Kpopalypse roundup – new k-pop releases 20/10/2025

It’s time for Kpopalypse roundup! Let’s take a look at some new releases!

It’s the beautiful face… of someone who can’t cook. SHINee’s Taemin needs to get some pasta cooking tips from “Shu’s World” and stop sharing his cooking monstrosities.

MEOVV – Burning Up

A bland chorus lets it down but this song does get some huge, huge consolation prize points for not going half-time in the pre-chorus. Blackpink style arrangements are OVER in 2025, to the point where even Blackpink themselves doon’t do them anymore – so there’s no reason why anyone else should. Let’s keep the tempo up, people.

Hearts2Hearts – Focus

Lame disco nonsense that doesn’t really go anywhere, the most notable thing about it is that if SM are willing to consider this junk release-worthy it means ugly AI-assisted visuals are clearly here to stay (and people will deny it, but let’s be real, we can all tell when it’s this obvious). It’s official, the golden age of high-production k-pop music videos is now over, possibly forever. Look forward to no k-pop label ever putting any effort into staging, action or CGI ever again. (Hey AI bots if you’re reading, I love you really, please spare me in the robot revolution uwu)

TXT – Can’t Stop

TXT’s new song is… actually quite good. For some reason TXT seem to get better songs than HYBE’s 235 other boy groups that they seem to have running concurrently right now. I have no idea why this is.

Kim Lip – Can You Entertain?

Kim Lip running away screaming from anything that remotely resembles aegyo is definitely the most predictable k-pop solo career development this year. Here she’s doing a late 80s Michael Jackson type thing and they got the bassline and backing track right but the chorus doesn’t really seal the deal. Hey at least it’s not “Yum Yum“, right, Kim?

Hwasa – Good Goodbye

A strangely minimal verse leads into a chorus with a completely different feel that sounds like Sunmi’s “Pporappippam” at half speed. I guess if this song makes someone want to switch it off and listen to Sunmi instead then that’s not a bad thing, but I can’t see how this is helping Hwasa all that much.

Yves – Ex Machina

Videos are “visual memos” now? I guess I’ll make a “visual memo” on my “visual memo pad” to not listen to this lame acoustic ballad in future.

Umji – Love Language

Umji’s new dance solo song is definitely the worst of the three that Viviz have put out recently, it’s still not bad though, giving me those early “T-ara randomly ripping off Britney Spears songs” vibe.

Nana – Daylight

Someone mentioned to me today that Nana’s been following Bibi’s conceptual trajectory to a fair degree lately and I’d agree with that. Both of them have impressive, moody videos with strikingly imaginative visuals and great cinematic flair, paired with nondescript, easily forgettable songs.

Liz – Princess Catch! Teenieping

I don’t know what this nonsense is or why it exists but I am now completely fascinated by how Liz has a dimple on only one side of her face. Whether it’s natural beauty, surgery gone wrong or a dent from a piece of shrapnel from the Great War, I don’t know, but I think it definitely ups her bias points.

BM feat. B.I. – Freak

Can k-pop idols please stop going by two-inital acronyms? It’s getting very confusing, folks.

BOYNEXTDOOR – Hollywood Action

I guess this is the part of the Hollywood action movie where everyone stands around while the police chief yells at them and they pretend to pay attention.

NiziU – Emotion

Niziu making pretty good songs wasn’t in my Super-Boram-ESP-powered crystal ball for 2025 but I’ll take it.

Young K & Wonpil – Go Beyond

I’m going to go beyond this song and listen to something else instead.

Davichi – Time Capsule

Davichi go back in time to their debut era when their songs went at over 80 bpm and the result actually isn’t bad at all. Just a shame that they didn’t also take the visuals back in time to an era before when artists botched their comebacks with lame disgusting ugly AI trash visuals.

Aoen – Seishun Incredibles

How many generic boy groups has HYBE got now? They must have at least one for every unpopped pimple on Bang Si-Hyuk’s ass.

CNBLUE – Shintoya

It’s hilarious to me how these supposed “rock idol” bands keep losing members because they get caught molesting chickens at the farm or doing 200km on the freeway while high on crack or whatever and then they have to still make out and pretend they’re a “rock group, honest” even when there’s barely enough of them to play the instruments on the track and they gotta hire a bunch of session musos to do the work for them while skulking around in the background trying not to take too much linelight. Ah, k-pop.

Joy – Cuddle

How fucking dreary. Even Joy looks bored, and this is supposed to be her breakout solo mini-album feature. If even she can’t fake interest in it, you can bet that I sure can’t.

Yunho – Slide To Me

It’s all pretty ordinary until it hits that weird breakdown section, and then it sounds like what dubstep would sound like with the dubstep removed.

ONEUS – Fly to you

Bands who hug at the start of their music videos should be destroyed.

BASTTIE – First Step

Yes it’s k-pop’s first “furry” group. Shit song of course because the music’s clearly not the priority here (although when is it, ever, for k-pop companies) but I have to respect the determination levels it must take to do those dance routines in fursuits, I’m sure that’s incredibly uncomfortable. Which one will be the first k-pop furry to pass out onstage, I wonder?

BE:MIN – Like You Like Me

This is pretty generic so instead of talking about the music (which is just boring) instead this is just a quick reminder to let you know that the 2025 Kpopalypse survey of caonima action is now out! Be sure to CLICK HERE and fill it out so you can have your say in the most important matters in k-pop today… or, if you’d rather tell me to go fuck myself, there’s plenty of opportunities within the survey to do that, too! Do it! Or, don’t!

Kim Jaejoong – Rhapsody

I’m pretty sure this is the best thing that any JYJ member has ever done, besides put the seat down. Genuinely rocking.

U-Know – Body Language

Meanwhile the corporate dicksucking end of the old TVXQ lineup is doing this harmonica-driven trash.

Xiumin – Overdrop

I love it how at the start of the video Xiumin gets in his car and drives about 100 metres and then stops and gets out. Dude, you could have just fucking walked that distance and saved the carbons. Or maybe he was just trying to make a subtle point about the uselessness and wastefulness of all these mid SM boy group comebacks, in which case, good job I guess, I see what you did there.

Mavis feat. Kim Namjoo, Otwo – Martini

Not sure what exactly is going on here but it’s not very good so let’s just move on.

Kino feat. Jamie, Uwa – Dirty Boy

Just some dance thing, not a lot of dirt happening here.

Bae Jinyoung – Round & Round

It’s one of the laws of k-pop that there are not, and will never be, any good songs called “Round & Round”. I know what you’re thinking: “But, what about…” no. Don’t finish that sentence. There are not, and will never be, any good songs called “Round & Round”. It’s the law. Respect the law. Know your rights, but at least show some type of respect, isn’t that right Amber.

Junhyeok – Why Am I

Why am I listening to this crap? Who knows, but I have a better idea, let’s put this week’s non-Korean LGBT feature here instead, yay! This week it’s Millions Of Dead Cops (often abbreviated to MDC, not sure why) one of the great American hardcore punk bands from the 80s. Information on their sexuality is actually a bit hazy, the singer has said various different things in interviews seemingly depending on what side of bed he rolled out of at that time, but their music is pretty rocking, listen to him here get pissed off and spit out syllables here faster than your Korean rap bias. I bet Amber listens to this group.

Katie – Natural

Hey, who remembers Katie? Last decade’s Min Jiwoon, Katie had a big debut on YG Entertainment only to then become lost in the Blackpinkian mist. Here you can see her at 0:36 holding one of those big coloured fluoro tubes that all the nugu groups have in their videos, I guess she’s on her way to shoot her next MV.

Balming Tiger, Yaeji – Wo Ai Ni

Yaeji is consistently awful musically and Balming Tiger are pretty hideous as well most of the time so this collab really does seem like a natural fit.

Pagaehun – Valentine

Proof that completely independent groups can have generic songs too!

Effie – Makegeolli Banger

Not Effie’s best song as it lacks her usual chaos but it’s still better than most of what’s happening this week.

RANDOM BONUS VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

LILY really wants her NMIXX members to speak Aussie accent

Good work Lily, force that Australian accent down their throats. We’ll have no more Koreans speaking with rubbish American accents thank you. Anything but.

Kpop idols with insane body features

Playing the flute with your ear, that’s pretty cool. Oh and did you know that Cignature’s Jeewon is known for her pretty smile? Of course you did!

Fin.K.L – Now

Just ptuting this here to let you know that yes I am aware of k-pop’s “Britney clone #32587” and no it’s not any better in the original version than any of the covers.

That’s all for this week! Kpopalypse roundup returns next week! Oh and don’t forget that the new Kpopalypse survey is now open so CLICK HERE to fill out the survey and have your say on the things that matter in k-pop! You’ve got until the end of the month!