I don't post my views on every new Kpop release I hear, but I will note that neither RESCENE -- Busy Boy nor H1-KEY -- To My First Love have really landed with me.
I have been a keen supporter of RESCENE in the past, so I was thrilled when I saw this unheralded release, but what I heard disappointed me. Perhaps "Busy Boy" will grow on me -- or perhaps not. I was not too happy to read that the release has something to with blockchains, which I associate with crypto awfulness.
"To My First Love" ought to be my cup of tea; it continues the vigorous rock of "Good For You" and this style is perhaps a little musical callback to GFriend's rock sound, to complement the visual references to the GFriend "Rough" MV. Yet it didn't grab me and the chorus evaporated from my memory as soon as the MV finished.
So that's this week's dose of Kpop disappointment. Yet my feelings of anticlimax will be as nothing compared to what some BTS fans* will experience if "Arirang" does not live up to expectations, because those expectations are so much higher and the sense of emotional connection with the group so much deeper than anything I feel about either RESCENE or H1-KEY.
Are BTS fans here in the Fediverse engaging in expectation management? What are your hopes and fears?
* I write "BTS fans" rather than ARMY because I am never quite sure how the latter term works grammatically.
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