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