Despite my initial hesitance, MCND’s Ice Age has slowly become one of my favorite boy group tracks of 2020. Of course, it hasn’t exactly had much competition in that realm, but its goofy charm has been a welcome salve in this era of trap-fueled angst. However, the rest of the group’s debut album was too generic and forgettable for its own good, and follow-up single Spring (떠) more or less succumbs to those same problems.
Spring is perched halfway between Stray Kids and Seventeen, borrowing the quirky hip-hop bounce of the former and jagged vocal layering of the latter. Within this trendy brew, there isn’t much room for MCND themselves. As silly as it was, Ice Age’s boisterous refrain had the potential to be somewhat iconic for the group. Spring spotlights their skills, but feels interchangeable with so many similar efforts.
It will surprise none of you to hear that I’m not a fan of Spring’s heavy trap influence. I find its instrumental to be pretty unpleasant, lacking the kind of warmth or funk that characterizes my favorite mid-tempo hip-hop tracks. The rapping is also overly aggressive, bordering on headache-inducing during parts of the verses. Spring’s more melodic moments are its saving grace, even if the song never finds a killer hook. From what I’ve heard so far, MCND’s vocalists are underrated. They’re given scraps of melody within songs that hinge too heavily on hip-hop. I would have loved to hear the tone of Spring’s chorus spread more generously throughout the rest of the track. As it stands, this feels pretty throwaway.
| Hooks | 7 |
| Production | 6 |
| Longevity | 8 |
| Bias | 7 |
| RATING | 7 |
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The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
I honestly love this, and I’m surprised I did. Just like you I did not enjoy their mini album but enjoyed Ice Age quite a bit. Now that their first comeback is here I can’t help but feel impressed. It feels like a buried treasure on a really bad album and there’s not much I can say against it. Even though the trap influences can be tough to endure at times it remains a consistent track throughout maintaining a lighthearted energy. The verses are fun but that killer chorus is going to be what brings me back. This song is a perfect companion for Ice Age and I can’t wait to see where MCND goes next. I’m surprised I’m typing this because when Top Gang came out I thought that this group would never release a good track.
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While Ice Age is not what I’d call a ‘good’ song, it’s certainly memorable by its goofiness and quite soft, comparatively speaking. This one, though, is actually physically unpleasant to listen to. I find it sounds too damn shrill, like I’m playing it through one of those pocket-size square JBC speakers that are so popular ’round here. I began sweating and feeling a pressure around my head when listening.
Regarding the instrumentals, it immediately brought to mind 가자 by ONEUS. It sounds a lot like it in my opinion and that’d usually be a plus in my book (quite generic but fun and agreeable enough), but this one seems oddly recorded or something and even the voices, beyond the main rapper in that dizziness-inducing passage sound kind of raspy, for lack of a better word, unlike their more gentle renderings in Ice Age. Or is it only that I got completely addleheaded from the beginning?
In short, like most releases I see since I began paying attention at the end of 2018 or so, this one’s not a BAD song, only quite charmless, but with the shrillness added it’s a complete deal breaker for me. I’m somewhat sad, since I expected, something more memorable after Ice Age. Only thing I can say for this is that their maknae looks just as good with red hair as blue.
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I’m old, so I find most contemporary music to be mixed to be too tinny. Oof. Add ubiquitous autotune vocal processing on top, and doof.
The engineers have to pick whether to make it sound good on earbuds, fancy earphones (“cans”), cellphone speakers, computer speakers, car audio systems,etc and it never works out well for all. To my ears on average earbuds or above average car audio, its either too much in the middle of the spectrum (“noisy”) or too much in the subwoofer to “impress” the ‘hood and the school car pool lane.
Back in my day, even the cheap stereo sets had half decent speakers with separate cones for different parts of the audio. Also 5 or 10 of those easy equalizer levers right there on the front panel. I have no idea where the same is buried in youtube.
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I’m always disappointed when there’s music I can rock out to on headphones but it sounds terrible in the car. Happens with all kind of genres, but it’s especially common with K-pop. I assume the general public doesn’t notice; everyone I know thinks it’s weird that I even adjust the EQ on my car stereo.
I guess now I just kind expect poor mixing in general so I was pleasantly surprised when an older Garbage album I’d purchased actually sounded perfect (from an audio standpoint) in the car.
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Wait, did I send that as a reply? Sorry, it was intended to be it’s own comment.
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My expectations were low but it’s okay. Nothing new, nothing particularly good but I wouldn’t turn it off. I’d rather listen to this than Ice Age. I really disliked Ice Age and I still can’t see why people like it
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I prefer this one rather than Ice Age. I still don’t get why so many agencies want to give such heavy hip-hop influenced material to their boy groups these days, while not having good rappers. Here the rap parts are not as bad as the ones in Ice Age but I still can’t find anything appealing in it. However the rest of the song remains alright and I don’t want to bury the group, maybe it’s my optimistic nature but I want to see more from them.
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The song lacks charm. At least Ice Age whether one loves or loathes it is memorable.
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Anyway, maybe they’re gonna come back again in 2-3 weeks, and that time they will play a tropical-house concept. Then, with another comeback one month later, they will prove how able they are to sing an r&b ballad. And before a 2 years hyatus, they will finally come back 15 days later with a dark emo-trap single.
Ad maiora.
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Collect them all!
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We are all saved: Dal Sooooooobin has released a new song “Dive”. Hot damn, she is praying for our souls this year. Lord knows I need it.
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I actuality love it this song for some reason listen and see mcnd make me happy, maybe because they look so young so is see them performing this song is so nice
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I know MCND are gonna make it big. Their rappers ARE talented, it’s easy to tell even if you don’t like rap. I think it’s a bit biased anyways to say you don’t like their rapping and think its unpleasant when you don’t like any rap in the first place but okay. Remember this when they make it big. Because they are going to, their fanbase is already enormous for a group that just debuted! I can’t wait to see them become huge!
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Yo Nick does like rap, he enjoyed Ice Age quite a bit. He just didn’t like this one because the instrumental was shrill and the overall mix was hard to listen to at times. Even myself who enjoyed this and Ice Age quite a bit, this song’s first minute isn’t great, and the intro is really unpleasant. Regarding your post about if they’ll make it big there surely is a chance. They probably won’t find a huge amount of success in Korea but they should make it big internationally and perform at k-con if they can keep their quality up and improve their music with time.
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I like it theses boys, they are going to fight in the industry at such young age, and with theses group from big agencies and mnet boys, but they have something , I don’t know but yeah thay make feel that way too, were they are going to be big
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I cannot wait to see what else MCND has in store!! This song was amazing just as I expected from them! The rapping and vocals were great and MCND are really gonna become big. I cannot wait! Loved this song and the more to come ❤
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Okay , at first listen the Song sounded ………………… like it was just there but when I decided to listen to it the second time the song grew on me a lot. Though it does not find a way to impress me like how Ice Age did , I can always appreciate it …… atleast.
Hooks might be atleast a little impressive and the production is kinda weak but My Bias and Thrill gets in the way of this song from having a bad review.
Hooks: 8
Production: 7
Thrill: 9
Bias: 9
Overall Rating: 8.25
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seongjuns’ rap part where he’s just straight up yelling is my favorite part of the whole song- i really like how upbeat this song is, i think it’s one of their more happy vibe songs than the others that try to be a bit more serious. i really like the hair colors they had ( besides huijun who kept his hair the same, although he looks great with black n brown hair anyway ), i think the purple hair on seongjun really fit him well and while the orange was a bold choice i think seungmin pulled it off well. im not surprised junhyuk had a different hair color, i think they need to chill down the hair dye for him. besides that, i like the look of the music video a lot. im not a fan of bright colors or anything but this looked really good to me. im a bit sad junhyuk didnt have more lines in this, but i understand why. also i do agree that the vocal line isnt given many chances to shine, really with any mcnd song. they have bits and pieces here but mostly it’s just rap. with that said, the vocal line has done a few covers and they sound really good.
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