco feel that permeates most of their other previous stuff. I’m sure it’ll inspire another few dozen deludu tripleS fanboy theory-of-the-universe videos.
tripleS msnz zenith – Q&A
Okay last one for this group I promise, and this is the best one of the lot just because it’s got a bit of unusual rhythm in the chorus, which is finally something other than the usual trend-following blandness.
BABY DONT CRY – I Don’t Care
A great chorus helps a lot, but it all just lacks a little something elsewhere. Certainly not an “F Girl” but maybe a B minus.
Handong – Gray Zone
Handong successfully carries on the Dreamcatcher legacy by having a great looking video and a song weighed down with too much slowness and not enough heaviness.
VVUP – Super Model
The entire song sounds like it’s building up to something and never arrives and then it just ends. Much like this review which could have had a proper payoff punchline but instead it
Burvey – Sugar Riding
Starts off with an awesome backing track but the melody writing kind of sucks and the whole thing gets bland really quick. I guess it’s back to complaining about tadpoles in k-pop until we get a decent song out of them.
ATEEZ – Choose
SoReal paved the way but they did it a lot better. I don’t think anyone is fooled here.
San – Creep
It’s better than San’s solo song though. The wayward farting synths sound terrible but they’re also the only interesting thing here.
NEXZ – Next To Me
“Nexz” is a great name for this group because it implies that their songs are so skippable that you can’t even get through saying the word “Next!” without falling asleep halfway through.
Moonbyul – S.O.S
Not the best Moonbyul song but it’s still okay enough, mainly just thinking of my lesbian readers here by including this.
IDID – Push Back
I actually really like the chaotic sounding track here but all the vocal harmony singing really takes the edge off of everything.
APEX – Checkmate
Not much of a song but it’s just good to see the saloon from TMC’s iconic “Pew Pew Pew” get another workout in the k-pop realm. Although they never get chess right in music videos for some reason. At 1:15 the guy on the right has a free queen he can take, what’s he sitting there thinking about? Even if you get caught afterward, it’s a rook for a queen, just take it fool.
LOVEONE – Dreamin’
Look at 0:43 it’s just like Hana with the stylist, “get that fucking shit outta my face” hahahaha
Jurin Asaya feat. Rhapsody – PS118
XG girls continue their incredible feat of having someone who actually understands what good English language rap music is write their raps for them, something no other k-pop group can seemingly manage. If tomorrow they all start sucking lyrically you know that some songwriter behind the scenes had a heart attack or something.
Sokodomo feat. Chaeyoung – Wake Up
The quality of this song is more offensive than a thousand questionable clothing choices.
Park Moonchi feat. Jo Yuri – Code: Kwang
Song starts at 1:30, ignore the crap beforehand. It’s not too bad and certainly rocks a bit (harder than Handong this week ahem), even if Jo Yuri looks as bored as somoene watching the voting scenes in Squid Game 2.
AIDEN feat. Seunghee – A to B
Despite the Oh My Girl member being in it, trust me this wasn’t worth a look or a listen, so let’s have our weekly non-Korean LGBT feature here instead, yay! I think that we all assumed that Michael Stipe was queer as fuck in R.E.M’s heyday, but I missed the memo when he actually came out and said exactly that in 1994. What I didn’t miss was their peak 1980s hits, nor seeing R.E.M live which was… okay I guess, they’re better in the studio honestly. Highlight of the show was Michael forgetting the words to “It’s The End Of The World” and running around the stage screaming “FUCK!” into the microphone until he finally remembered his lines. I think it’s the most angry anyone’s ever seen him.
Paul Kim & Yuqi – Have A Good Time
Very much a Fifty Fifty “Cupid” vibe here with the general groove and the vocal placement, but hey speaking of slightly above-average songs have you heard “Starry Night“? You could listen to it, if you wanted.
Hebi – Overlock
Hebi’s actually kind of decent songs are definitely let down by the fucking awful visuals every time. Weird for the same company behind QWER, you’d think they’d understand what looks good and what doesn’t but I guess not.
Bronze feat. Jay Park & Sunhye (YOUNG POSSE) – Witty
Jay Park getting upstaged by the youngsters, who would’ve thought? Wait, probably everybody. Well, that’s that, then.
Yein – Landing
Don’t die of fucking shock but this song by an ex-Lovelyz member actually has a fucking pulse. It’s not all that great but it’s still better than the 57 idol group boy soloists that I removed from roundup completely this week for your sanity.
Cha Eunwoo – Saturday Preacher
This isn’t too bad I guess but it’s also too generic for me to really care too much about it. There’s so much boy-solo stuff and if it’s reasonably uptempo it always sounds pretty much like this. Nobody is trying too hard here.
Romantic Punch – Future.exe
The most amazingly over the top video, finally someone used AI for good. The song isn’t bad either but loses significant points for having that “nyah nyah” chorus melody. If I want to feel like I’m being bullied in high school again I don’t need to listen to your chorus, I’ll just read my own books.
Cotoba – Light, World and Me
Cotoba are always pretty good if never exceptional, they’re the Fifty Fifty of post-rock whatchamacallit. You could listen to them if you wanted.
The Deep – Kpop Bitch
I thought that “Lucky Star” last week was good, but “Kpop Bitch” is knocking it out of the fucking park, this is sheer gold. Abrasive and cool as fuck, this reminds me of the early 2NE1 style (“Fire“, “Can’t Nobody” etc) but better than that because the production is rawer and nastier, and it’s not hamstrung by grating hard Autotune that dates it back to 1743 and Dara’s toilet brush hair. Let’s end roundup here for the week because it’s not going to get any better.
RANDOM BONUS VIDEOS OF THE WEEK
PUBG MOBILE x BABYMONSTER Live-Action Trailer
I feel like YG probably should have waited until someone actually gave a fuck about their new girl group before doing a PUBG collab with them but whatever, I guess that’s why they only get the “baby” mobile version of PUBG. Mind you, after PUBG botched the aespa and NewJeans events by hiding all the good stuff behind scammy random-roll lootboxes (instead of just letting us buy the loot upfront like back in Blackpink event days), I should be grateful that the BabyMonster event is mobile-only because I don’t play games on my phone.
ZHEKE – How tripleS Became the VOICE of YOUTH in this GENERATION
Speaking of tripleS fan theory videos, here we go, enjoy this one. I think the person who made this just blew his house deposit savings on tripleS NFTs and is trying to justify it after the fact. Actually it does have some basis in reality in terms of identifying the group’s conceptual identity but the real issue with this video is that the whole overarching premise of it is kind of bullshit regardless. Nobody I knew who grew up when The Spice Girls were big thought that they were “the voice of a generation”, even the most deluded pops fans at the time were just like “it’s just yet another fucking manufactured overseas pop group ripping off Australia’s Girlfriend but I guess I like that one song of theirs so whatever, I’m sure they’ll barely last three albums anyway”. Back then people had common sense, you didn’t have to pretend to glaze everything unconditionally 100% of the time like you do now because there wasn’t a social media to cancel people on.
15& – Sugar
From back in the day when JYP would actually “give them an album”, 15&’s “Sugar” was reasonable enough if not amazing but it was also sadly the only time 15& would actually get a semi-decent feature track. JYP later tried to push 15&’s Park Jimin into variety TV hosting instead, something she complained loudly about, while Lee Hi and AKMU were racing up Korean charts with a similar sound at the same time, which must’ve burned. I guess they’re all now hanging out together enjoying life and swapping ex-shitty-label war stories, all’s well that ends well.
That’s all for this week! Kpopalypse roundup returns next week!
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