It’s a day of pre-releases, as Mamamoo’s Moonbyul joins the fray with a teaser of her new album. She had a very strong slate of 2024 releases, including several standouts in a variety of genres. With this as a comparison, ICY BBY is a definite step down and feels much more indebted to current K-pop trends.
At the same time, parts of this song seem well-calibrated to Moonbyul’s strengths. She gets to fire off a rapid rap verse, the likes of which we haven’t heard from her in awhile (at least on a title track). However, the rest of the track is repetitive and boring. The hooks do nothing for me. They’re insistent in an irritating way, circling around the same simple refrains without enough breathing room to offer respite. The beat stutters in and out, causing ICY BBY‘s momentum to feel piecemeal. Just as often as it gets going, it stalls.
ICY BBY‘s hook bears the simple, stuttering structure so popular with K-pop’s girl groups at the moment, leaving little room for melodic development. Rather than surge or glide, the refrain has a stabbing rhythm. Had this been set against a contrasting instrumental, the approach might have worked better. Instead, the entire track is built upon this herky-jerky style and winds up feeling monotonous.
| Hooks | 6 |
| Production | 7 |
| Longevity | 8 |
| Bias | 7 |
| RATING | 7 |
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
When I read the word “repetitive” in Nick’s writeup, I often wonder oh how bad get it be. … yeah, the last minute or whatever of ice babybaby seems to last forever and not in a good way.
A minor secondary issue – I get irritated when songs that sound like they were crafted for multiple voices (vz multiple lines, ranges, styles, shifts, overlaps) are performed by one voice. The seams always show and not in a good way.
Moonbyul is a better singer and performer than this song shows.
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Agree this should be a group performing the song. This kind of repetitive chorus really needs the alternating voices of a group to succeed so it isn’t as cloying, though I’m not sure it would be enough anyway. Hurts to say it, but besides the rap, I would go as far to say the song doesn’t suit her well, despite normally loving her. Stayc or i-dle come to mind as better fits. Tweak the song a bit and add some more depth to the chorus and it could’ve been solid.
As is: 8,7,7,7 = 7.25
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I agree that the song is a step back from everything she released in 2024, because her songs, aside from all their musical merits, carried a great deal of personality. This doesn’t even compare to the rock ballad she released in Japanese a few months ago, which I thoroughly enjoyed.
While this release still has that playful vibe that Moonbyul instills in her songs, it’s too repetitive and insistent with that irritating chorus, and the song also doesn’t do any favors to Moonbyul’s vocals. Well, what I definitely enjoyed the most was the rap.
Honestly, it’s fine for an artist to have a mediocre song every now and then, but Moonbyul needs something better to stand out among the crowded and diverse scene of female solo artists in the Korean industry. Even those great songs from last year didn’t achieve a noticeable increase in streams, which saddens me because she’s a very good and versatile singer.
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Argh. I love Moonbyul and in another life her solo career would be flourishing but her selection of songs is so unfocused. Nothing wrong with trying things out but it feels all over the place. I was hoping she’d lean more into j-rock style (a la her song Memories) but alas
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