Song Review: Girls’ Generation-HRS – Skibidi

Apart from solo tracks, the members of Girls’ Generation haven’t released new material together since 2022. They’ve worked in sub-units in the past, but not nearly as often as agency peers Super Junior. It’s refreshing, then, to see them debut a new unit nineteen years into their career. HRS consists of members Hyoyeon, Yuri and Sooyoung and they’ve chosen the gimmicky Skibidi as their entry point. As someone who works with middle school students in my day job, the first thing the title Skibidi makes me think of is “skibidi toilet,” which was a big thing a couple years ago. This Skibidi plays more strongly on scat sounds (not that scat… get your mind out of the gutter) and references several distinct genres. The track blends a stylish strings-assisted house sound with a prolonged hip-hop breakdown. This blending of genres is nothing new for SM Entertainment (or SNSD), but they’d do well to remember that “blending” means actually melding several elements together into something new. Abrupt turns into a completely different sound are not nearly as effective. Skibidi‘s piecemeal approach is frustrating. Aside from its silly spoken-word hook, I enjoy the club atmosphere developed up un...