A new Sunmi single is something to be excited about, even if last year’s Heartburn didn’t do much for me. After a brief foray with different producers, she’s reunited with longtime collaborator Frants for Stranger. The song mashes together many of her musical hallmarks to create an odd, ungainly product.
There’s half of a good song here. The verses pulse with the sultry energy that drives many great Sunmi tracks. Her voice is made for this sound. Even if these segments don’t stand out on their own, she casts a compelling mood. Had the entire track followed suit, we might have another fantastic Sunmi single on our hands.
Unfortunately, Stranger changes gears for is spoken word chorus. I get what they were aiming for here — especially given the song’s release right in the middle of spooky season. However, I detest this hook. It’s lyrically clunky, melodically inert and silly without being fun. It completely disrupts the flow of the song and the rest of the track makes no effort to connect these disparate pieces. As a huge fan of Sunmi’s music, it pains me to write this, but I don’t see myself listening to this again by choice.
| Hooks | 5 |
| Production | 8 |
| Longevity | 7 |
| Bias | 7 |
| RATING | 6.75 |
Grade: D+
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
I think my reaction was mostly the same to yours ( i didn’t mind the hook as much). However, i wonder if stranger will make more sense with future listens
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I don’t think its quite that horrible, but it is out of place. It sounds like the novelty seasonal single that gets dropped in the middle of a great run of other singles. Not the single that is the only single released after a long time away.
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I love Sunmi and have seen her in concert, but I can’t love this. When K-Pop started playing with tempo shifts and chopped up songs back with Girls’ Generation’s I Got a Boy (or maybe Davichi’s 8282?), I saw it a continuation of what Xenomania had done in the 2000’s with Girls Aloud, Sugababes, etc.
But Xenomania always made sure there was connective tissue. And that there was a whistleable melody. Stranger is another K-Pop song that plops jarringly different songs together with nothing to connect them and asks us to listen over and over until we’re used to it. That might be too much to ask here.
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SNSD’s Express 999 from the same album is a very good example too!
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Come on now, this is much too harsh!
Doesn’t reach the same heights as Heartburn, but it’s not that bad. Mid 7 for me.
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that spoken chorus is literally that one part Hype Boy. I’m sorry to say it but her music has just been going… downhill after Tail. I’d rather for her to just take another year off if this what was she was gonna give us.
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Love Sunmi and the MV is really well shot, but the song starts and stops so much that I can’t imagine myself wanting to listen to it again. I’ll be curious if I warm up to it more on repeat listening
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A true Frankenstein of a song. I feel like this would work better as musical theater or an accompaniment to a performance piece. I’m always excited to see what Sunmi will do but I’m not sure what her intentions were here.
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I love Sunmi but this was by far her worst release , i feel there’s barely 20% song and 80% talk here , a terrible mismatch of ideas , can’t believe this is actually a Sunmi / Frants production what were they thinking ?
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This song should have been scrapped.
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I totally respect all opinions, but come on guys… After getting out of one of K-pop’s trailblazer girl groups (first K-pop band to break the Hot 100 in the US + world tours + opening for the Jonas Brothers + a ‘movie’ + etc.), the woman has been steadily releasing her own material, with her signature all over almost the whole process of each promo cycle, and always with class and in style. Needless to say, she’s one of the first pop girlies that opened up about her mental health issues, putting it into words in a very beautiful song called ‘Borderline’. We need to appreciate our ladies after they went through their so-called ‘peak’ (be it in a band, duo, soloist, and so on), as all of you know how the K-pop industry pushes idols to their limits… Or are we forgetting how Brown Eyed Girls came out with ‘Sixth Sense’, already passed their 30’s and with some controversies on their back, delivering a musical landmark in their country’s pop history? Enjoy music and celebrate your divas, they rightfully deserve it!
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This is all well and good, but I still think the song stinks. My reviews are never about the person themselves.
I love and respect Sunmi. I don’t like this song. The two can coexist.
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we can enjoy artist’s music but not like a song. We can be a fan of a director but not enjoy their latest film. Art by its very nature is subjective and music fans should’ve been aware of this long time ago
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I also dislike the clunky transitions from the rest of the song to the chorus but I still think the song is decent. What I HATE is the fact that it’s been 10 years since Sunmi has debuted and she STILL doesn’t have a full album??? How is that possible??? 🤯
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That part about the album is a hard pill to swallow. I really do wonder what the conversations are behind the scenes. I would have a hard time being content with just a couple EP’s(even if they are good)
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Hopefully next year she finally releases that full album!
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Hopefully! But I kind of doubt it. I don’t want to get my hopes up again🥲
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No Queen NOOOOOOOO….
Sigh, Sunmi is electric in everything she does but no one can save this song. It’s bizarre. Why is Kpop intent on fitting bite size mini songs into one song? What’s so hard with keeping one song as ONE song?
Anyway, I like the second(or third?) song in this song and that’s about it. I would rate it even lower.
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Is this song good? No
Will I be pretending ‘Call my name’ is the title instead? yes
Do I appreciate her experimenting? Sure….?
I think what this was going for was a Lollypop Candy Bad Girl moment that Tomoko Kawase gave us between her two personas:
This is disjointed but also clearly structured and with a point across. It needed more balance. It was a bad experiment but I appreciate her trying for sure.
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I love the prechorus, everything else is in-between “eh” and “ok”
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I agree this song was dreadful…then she also releases Call my Name which is one of my favorite tracks this year as it’s b-side.
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Im all in all for horror concepts but the chorus is awful and the song doesnt really go anywhere
7.25 for me (6, 8, 7, 8)
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This song is so bad! So, so disappointing especially because it’s Sunmi. Thank you for this eloquent review. It sums up everything I feel about this song.
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NMIXX and Aespa “We do rhythm change-ups!” Sunmi “Here, hold my beer.” It’s disjointed, but I like it. That partially has to do with Sunmi, my favorite soloist, male or female. I also am in full agreement with Andy’s post: celebrate these women for what they do and have done!
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I can’t think of any recent songs which have been better off with rhythm change-ups than they would have been without (except for that one novelty song by Professor Lee’s Band: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hKpYApmBF0). I LOVE each of the individual sections here (classic 80s groove verse, cool reggae-lite prechorus, even the halloween bass-driven jangly spoken word chorus parts) but don’t understand how they fit together lyrically.
I also really liked Heart Burn—Sunmi has some incredible dance tracks but I’m falling increasingly in love with her more groovy band tracks like that one and Narcissism.
The MV is amazing as usual, but I don’t have as much knowledge about visuals. Overall I’m not that upset because I can enjoy each individual part (not true with most change-ups,) and because I doubt she’ll stick to this style long-term.
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I liked it when it came out, and I still feel that way. Sunmi’s never put out a mediocre single; no one’s been more consistently, imo. I applaud her for releasing it as a single rather than a b-side.
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