Sandwiched between Western and Lunar New Year, January has been pretty dry when it comes to new music. And, most of what’s been released hasn’t felt particularly noteworthy. In many ways, it’s as if we’ve simply kicked the start of 2025 down the road, finally ready to open the floodgates next month. If that’s the case, I hope CIX’s Thunder acts as a clarion call to unleash energy and verve throughout the industry.
CIX’s music has a mixed track record on this blog, with occasional synthpop stunners battling it out with murkier material. Thunder marks their first new music as a four piece after Bae Jinyoung left the group last year. It also feels like a statement of intent, directly placing them in the new-gen funk-pop lineage re-popularized by groups like RIIZE. On its face, there are plenty of recent boy group tracks that sound like Thunder (WHIB’s excellent Rush Of Joy comes to mind), but its success lies in the details. The propulsive melodies and airy vocals feel quite familiar. Generic, even. Yet, the track is buoyed by a crackling electro backbone that supplies a competing texture. This grows more addictive as Thunder develops, climaxing in a fantastic dance break toward the song’s finale.
Thunder also benefits from a fully-fleshed out structure, making room for two central hooks, a brisk second verse rap and some surprisingly dramatic vocal flourishes during its pre-choruses. I’d love to hear more individual character in these vocals, but CIX give a polished performance that matches the airtight arrangement. Overall, Thunder feels like the first major musical moment in K-pop’s 2025.
| Hooks | 9 |
| Production | 9 |
| Longevity | 9 |
| Bias | 9 |
| RATING | 9 |
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
This sounds like this decade’s version of EXO’s Lucky One. Which is all right by me. Rating is about right.
For the kids here, with live live singing
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One of my favorite groups delivered again. I smiled throughout the whole song. I’ll say 9, but I want to say 10!!!
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Pretty good. What is it with CIX? Like they always try stuff with their title tracks and they more often than not deliver great tracks.
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Now that you pointed it out, I do hear Riize’s funky energy in this track! And tbh, this also sounds like smth TAN would have tackled (man, I miss them and I am just a mere casual listener!). This defo joins Rebel Heart in my candidates list for 2025’s SOTY.
Rating’s the same.
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it’s excellent!
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I liked it upon first listening. A strong release 💪
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kinda reminded me of Golden Child’s Lucid dream in a way,but mainly the song structure.
9.25(9;10;9;9)
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It definitely sounds like ground that’s been tread before, but there’s always something to be said about doing something well. And this is done great!
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Omg loved it!! Those vocal Michael Jackson-esque runs were gorgeous. Those little details are like candy to my ears. It actually reminds me a lot of BBB after the dance break, with the 80s orchestra hit synths. Right to my playlist! Oh, and I know how ot escaped me last year, but Trendz Go Up has been on constant replay.
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the 1st big hit of 2025! Thunder is accentuated for its exciting sound explosion that catches your attention from the first moment. This milestone reiterates the group’s importance in the music industry, as it’s the group’s first comeback without Bae Jin Young. Fusing electronic and high-intensity instrumental elements, this track provides a pulsating and immersive rhythmic experience, showcasing the renowned skills of a renowned group
the infectious energy of the music just captivates me, as it resonates like a true auditory spectacle, leaving the visceral and memorable impact that you already expect from the first play
9 (9, 9, 9, 9)
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When I look back at Januaries of most years, almost always (or perhaps always) there’s at least 1 song, usually more than that, that ends up among my favorites of the year (e.g. 2024: NMIXX’s Dash & TWS’s Plot Twist; 2023: Nine’s beyOnd & Henry’s Moonlight; 2022: Enhypen’s Polaroid Love & 2 cuts from Changmin’s Devil ep.) And this year, I was starting to get worried, because nothing seemed like a future classic. But CIX has saved the day! (or make that the year!) It’s like a spiritual brother to RIIZE’s Impossible. And such a nice surprise, because only Cinema’s ever really done it for me from them, and now they’re no longer a one-hit band for me.
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I feel like this is the kind of comeback everyone wanted from them after the promise of Movie Star. Better late than never!
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I hear this song as a thrilling mix between funky (and Ready to Love) Seventeen and French electronic duo Justice but it might just be the CIX enthusiast hearing
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This impressed me!
What a banger!
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I’m back! In K-pop! After nearly 5 years! (like anyone cared!)
Today I fired up the old playlist and it was all Greatest Hits of 2018-20 and, like, they still sound good and all but…
(what happened with the last 5 years of my life?)
So, the day I decide to dust off my playlist, who but TikTok(!), which I use for about 10 minutes every 3 months or so, comes and shows me a teaser for a New Comeback! by my Ultimate Bias group! And it’s fire! And Nick likes it too! (you never gave my boyos more than 8 when I was around…)
This must be destiny.
…though I can’t help but notice a conspicuous lack of Baejin in the group whose whole Reason For Being was being a star vehicle for Baejin. Where is Bae Jinyoung, dangit?!
(Although to be fair I’m mildly surprised to note the group still exists at all, unlike a bunch of me other rookie/nugus…
Wonder what else I have missed 🤔
K-pop news since 2020, anyone? NCT?)*
A-ny-ways, is this sound a CIX thing, a 2024 thing or a new 2025 thing? Because I’m digging it. It’s so breezy that every time I play it, it feels like the ending dance break hits before I even get used to the song, like I barely have time to acknowledge its existence. This sounds like a prelude. Like, literally a prelude to something, like the beginning of an energetic anime movie or something, not like CIX will… but one can hope. Oh, and the Hong Kong background. Terrific.
And for all that I don’t like “truncated” groups I’m thinking that maybe this wouldn’t have worked as well with Jinyoung’s husky voice. This seems different from their usual output, or at least what I was used to. Presumably all of their production choices were based on his, idk, aura, eh?
Any other group a born-again old hand should be checking out?
—————-
*(Matter of fact, I’m happy to see you are still around, Nick-san. A one-man main operating base for all things K-pop, new and not so new. Outstanding service to the community, I say.)
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Hey, welcome back!
Yep, I’ve been here the whole time, up to the same old shit 😅
(If you’re asking me about new groups, I’d happily recommend my ultimate new-gen trilogy of favs: TWS, RIIZE and BOYNEXTDOOR. But then again, I can’t remember how frequently our tastes align so you may end up hating all of them haha)
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Aye aye cap’n. Will check.
Found my newer old account too, hehe. I remember the “almighty bug” I thought of was Golcha’s Seungmin.
IIRC, I think the songs and groups you like are usually pretty good. It’s me who gets enthusiastic by random stuff you don’t care much for.
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For funky boy group tracks since 2020, what first comes to mind for me is: Beautiful Beautiful by ONF, Bye Bye Bye by WEi, Focus by Ha Sungwoon, Bibora by SF9, Favorite Boys by ACE (kinda, but great song,) You Can’t Hold My Heart by MonstaX, and Back Door by Stray Kids (you’ve probably heard that one already.)
Non-boy group funky tracks for me were Jotto by BiBi, Black or White by Dreamcatcher, Cherry by Jiu (from Dreamcatcher,) and Zoom by Red Velvet.
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For various individual news updates I would check this thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/kpopthoughts/comments/17dia1q/what_surprising_news_in_kpop_has_happened_since/
In terms of news… well, where to start? Overall trends are: more “global groups” (with members of many nationalities,) more companies being sued (HYBE a major/important example,) LOTS of new groups overall (especially 2020-2023 or so, seems to be slowing down,) less variety and longform content, more instagram/TikTok/Youtube shorts, more “polish” to idols over goofiness, fewer “ice queen” types (everybody is “nice” now,) less crossdressing, less blatant cultural appropriation, lots of bullying scandals of various levels of believability, South Korea had an attempted coup after which the president was arrested, a huge plane crash with a lot of fatalities, scandals around idols being overtly “feminist,” there have been various hidden camera scandals which seem to be ubiquitous.
JYP has a new Japanese girl group (NiziU) and Korean one (NMIXX,) a k-band (Xdinary Heroes,) and is currently debuting a survival show group after delaying for years. NMIXX had a rough start with a “change-up” concept but are doing better now and famous for having good live vocals+dance. JYP also had a show to debut a “global girl group,” though one of the (American) contestants is currently suing the company for typical idol shenanigans. JYP continues to do around one goofy comeback for himself per year with a retro theme, in which he continues to sing live and confuse people at music shows. Twice had some solos.
SM changed their organization and the artists/staff don’t seem happy with it—there are last minute reorganizations such as it being announced very late that Wendy/Taeyeon won’t be in the SMTown concert. SM debuted a very famous girl group (aespa) who have a sort of techy AI concept, plus a virtual idol associated with them (naevis) who everybody hates. aespa are also associated with “Kwangya,” some sort of pan-SM virtual world. More recently SM debuted Riize, a boy group whose concept seems to be “good music” with a funky style a la early Shinee. One of the members was kicked out for dating/smoking pre-debut, teased to return to the group, and threatened so intensely by fans he wound up not rejoining. NCT released their final group (Wish) which is sort of a Dream retread. Lee Soo Man is gone.
YG… basically lost Blackpink to solo activities lol, and are trying super hard with their new girl group Babymonster AKA 2NE3 to make their “formula” work again, with mixed results. Their sublabel also has a new girl group under where Somi is, called MEOVV. They’re more model-oriented I think? The Blackpink members seem to have a fair amount of freedom now and Jennie/Rosé/Lisa have each released multiple singles with various “freer” images. Also, 2NE1 are having a comeback tour! Which seems to be doing very well. G-Dragon had a comeback also.
HYBE is having uh, a weird time. There was this (probably) attempt by Newjean’s creative director to make the Newjeans label independent, and Newjeans is now in stuck in this monthslong legal battle, in which a group has made public explicit demands of their company for the essentially first time ever. HYBE debuted a new survival show girl group ILLIT which copied a lot of Newjeans’s branding and appears to have been literally an attempt to make it so HYBE doesn’t “need Newjeans.” They do have pretty different music, though. BTS stopped performing as a group due to burnout and massive amounts of creative freedom, came back from the military for the most part, and are involved in various solo activities. HYBE has a TON of independent subsidiaries with their own groups. Gfriend was “surprise disbanded” against the will of the group after one of their greatest songs yet (but did have a pretty small-scale comeback recently.) Le Sserafim is another new girl group with a whole bullying scandal/surprise removal of a member you can look into, plus an abnormal amount of hate for their singing (good music though.) Zico made his own boy group under HYBE called Boynextdoor who have more of a mischievous hip-hop sound. &Team is a new Japanese boy group. TWS is the new Pledis group (sort of Seventeen’s younger brothers) who also have a “good music concept.” HYBE did a “global girl group” (Katseye) who went pretty viral and seem to be doing well now, but unclear now much people consider these groups with no Korean lyrics, few Korean members, etc. to be “kpop.” Oh, and a giant “industry report” HYBE had where they trash a bunch of idols’ looks and personalities went public during the Newjeans investigation, and the Korean court was not a fan of the way HYBE handled this. (It’s not clear how unique HYBE is in writing a document like this, but very crappy thing to do anyway. There is some evidence now that companies may mobilize netizens against other groups.) Bang Si-Hyuk was seen hanging out with Korean female streamers in LA, which was a big deal apparently.
A lot of mid-scale groups seem to not being doing that well? TS entertainment, Woollim, Jellyfish, FNC, etc. seem to be having some struggles. The most successful mid-tier group right now is probably IVE (two IZ*one members) who singlehandedly brought their label back into relevance.
QWER debuted as basically the first k-band to do really well out the gate, especially given they’re from a small independent/new company. It may help that they’re streamers.
XG is another recent big group with all Japanese members and mostly English lyrics who promote on Korean shows.
There were some more “Produce”-style shows which resulted in boy group ZB1 and girl group Kep1er, both of whom are famous but not as much so as IOI, IZ*one, etc.
I’d say the hot-button kpop news issues in my circles right now are Suga’s drunk motorcycling scandal, the MADEIN CEO a*saulting one of his idols, and a divorce/cheating scandal with FTIsland member Minhwan and his ex-wife Yulhee.
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First and foremost, thanks for the detailed write-up. That must have taken a lot of time.
But, wow, really, I don’t even know where to begin. For a second I thought you were saying Ol’ Man Lee Soo had kicked it. Thankfully he hasn’t, but from what I’ve been reading he might as well have. SM Entertainment: from the pioneer, most elite agency in Korea… to a glorified subsidiary of Kakao (itself going under, it seems). How the turntables. Part of me wants to laugh but strangely that hits deep. It seems I’m an abject company stan.
And I see the whole NCT concept is finally, officially dead (I mean, wbk since at least 2020 but we lived in hope, no?) Am I the only one thinking that without that there’s nothing that makes SM special anymore?
Long Live Riize, I guess? 🫥
I read that 2024 was the first year in a decade with a drop in K-pop album sales. And a major one too, 20%. I’ve been seeing people warning about saturation since at least 2018. Perhaps that’s related to what you mention about less debuts. And yes, I’ve been wandering around the Youtubes for 2 days now and there indeed seems to be a lot less actual variety content along with a lot of idols drinking (?) with random Youtubers. WTH K-pop?
Oh, also, if what Youtube shows me (someone who hasn’t been into Korean content for a long time) is any indication, both TWS and Boynextdoor are pretty popular, but girl groups seem to dominate. I’m happy for Zico and happy for Pledis anyways (weirdly; why the soft spot for Pledis, me?) I’m surprised you didn’t mention either TXT or Enhypen though. Back then I had supposed they were going to take the world by storm eventually, but maybe they haven’t been up to anything very interesting? From the reverberations I felt, I looked like the only boy group of note after BTS left the scene was Stray Kids, which apparently became kosher for normal people as gym music or something with Maniac. Turns out that was nearly three years ago already. Funny thing is: that was the third time in my life when everyone in my circles suddenly came to me as “the guy who’s into Asian stuff” with their new discovery: Parasite, Squid Game and Maniac. And all three times I was like “believe me, I had no idea that even existed.” 🥴
And speaking of middle companies, Cravity was in a survival show?! Weren’t they solid sellers? Starship? Now they’re “desperate?” (no spoilers pls) I’m starting the show now because I need to start somewhere with all the rookies/nugus I have to dive through. (I swear I’m getting the names all mixed up; I thought Nick’s faves would be there too.) And I see they finally made the ISAC like they’re supposed to again. That helps research xD.
Anyways, in the end I can’t help but notice that all the news from the past few years seems to revolve around HYBE and JYP, over and over again. Have those two sucked all the oxygen out of the industry? Or was it always like this, and I just didn’t notice because I was engrossed in the nugu nitty gritty?
And, ugh, don’t get me started on the general situation in Korea. I swear, I leave this country unattended for a while and now everything is upside down. Lotsa catching up to do, yes. Who needs a job when you have Kpop.
Thanks again.
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Hey! One thing I do feel like clarifying now is while I tried hard to include everything, I’m sure I’m not representative of what all kpop fans care about. I personally don’t really follow survival shows for example so luckily can’t spoil you on that.
I have no idea if SM is breaking down commercially/influence-wise. To me it still seems like their groups are tops (especially aespa,) but maybe not as quickly as before? Taemin is still selling out stadiums where I live with Justin Bieber-esque prices. Lee Sooman before he left did have some … interesting ideas such as making aespa “Drama” about environmentalism though, and opening a 420-friendly SM-themed casino(?)
I think you’re right about them being artistically less daring than before, though. It feels a bit like they keep trying to grab onto trends around them rather than innovate.
“Random Youtubers” sounds about right also. Tbf I love Youtube shows, but I wish there was more footage available of idols interacting or having fun meetups with fans. ISAC is also much less of a thing than it was when I got into kpop (2019.)
Girl groups do seem dominant on Youtube at least; not sure if that reflects in sales/streaming though. The most popular boy groups are far and above BTS and SEVENTEEN (yay for Pledis ,) and the most popular non-big 4 boy group is ATEEZ. I think there was a bit of a “girl group wave” recently (’23-’24,) and it’ll probably balance out again eventually. I got my impressions partly from this: https://www.reddit.com/r/kpopthoughts/comments/1dm1vuo/results_the_kpop_group_popularity_ranking/
TXT and Enhypen are def still around and popular (top 10 or so both of them,) but I didn’t mention them because I’d assumed they’d debuted by the time you took a break. The main things about them I remember were Enhypen’s fans getting mad about a cool routine with female dancers, and Yeonjun’s GGUM being very musically controversial in an EXO “Wolf” kind of way (I liked it though.)
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This is my favorite K-pop song of the year so far!
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as soon as the first verse started i knew you would like this
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