Music Month in Review (Discussion Post): November 2021

[adenar.livejournal.com]

Hello omona! In a few discussions recently, a couple of users (I remember dior_chic especially) have suggested we start to do roundup posts for releases through the year. I thought that a 2-weeks-later post for every comeback might be too much, so this is my pitch for something similar; a month-in-review post, perhaps posted two weeks into the next month, for users to discuss and review the previous months' releases, see if opinions have changed, and even find see if there's anything they missed.

~BRIEF FOREWORD AND EXPLANATIONS~

- I've left out overseas releases just for now because I didn't want to melt my brain
- i put together the spreadsheet because i knew that if i put all that information in a post i would go over the character limit by like, 200%. I think it's a good compromise between 'having links to music in the post' and 'not being able to post due to character limit'
- i put the header together on befunky.com ok please don't drag me, this is half a pitch and half a discussion post, if anyone can direct me to a 'download free editing software 101' pls that'd be gr8, graphic design is my passion. i finally found my mouse the other day and i am ready to do this
- please discuss november's music in the comments but please also discuss if i you think i could have added information, taken information away, alternate ways of doing things, etc.

Top 10 commented new music posts;

🧬TWICE: “SCIENTIST” MV🧬 with 101 comments
KAI - 'PEACHES' MV & ALBUM LISTENING POST with 89 comments
BILLLIE: “RING X RING” MV with 30 comments
CHUNGHA - 'KILLING ME' MV with 24 comments
티아라(T-ARA) - TIKI TAKA(티키타카) weki meki's impact with 22 comments
WEKI MEKI - 'SIESTA' MV & ALBUM LISTENING POST with 17 comments
MISS A’S MIN RELEASES PRE RELEASE “ONION” MV, PREPARING FOR SOLO DEBUT with 17 comments
MONSTA X "RUSH HOUR" MV & "NO LIMIT" ALBUM LISTENING POST with 14 comments
CIGNATURE - 'BOYFRIEND' MV & ALBUM LISTENING POST with 11 comments
LABOUM - 'KISS KISS' MV & ALBUM LISTENING POST with 10 comments

The biggest surprise to me on this list is to see Billlie so high; it goes to show that sometimes taking a risk and dividing your audience can actually be a really good strategy, if you are truly bringing something new and interesting to the table.

An overview of all new music posted to omona in November;



spreadsheet with links available here

I've missed some but that's 48 posts of new music, music videos and albums. While kpop posts are naturally the most popular, we have a good spread of genres thanks to posters such as waves_of_light and others who will post literally anything, and have introduced us all to music we wouldn't have otherwise encountered. Thank you to these users!

A selection of releases that omona missed;

Singer Gemini, who debuted under GroovyRoom's label Area in 2020 had a second release this month; his first EP, Inside Out, with lead single 'UFO' featuring Seori. There are 7 songs on the EP, including UFO and his single from earlier in the month, Mia. This is an energetic but chill r&b song, led by electric guitar riffs and a funky bass. Seori's feature is excellently used. You can listen to Inside Out in its entirety at youtube.

cw: blood, wounds

Heize collaborated with and promoted beauty brand STONEHENgE (weird capitalisation but ok) to release her newest single, Beautiful Moments. It's a fairly typical Heize-style ballad, but nice nonetheless if you're into her style of music. The M/V is a little dark though difficult to understand, with various people wandering around with open (small) wounds and arrows shot into them.

Changmo attends a very creepy, very wealthy wedding in the music video for the orchestra-infused r&b track 'Hourglass', the lead single off his third album, Underground Rockstar, and turns to mass murder.

Woollim Entertainment's newest group, Drippin, go through a transformation from gentle flower boys to supernatural? fugitives? in their contribution to the Universe app. The song is synth-heavy and heartfelt.

yodayoung is a 25-year-old soloist under Brand New Music's subsidiary, BrandNew-A, who debuted in January 2019 with 'One Side Love'. She's an indie artist through and through, with soft hushed vocals and a soothing, jazzy instrumental, perfect for cold winter days and warm mugs of warm drink. You can listen to her previous singles on youtube: One-Side Love; Cloud; A Night of the Star.

So, omona, let's discuss!
What are you still listening to?
What grew on you?
What fell out of favour quickly?
Did you miss any releases that you would have been looking forward to?
Who surprised you and who let you down?
Is there anything omona missed that you'd recommend?
Did you find that the reaction to releases in other kpop communities was different to omona's?

sources: me & google sheets, Stone Music Entertainment, Kozypop, Ambition Musik, UNIVERSE_OFFICIAL, 1theK

Comments

[adenar.livejournal.com]

so real quick here's my month in review;

i still listen to who am i _a lot_. i love that song. I don't actively seek out the rest of Siesta's tracks but they come up on shuffle enough and i skip them seldom enough that they remain in my current playlist. sweet winter in particular has grown on me a little more than i expected it to. There's not a lot else from the month that I have continued to listen to/chosen to download, but there were a lot of songs that I enjoyed in passing. I enjoyed MJ and Billlie's debut,

I've still not actually checked in to cignature's song. i don't know if i'm maybe just a little bit tired out from all the member changes, have been a fan of the girls since good day existed. there's also something really squicking me out about how they're styling/presenting dohee, the maknae. yes she's 19 but she looks like 8 and i know that some of their styling choices are more sexual in the context of kpop than i automatically realise.

when putting this post together i think i was most shocked to see that the post for B.I's Cosmos had 0 comments? This is the guy from Ikon right? Wow we as a community really just dropped him lmao. Mino's recent release also has 0 comments lmao what is going on with the fans of the yg/ex-yg boys

[chiives.livejournal.com]

i think omona in general has really soured on yg, including bp and somi, whose posts get comments although half of them are usually neutral to negative, lol. it's been going on for a few years now and the few hardcore yg stans this comm had have left. they're still really popular everywhere else (reddit, twitter, they also have a bunch of newer stans on ontd), just not in omona.

[adenar.livejournal.com]

Yeah! I think I'd sort of noticed that happening but since I had completely stopped going into the posts of YG artists I wasn't super aware of it; doing this post kind of drove it home. I suppose YG/The Black Label's flashy new crop of artists are good for smokescreening all the crap they used to do (still do) and all the assholes who used to work for them/work for them but aren't active. It's going to be interesting (/ugly) when we do ultimately get bigbang activity. It's interesting to note though that Treasure, their newest group, haven't yet had one single that's actually charted in SK, so the YG magic rubbing off might be more than just limited to omona.

[chiives.livejournal.com]

treasure is in this limbo where they're doing fine? for nugus, but doing really, really badly for a yg group. they don't seem to have much name recognition at all except for yg stans, unlike ikon and winner, both made a huge splash upon debut and were actually really popular for a few years (can't say much about them now though). i don't follow them at all, but most of the kpop fans i know are multifandom and some of them 4th gen stans, none of them follow or care about treasure at all (but a lot of them follow bp). who knows what's going on with yg anymore.

[takemydream.livejournal.com]

I didn't even know that Treasure was from YG....

[myungung.livejournal.com]

I’m glad omona doesn’t care about YG groups because the general consensus outside still feels very positive, especially towards Big Bang (I wanna puke everytime people praise GD’s “talent” or artistry)

AKMU are also not getting positive stuff since they chose to renew too, and good for us though

[chiives.livejournal.com]

despite all the (factual) allegations against yg, celebs really don't care as long as the agency can get their names out there, and unfortunately yg's name still holds a lot of sway in the k-entertainment world. i really enjoy akmu but them renewing with yg soured me off them. and if you're still a bb stan in 2021 in the year of the lord... i don't know what to tell you.

[myungung.livejournal.com]

there are a lot of casual kpop listeners or ex-fans who would definitely be wow-ed if Big Bang came back soon, I'm predicting they will actually have a successful comeback sadly. especially people glossed over their involvement with sngri. hell, gd's nike shoes are in hot demand and people are happy he's with jennie so they really can do many wrongs and be considered as saints.

[chiives.livejournal.com]

everyone in my circle usually clowns on gd+jennie as a couple and i've actually forgotten they're looked very favorably upon in most of the general public 🙃