With the recent announcement that boy group A.C.E would not be renewing their contracts with Beat Interactive, the agency’s decision to debut Newbeat seems even more important. These rookies are now the vanguard of the company, paving a new road forward. If their pre-releases were any indication, that road seems build around quirky, old-school hip-hop. For better or worse, title track Flip The Coin is more of the same.
The song kicks off with a now familiar rumble of bass. It’s the five millionth K-pop song to employ this 90’s sound. At this point, it takes an insane amount of skill and personality to breathe new life into the concept. Sadly, Flip The Coin quickly becomes unlistenable for me. It’s not that the track is any better or worse than any of its contemporaries (though it’s quite reductive in its approach). It’s just that the specific frequency of sound that occurs when K-pop boys shout-rap in unison gives me a headache. Somehow, the vocal blend always sounds exactly the same. Nothing about it is enjoyable.
For a brief moment, Flip The Coin offers a reprieve in the form of a guitar-backed breakdown. We get a glimpse of what Newbeat could sound like back with different material, but that promise is yanked away immediately because it’s more important that they shout “Flip the coin! Shut up, we’re gonna make some noise!” at us a few more times. I’d like to keep an open mind about this group. They very well may deliver incredible material in the future. But so far, I can’t get into anything they’ve released.
| Hooks | 5 |
| Production | 7 |
| Longevity | 7 |
| Bias | 6 |
| RATING | 6.25 |
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
And this is the very same company that gave us CACTUS and CALLIN’ for A.C.E’s debut year… (ಠ_ಠ)
I have nothing to say about this song. The production’s decent, though like you said, the 90s-hip hop sound is basically boy group’s drum-and-bass (although better than the latter), so nothing much to say about it, though I like the production here. But my god, the shouty hooks are a headache, if you wanna do a shouty song, idk, add some metal or strong electro? Quite disappointing coming from Beat, even though they’ve also lowkey fumbled A.C.E’s post-enlistment work and Pinata tragically exists too.
6.5 (5, 8, 7, 6) for me.
LikeLiked by 1 person
And they gave us Undercover and Favorite Boys-Goblin too
LikeLiked by 1 person
Right, A.C.E had a super solid singles run till enlistment (for continuity’s sake, let’s pretend Savage doesn’t exist). Hopefully these guys have stronger materials up their sleeves for the future.
LikeLiked by 1 person
There’s potential in there somewhere, but it’s a strange mixture of nothing and obnoxious as it is
LikeLike
YIKES
LikeLiked by 2 people
A song full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
LikeLike
They should have worn hot pants.
LikeLike
What a way for me to find out about A.C.E.’s departure…I’ve been rooting for them since Mix9 and The Unit. I was hoping they would have a similar trajectory as ONF.
This new group is not really doing it for me. You could told me this was a song by Xikers or Kickflip and I would believe tou. Why do some boy groups just refuse to sing, we don’t need a song filled with 75% sing-talk/shout in unison nonsense. There’s some decent vocals in this group but the producers aren’t utilizing them, such a shame.
LikeLike