[Review] Outside – ENHYPEN

Coming from ENHYPEN’s Desire: Unleash mini-album last month is the follow-up promotional single Outside. It follows the promotions of their latest title track, Bad Desire (With or Without You).

If I had my way, Outside would not have been my choice for follow-up promotions. It is my personal pick for the least liked track on ENHYPEN’s latest mini-album. Outside is a hip-hop-inspired track featuring a trap-based instrumental. I do like one of the synths in the background that reminds me of a Billie Eilish song, so Outside had that going for them. And I suppose the song had some potential due to its intensity. It just never really got anywhere with it. Unfortunately, the rest of Outside just doesn’t do it for me. The shouty rapping and deep, husky delivery of the chorus flash by without much thought, while the vocals are plain and lacking anything memorable. There also wasn’t much of a hook to the song, thanks to the vocal processing.

The music video for Outside sees the members battling against shadow versions of themselves. The lyrics talk about the changing desire (a constant theme of the mini-album) that they are experiencing within themselves. As the desire takes hold of them (switching to their shadow versions), they ensure it happens to all of them (which is why we have the sniper SUNOO taking out JUNGWON). Conceptually, this is quite a cool video. I just wish the song accompanying it was just as cool.

Outside‘s performance shows an intense version of themselves that I don’t think we have seen before. It is an interesting dynamic, and I quite like what they do on stage with it. A compelling performance, overall.

Song – 5/10
Music Video – 8/10
Performance – 8/10
Overall Rating – 6.5/10