Song Review: Close Your Eyes – Open Your Eyes

Close Your Eyes will be returning with an album at the end of the year, but they’re teasing the project today with a pre-release. I’m a fan of this group, but never know what to expect from them. Each album has been markedly different from the last, which means I have strong preferences about which sounds I enjoy most from them (debut era for the win!). This time, they’ve taken a jazzy approach for Open Your Eyes, featuring pianist Yohan Kim and saxophonist Jacob Scesney. It’s a novel turn, especially in our world of cut-and-paste sample packs that cause so many songs to sound the same. I’m not a big fan of jazz music, so the genre itself gives me pause, but I like how they’ve meshed it with more classic K-pop tropes. And really, elements of the genre have colored all forms of music for decades. It makes an especially strong conduit for hip-hop tracks and Open Your Eyes‘ free-flowing vibe takes advantage of this. The song’s selling point is its ultra-smooth chorus. It’s short and sweet — more of a “hook” than a full-on refrain — but the vocal layering here is gorgeous. As far as vibes go, this one’s pretty elite. I just wish parts of the instrumental hit harder than they do. I know...