The High Three Okay-Pop Songs of March 2024

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On the finish of every month, I look again at my three favourite title tracks by Okay-pop artists. I take my very own rankings into consideration, however there’s a little bit of wiggle room as sure songs are likely to develop or fade.

March 2024 General Ideas

Okay, this yr’s already somewhat bizarre. We kicked off with an unusually robust January, however every successive month has seen a decline in general track high quality. February delivered a pair bangers however was in any other case fairly sparse. March felt much more vacant (particularly the primary half) and missed out on the type of 9+ rated smashes that are likely to get me tremendous excited on the weblog.

Plainly businesses are saving their massive weapons for the spring, which makes me wanting to see how the following three months will look. March was a quiet earlier than the storm. Most acts who launched materials could possibly be thought of low-to-mid tier, which is often my candy spot relating to music. However slightly than bowling me over with thrilling sounds and concepts, Okay-pop in March reverted to drained trade developments that had me doling out means too many “7” (or under…) rankings.

The top of the month noticed a burst of newly-debuting lady teams, and I want I may say all of them felt contemporary and compelling. ILLIT’s (very quick!) mini album painted probably the most cohesive fashion, however the trade appears utterly devoid of the fashion of lady group songs I like. The place are the excessive power, vocally bombastic standouts? The place is the following GFriend, Kara, Sistar, Lovelyz, Oh My Woman, WJSN, SNSD, 9 Muses, and so on and so on? I do know I sound like a damaged file and plenty of of you might be most likely past sick of listening to it, however the final time I actually fell in love with a woman group title monitor was nearly a yr in the past. Okay-pop simply isn’t making these massive, daring melodic statements anymore and it type of sucks.

Okay, rant over. I’m sorry about that.

Although I had numerous “fallers” this month, there have been just a few songs that caught out as highlights. Most are usually not from big-name acts, however all have been Bias Checklist favorites for a while. Although not represented on this checklist, my favourite Okay-pop monitor of the month was simply Infinite V’s Stunning. I discover the track a lot extra satisfying than Infinite’s full group comeback final yr and I like the way it was mainly surprise-dropped with only a couple days between announcement and launch. There was no time to set expectations excessive or low. It was simply… BAM! Right here’s a improbable new track for you!

I’m truly actually happy with my prime two songs of the month. I stored switching them forwards and backwards and nonetheless don’t fairly know which one deserves the highest spot. One track was an out-of-the-gate smash whereas the opposite has confirmed to be a giant grower. Lengthy-term attraction often favors the grower, however it’s nonetheless too early to inform how issues will shake out. Regardless, these two songs are primarily tied and have each change into staples on my playlist.

As anticipated, my March was dominated by just a few favourite J-pop acts. Ryugujo’s new EP Deep Wave owned the month for me, which was most likely apparent by how usually I rave about it. Listening to the creativity and expansiveness of their music has truly been detrimental to lots of March’s trendier, generic Okay-pop choices. The comparability is just not favorable, and makes me notice how a lot we want idiosyncratic auteurship again in Okay-pop. That’s what made me first fall in love with the music, in any case!

Proper behind Ryugujo was Genic’s new album (although it bore no new single so isn’t represented on this month’s prime three). It’s simply such a stable album all through. Aside from these two massive highlights, J-pop continued to trudge alongside at a much less spectacular tempo than final yr. Additionally, has anybody else type of misplaced pleasure for the music coming from Starto Leisure because the rebrand? They should kick issues into gear as a result of most of their current stuff has been somewhat boring. Fortunately, Kis-My-Ft2 is lastly again with a brand new album this spring and a clip of the lead monitor sounds proper up my alley. If one Starto group goes to hit it out of the park this yr, please let it’s them!

In any case, I do know most of you don’t come to this weblog for J-pop so I’m hoping April will attain (or surpass!) January’s Okay-pop heights. The comeback slate is already wanting packed as extra dependable hitmakers throw their hats into the ring. TXT’s mini album feels like it might be a return to 2021-era type and I’m tremendous curious what RIIZE will come again with in the event that they do truly launch new music in April. Spring and summer season are usually my favourite seasons for Okay-pop, so I’m wanting ahead to some massive highlights.

Month Cumulative Score: 7.6

(compiled by averaging the scores of each Okay-pop evaluation from this month)