K-Pop’s Bummer Summer: What went so horribly wrong?

Normally, this time of year I’d be publishing a post about my “songs of the summer” for 2026, but the state of K-pop has forced me to write something else instead. Trust me, I didn’t want to! I’ve been writing about K-pop for a decade now and been a devoted fan for years longer than that. During this period, I’ve usually looked forward to summer as a time for many K-pop highlights. Music during this season is often upbeat, enjoyable and plentiful. Unfortunately, the summer of 2026 stands out in another way. In all my time doing this, I can’t think of a more disappointing seasonal stretch. With this in mind, I offer a referendum on the past few months. What went wrong this year? 1. “No-chorus” choruses Structurally, this has been one of the trendiest things to happen in K-pop songwriting over the last few months. Rather than write a full, melodic chorus, the majority of songs opt for spoken-word repetition. No matter how great the production might be, this severely limits a song’s potential for me. It makes me feel like I might as well be listening to an instrumental instead. The artist becomes kind of extraneous. Without a melody, there’s no sense of timelessness. It’s just disposa...