After releasing a cover of TRF’s Boy Meets Girl last month, NCT Wish are back with the other half of their double A-side single. YO-I-DON! takes us into the frantic, fast-paced world inhabited by a certain style of J-pop. I’m not sure whether you’d call it Denpa or simply Eurobeat-influenced pop music, but whatever the case this sound isn’t something we usually associate with SM artists.
I happen to love Eurobeat and miss its general influence on pop music. High NRG dance tracks are always welcome in my playlist, but the song itself still needs to be solid. YO-I-DON doesn’t lack in energy. It springs out of the gate on a single-minded mission and never once looks back. The production is busy and stuffed with ideas. Even when the air clears for a brief interlude of bass guitar, the rhythm operates at a frenzied pace.
But while the music itself is classic J-pop in a fun way, the songwriting is mostly just the kind of tuneless NCT slop we’ve been saddled with for too long. Its catchiest segment is the chorus, but even here the melody is flat and uninteresting. In between, we’ve got a ton of errant sing-talk that’s not refined or memorable enough to compete with the maelstrom of sounds underpinning it. I imagine this will go hard at a concert, but overall the song feels like a missed opportunity.
Hooks
7
Production
8
Longevity
8
Bias
8
RATING
7.75