#and song rec for you: broken compass by stray kids :]

[mythbits]

For the request,how about your captain hanging out with any egos of your choice ?

story time with yancy!

[holdinbacksecrets]

omg i saw you started getting into strays kids. i've been a stan since debut and they're the group that got me into kpop. watching them grow and the success they've had recently makes me so proud. i don't keep up with them as much anymore but they'll always have a special place in my heart.

these are kinda obscure recs but all of hans skz records. they aren't officially released as of now and are only on youtube but they're gonna be officially released at some point before the end of the year. my other recs for the rap line are the predebut 3racha project. someone of them did get turned into skz songs (placebo, for you, broken compas and a few others) but my personal fav is scene stealers

- 🦢

🦢! how are you? i’ve missed chatting with you 🫶

ahhh i love this and completely understandable now that i’ve dove into their discography. the level of talent is insane. i’m so so impressed. cheers to the special place they have in your heart 🖤

i’m so glad you decided to send this ask because i don’t know how long it would’ve taken me to find han’s records. i will search them up after i finish this reply!

i will also check out the 3racha pre debut project and your remaining recs. broken compass is currently one of my favorite songs by them. i’ve had two friends recommend it as well, and i see, well hear, why ✨✨

[jashne-bahaaraa]

tagged by @beomgyus-choi thanks for tagging! i had so much fun! <3

Rule: you can only repeat one artist and only one time, so we can all kind of spread new 🎶 to the people we tag. Try to listen to at least one of the songs people rec here.

1) one song you 💛 the first time you listened to and never got tired of?

broken compass by 3racha

2) one song you 😭 every time you listen or makes you emotional?

i don’t usually cry while listening to music but so far away by suga makes me super sad so i don’t listen to it a lot

3) one song that always makes you happy/😁?

rhythm ta by ikon

4) one song that you would dedicate to your best friend and/or your family?

universe by exo ( @bangxchann i fucking love this song and ily too)

5) one song with a production (the sounds, the beat, the mood) you 😍?

home by svt

6) one song with perfect, amazing, outstanding lyrics?

grow up by stray kids

7) one song that you would recommend to anyone?

dance the night away by twice uwu

8) one song you don’t understand why you like so much but you do anyway?

zimzalabim (did i spell that right oof) idk why but when i heard it, i didn’t really like it but it was so catchy 

9) one song that you think people in general wouldn’t like but you do?

mhmmm idk.... ko ko bop by exo?? (idk if people don’t like it but i’ve seen so many people say they didn’t like it sooo)

10) one song people normally like and you don’t like or hate?

despacito lol

11) one song you would call a masterpiece?

mikrokosmos by bts

12) one song you recently (last 30 days max) discovered and really liked it?

psycho by red velvet (i’m fucking obsessed with this song ok??)

13) one song you listen to to get pumped like you wanna tear down the fucking government or something?

love the way you lie by eminem and rihanna (i honestly can’t explain how energetic this song makes me sdjfnljdfnfo)

tagging @bangxchann @stray-nayru @cramelot @mark-tuan-and-jinyoung-lover and anyone who wants to do it!! 

[juunshua]

I'm not the anon from before but since you said you're not familiar with stray kids I just wanted to recommend some songs in case you're ever curious (and don't just wanna watch their most viewed mvs and stuff): Insomnia, 어린 날개, Mixtape 3, Broken Compass, I See (3Racha/J.One) ♥️

thank you for the recs! insomnia has a really interesting prechorus chord progression i think?im curious as to how the bg piano is moving. 어린 날개 that chorus is so catchy!!! mixtape #3? a song that is more or less completely in their lower register?? thats really refreshing to hear in this day and age! i also enjoyed the first parts of the verses^^ broken compass, were they trainees when they did that? one of the youtube comments on the lyric video said that thats really great they were able to start exploring with their music and release it so early on!! i see, the piano motif is really pretty! and alskdj im soooo weak to the strings sound loved hearing it in there, and i love how much the texture changes throughout the song. are those clicking noises supposed to be representatives of like texts or like typing things on the phone? really interesting if that was the intention, and if not, then im curious what the intention actually was for those sounds (if there was any) thank you once again for the recs!! 

[kachulein]

Mind giving me K-pop recommendations? Like, what got you into K-pop, who's your favorite, things like that? I want to try listening to it and I wanted to ask you, Kachu! Congrats on 800!! 💖💙

Aww thank you so much dear!!

First of all, Kpop is not just simply pop music, as the name suggests. Within the genre kpop are actually many different genres of music mingled and there’s something nice for (almost) everyone to find. I’ll give you some information about my favourite groups that might help you find what you could like. I will also link mostly title songs as they are the more popular songs and usually have a music video (kpop music videos are always very aesthetic btw).

Starting off with my ultimate favourite group Stray Kids. They are still rookies as they debuted in March 2018 but I’ve fallen in love with them and their music so much that I highly recommend you checking them out. They are a 9 member boy group with three of those members, Bang Chan, Changbin and Han (knowns as 3RACHA) writing and composing all of their songs. 3RACHA has been releasing pre-debut mixtapes on Souncloud throughout 2017 and if you like hip hop/rap music, you should definitely give them a listen. Some recs are:

Hellevator

District 9

Grow Up (try to listen & read lyrics without crying; you can put on eng sub on the mv)

Voices

My Pace

Awkward Silence

I am YOU

Get Cool

M.I.A

Mixtape#3 ‘For You’

Mixtape#1 ‘Placebo’ (my favourite songs of theirs)

Mixtape#2 ‘Even a shadow needs light to exist’

note: The songs with a ‘mixtape’ in front of them mean that they were originally  track 3RACHA released in one of their mixtapes but they’ve been alternated and remastered into a ot9 Stray Kids version

Some 3RACHA songs:

ZONE

Start Line

Matryoshka

Broken Compass

NXT 2 U

Tik Tok

P.A.C.E

Placebo (I love the original version as well)

For You (^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^)

Runners High

MONSTA X is another one of my favourites and it was actually thanks to their song Hero that I got into kpop. It’s a great song with a beautiful music video and I highly recommend it. Their songs are usually very powerful bangers to get hyped to. Some song I recommend are:

Hero

All in

Stuck

Shine Forever

Beautiful

Fighter

Jealousy

Dramarama

Newton

Shoot Out

Another favourite of mine is BTS. I’m pretty sure you’ve heard of them already. They’ve been around for a while and gained worldwide a lot of popularity in 2017. They’ve changed their music style over the years but it shows that their music has grown with them. Some recs are:

I NEED U

Dope

Run

Fire

Save Me

Blood, Sweat & Tears

Spring Day

Not Today

DNA (their most famous song I believe but not their best imo)

MIC Drop

FAKE LOVE

IDOL

I’m Fine

Don’t Leave Me

Another group I definitely cannot miss is Seventeen. Their name is misleading since they are actually only 13 members not 17 (it’s still a lot though). The group is split into 3 sub-units, Hip Hop Team, Vocal Team, and Performance Team with each of those teams having a leader. The three leaders also created a SVT Leaders unit for their song Change Up. They mainly release ot13 songs with one of their members, called Woozi, being the main composer but they also released songs in their respective units. Some recs are:

Boom Boom

Check-In (Hip Hop Team)

Highlight (Performance Team)

Don’t Wanna Cry

Change Up (SVT Leaders)

Pinwheel (Vocal Team)

Clap

THANKS

Oh My!

Call Call Call

Getting Closer

bonus: Just Do It (by BSS a new sub-unit consisting of three members, however they only released this song so far)

Got7 is a groups under JYP entertainment just like Stray Kids and they are their seniors since Got7 has been around since 2014. They also have great music I highly recommend checking out:

Hard Carry

Never Ever

You Are

Look

Lullaby

Miracle

Day6 is under JYP entertainment as well but they are a bit different from the usual Kpop group since they are actually a band and play their own instruments. If you like rock music, I highly recommend them!!

Shoot Me

Beautiful Feeling

Somehow

DANCE DANCE

I Wait

How Can I Say

Congratulations

and since we’re already talking about about rock music, here’s some more groups whose music goes into the direction of rock to check out:

The Rose - BABY, Sorry

FT ISLAND - Take Me Now, Pray, Out Of Love, Lose, Hello Hello, Wind

Dreamcatcher - Chase Me, Good Night, Fly High, YOU AND I, What

EXO is a group that has been around since 2012 and even though they haven’t been very active lately, they still got a lot of bops that you could check out. They are under SM entertainment just like the next three groups I’m about to mention:

Overdose

Call Me Baby

Love Me Right

Lightsaber

Monster

Lotto

Ko Ko Bop

The Eve

Tempo

Love Shot

NCT are another group under SM. Their concept is a bit difficult because they are said to have an unlimited member count and they will be debuting more and more sub-units. NCT (as a whole) consist of 21 members as of now with 3 already existing units called NCT U, NCT 127, and NCT Dream and a fourth unit called WayV that is said to debut this month. Some recs are:

NCT U:

The 7th Sense

BOSS

Baby Don’t Stop

NCT 127:

Limitless

Cherry Bomb

Chain

TOUCH

Regular

Simon Says

NCT Dream:

We Young

GO

We Go Up

Red Velvet and Oh!GG are two girl groups under SM Entertainment. They are both really nice and worth checking out. OH!GG is actually a sub-unit from the girl group Girl’s Generation, one of the most popular girl groups of the 2nd Generation. I hope I’m not messing up rn with the info lol. And Red Velvet is currently one of the big three girl groups.

Red Velvet:

Dumb Dumb

Ice Cream Cake

Russian Roulette

Red Flavor

Peek-A-Boo

Bad Boy (love this so much)

Really Bad Boy (what a bop)

OH!GG:

Lil’ Touch

Twice and Blackpink are the last two girl groups I’ll be introducing to you. They are the other two of the big three girl groups alongside Red Velvet and are very successful and definitely worth checking out:

Twice, an example of a cute girl group:

Likey

TT

What Is Love?

Dance The Night Away

YES or YES

BlackPink, an example of a badass girl group:

Boombayah

Whistle

Playing With Fire

Stay

As If It’s Your Last

DDU-DU DDU-DU

The last group I’ll be mentioning is Big Bang, they are the Kings of the 2nd Generation of Kpop (if I didn’t misunderstand the whole generation stuff) and they released A LOT of great songs since they’ve been around since 2006. here are some recs I really like:

Bang Bang Bang

FXXK IT

Sober

Last Dance

Fantastic Baby

Let’s Not Fall In Love

GOOD BOY (GD x Taeyang)

Last but not least, I’ll list you some more songs from girl/boy groups and solo artists that I really like and find worth checking out. However, I try to keep it on the down-low since I could recommend and huge amount of songs.^^

Boy Groups:

iKON - Love Scenario, Killing Me, Bling Bling, B-Day

WINNER - REALLY REALLY, EVERYDAY

VAV - Senorita

TRCNG - UTOPIA (one of the most beautiful songs I’ve ever heard)

VIXX - Fantasy

Pentagon - Shine, Runaway

SF9 - Fanfare, ROAR, Now Or Never

Girl Groups:

Pristin V - Get it

CLC - Hobgoblin, Black Dress

Weki Meki - Crush, La La La, I don’t like your Girlfriend

Gugudan - Not That Type

IZ*ONE - La Vie En Rose

(G)I-DLE - LATATA, Hann (alone)

Mamamoo - Egotistic, Starry Night

9MUSES - Remember, Love City

Solo Artists:

Sunmi - Gashina, Heroine, Siren

Chungha - Roller Coaster

Taeyeon (member of Girls Generation/Oh!GG) - I, Why

Hyuna - Roll Deep, BABE, Lip & Hip

IU - Twenty-three

Jay Park - Me Like You

G-Dragon (leader of Big Bang) - Untitled, 2014, COUP D’ETAT, Crooked

Jennie (member of BlackPink) - SOLO

Taemin (member of SHINee) - MOVE, Thirsty, Sayonara Hitori

This probably sounds confusing and like a whole lot, but don’t worry!! The main thing right now is that you find some songs to check out and the rest is some additional info to help you decide what to check out since it’s a lot.^^

[honeyboyfelix]

can you rec me more stray kids/3racha songs? i'm going to have a long car ride tomorrow -goblin anon

I think ive reced like almost all of skzs songs tbh

Mixtape #1 & mixtape #3 (are thelse technically 3racha songs ot9ified.....maybe so)

Runners high

Broken compass

Domestic banana

Pace

Alchemistry

Hoodie season

Scene stealer

Double knot

Start line

[daily-music-recs]

A Year (kind of) in Review: 2017

Before I get into daily music recs (the entire purpose of this blog), I thought I would share some of the songs that left an impact on me in 2017, starting from the week of May 28th. (A Year in Review: 2018 can be found here.)

I started this project almost halfway through 2017 as a method of personal record-keeping, so to speak - I wanted to remember which songs I could not stop listening to for hours and hours on end, as well as the context in which I listened to them. These songs are not necessarily my favorite songs.  Regardless, I see these songs as having heavily influenced how I thought and felt in the following weeks of 2017. I hope that you, too, will be able remember the music that shaped your life in 2017.

Most of the following songs are in Korean and would fall under the genre of pop, but you will occasionally see songs of other languages and genres (perhaps not so much in this particular post, but in others, certainly). Without further ado...

Week of May 28th - Week of June 18th:

It’s (Produce 101) - Showtime

Slate (Produce 101) - Oh Little Girl

Nation’s Sons (Produce 101) - Never

Produce 101 - Always

I was highly, highly invested in the show Produce 101 Season 2 in the months of May and June. (I’ve always been a sucker for survival shows, especially those focused on music.) While I found all four songs to be quite catchy, Never and Always left a particularly deep impression because of the emotional investment I had in the people who sang the song and the impact of the performance (Never) and because it was meant to make me cry and cry I did (Always). Never is actually my most played song to date across any music platform, although I no longer consider it to be my favorite song. I always tear up whenever I hear Always, especially if it’s the piano version of the song.

Week of June 25th - Week of July 9th:

Blackpink - As If It’s Your Last

Red Velvet - Red Flavor

Both of these songs were an abrupt departure from the rollercoaster of emotions induced by Produce 101 songs. These two songs are quite upbeat and cheerful, and so were perfect summer releases. I was actually studying abroad in Spain when these songs were released, and I remember blasting them through my earphones as I rode the metro to school every day. As someone who is naturally not a very happy person, and whose social anxiety was drastically heightened by being in a foreign country, these songs definitely made me feel more excited and optimistic during these weeks.

Week of August 6th:

Girls’ Generation/SNSD - One Last Time

The Rose - Sorry

For both of these songs, the vocals cut cleanly through the instrumental for a fuller impact. In particular, the rawness of the vocals in the choruses leads to an emotion-packed delivery. One Last Time hits close to home especially because SNSD was group that got me into K-pop back in 2009, as well as the first group I was a fan of. I knew that the members’ contracts were coming to an end soon after the release of their album Holiday Night, so to me this song signified one last ode to their long run as one of Korea’s most successful girl groups (if not the most successful). Sorry was an amazingly strong debut for The Rose, and they’ve definitely stayed on my radar since then.

Week of August 27th:

Piso 21 ft. Maluma - Me Llamas (remix)

I like both the original and the remix, but I like the remix a tad bit more.  I’ve definitely jammed to this song more times than I can count - any song with Maluma is bound to be a hit. 

Week of September 3rd:

Pentagon - Like This

I liked prior Pentagon’s title tracks, but Like This is solidly my favorite. At first, I didn’t like it because the pace of the song is broken up during the rap verses, but the chorus is epic enough that I was drawn right back in. Hui and Jinho, among the rest of Pentagon’s vocalists, really know how to deliver hard-hitting and impactful choruses.

Week of September 24th:

Sebastián Yatra - Traicionera

The chorus is quite catchy, and I like the darker tone of the song.

Week of October 8th - Week of October 29th:

Stray Kids - Hellevator

3RACHA (Stray Kids) - Broken Compass

BTOB - Finale: Our Concert

EXO - White Noise

Hellevator is, in my opinion, a God-tier song. I clicked on it randomly when it came out and didn’t have any expectations - I didn’t even know about JYP’s new survival show or the impending boy group debut - but Stray Kids blew me away immediately. Seungmin starts off the song with his lovely baritone voice and then Changbin’s rap basically punches you in the face with how aggressive it is (and how talented he is). The pre-chorus is beautiful and then the chorus hits you, and it hits HARD. I’m usually not a fan of rap-heavy songs but Hellevator is so amazing that I wouldn’t have it any other way. It definitely piqued my interest in Stray Kids, and I became a fan through watching their survival show and listening to their other (self-composed!) music. I also checked out the 3RACHA releases, from which I fell in love with Broken Compass. One of my favorite things to do is to rap to the English parts of Bang Chan’s verse. You should try it, it’s actually really fun lol.

Finale: Our Concert is one of those deep and uplifting songs that never fails to evoke an emotional reaction. BTOB are known for being vocally talented, but in addition, they all sing with such genuine earnesty that it’s hard for tears to not spring up in my eyes when I hear this song. It’s the perfect song to end a concert on; it’s so, so bittersweet.

Finally, the falsetto in the chorus of White Noise is piercingly haunting. It’s the majority of the reason why I found this song to be so catchy.

Week of November 19th:

Playback - Want You To Say

A bop. I usually don’t like when songs have outros, but the one in Want You To Say (right after the last chorus) works perfectly. In fact, I think it should be longer!

Week of November 26th:

Shawn Mendes - There’s Nothing Holding Me Back

This song was released much earlier, but I fell in love with it (and the rest of Shawn Mendes’ music) much later. He has a very earnest and heartfelt way of singing; I always look forward to his releases.

Week of December 17th - Week of December 24th:

A.C.E - Cactus

I - My Melody

Nell and GroovyRoom - Today

Cactus piqued my interest in A.C.E and lead to me later becoming a fan, while My Melody was a welcome change of pace from the less rock-heavy songs in my playlist at the time. 

Of these songs, Today left the deepest impression; when the clock struck midnight on January 1, 2018, it was the first song I listened to. It’s a song that never fails to make me feel both melancholic and nostalgic, as if I’m reaching, straining, for something I can no longer have.

Honorable Mentions:

MIXNINE - Just Dance

MIXNINE - Just Dance (Girl ver.)

MIXNINE - Just Dance (Boy ver.)

DAY6 - Sunrise (album)

DAY6 - Moonrise (album)

Just Dance is the theme song to the survival show MIXNINE. It has three versions and I love all of them, although I like the Boy ver. slightly more just because it’s in my range and I can actually sing it. Sujin and Hyojin (the female and male leads in the bridge of the song) both give off a really fresh feeling and I love that they were paired up for the song.

Also, special shoutout to DAY6 for busting their asses off for the entirety of 2017 to compose songs for two full-length albums. Two songs per month, complete with an MV for the title track and a concert; that’s a lot for anyone, let alone a band that has a heavy hand in the composition, production, and lyric writing of many of their songs. DAY6 is actually my all-time favorite band, and so 2017 was definitely a great year full of quality music. I could spend all day talking about DAY6 but I’ll spare you the whole spiel; you should definitely check out their discography!

To end this Year (kind of) in Review: I have always believed that music transcends languages. It is the beauty of the singer’s careful phrasing of every note and the balance between raw power and emotional vulnerability that evokes a genuine emotional response, not necessarily the ability to understand the lyrics. As such, if you have any song recs, please please please send them to me regardless of language or genre or anything else - I am always looking to be exposed to more diverse music, and I try my best to approach every song with an open mind.