Rather than promote a follow-up track from their recent album, BABYMONSTER have taken the rare approach of releasing a new song just a month after their comeback. This reminds me of the old days of album repackages, which I miss very much. They made comebacks feel more like eras and stretched out the excitement. Unfortunately, BABYMONSTER’s Choom wasn’t particularly exciting and Sugar Honey Ice Tea doesn’t fare much better.
We’re in a weird era of K-pop girls sing-talking about sugary sour drinks over club beats. That’s a hyper-specific trend, but how else do you explain this double volley of Lemonade and Sugar Honey Ice Tea? As with aespa’s song, this has its fun moments but is overall let down by its lack of melody. The thing about this style of “charismatic” talk performance is that it feels extremely put on. Yes, K-pop has always traded in artifice (and I love artifice!), but without the sense of a beating heart behind the facade you end up with hyper-disposable drek that may get your blood moving in the moment but ends up being empty calories.
So, what makes Sugar Honey Ice Tea different from a classic K-pop track like… let’s say… T-ara’s Bo Peep Bo Peep? Both are silly, irreverent catchphrasey tracks over propulsive electro beats. However, Ice Tea is a constant stream of “I, I, me, ME” posturing and lacks the candyfloss hooks this style demands. It takes itself weirdly serious, as evidenced by the momentum-killing trap drops that fracture the song’s flow in service of — I assume — some bid for musical credibility. Terminally online K-pop fans will counter this review with a “you just hate fun!” critique, but if “fun” is what Sugar Honey Ice Tea is aiming for, there are so many things it could do to be legitimately cheeky. Instead, this is a copy of a copy, corporatized down to its bone.
| Hooks | 6 |
| Production | 8 |
| Longevity | 7 |
| Bias | 7 |
| RATING | 7 |
Grade: C-
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
Hmm. On one hand, I appreciate the energy of the beat but on the other, I wish they were more ambitious with their music and melodies! The girls are cleary very passionate about music and talented and with the right material, they could be very good!
7.5/10
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I love iced tea, lemon especially, but suddenly, I don’t crave it anymore. Iced mocha still remains as my favourite drink.
Rating’s the same.
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great beat but overall, it’s a chop.
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This songs still so outdated if it was released 10 years ago…
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I’m usually fine with this new trend of chanting vocals but the performance here goes way past ‘dancefloor cool’ into just sounding bored. It’s like they popped a valium before recording. The beat itself isn’t too different to something 2ne1 would have had 15 years ago but say what you will about those girls but they never sounded like they were counting down the seconds. The mv is similar low energy and boring. I don’t get why this had to be its own thing instead of a bside to their last album.
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Ah, YG, I really don’t understand you. I’d even like to understand your logic, like someone trying to understand a friend. After all, what’s the plan? U build the entire identity and appeal of a group around an emotional image and a connection with the fans, but when a new group emerges, it seems to simply push the previous one to the background little by little. That’s the impression I got with iKON and Winner
What bothers me is that it’s already difficult for the public to become attached to a group. And then you base a good part of that appeal on musical formulas and tropes that already seem worn out 🫤🫤
Ugh… how I hate it when I end up making deeper criticisms than simply commenting on a simple song. I love music with electro beats, but of course, in adapting it, they had to use the same structure, the same “spoken” vocals, and the same attitude
But anyway, shall we move on to the next one? How about a drop with “lalalala i’m badass, clik clak bada bing bada bom, i’m badass”?
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Yikes.
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comparing this to bo peep bo peep is so offensive to t-ara 😭
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it sounds too much like Supernova especially the last part and the video is Whiplash adjacent. Just a very lazy track with vaguely interesting production drowned by the worst lyrics and zero originality. Sad honestly.
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It’s not bad, but nothing special. Solid entry in the discography. My favorite part is probably the pre-chorus where we get a little melody.
I do think I like it more than Choom.
YG is still misusing these girls.
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This is a lot like My Humps.
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I still remember I just mention my thought on some recent song (Bompala/Lemonade, whatever) – stating that I’m in my era to ignore the lyrics and just the enjoy the song and production itself.
But this is definitely not applicable to this song. All the song I’ve listed above, at least still ‘work’ to my ear. But Sugar, Honey, Ice, Tea, all of these 4 words just don’t rhyme with each other, and speaking of the production itself is just so so mess.
A low 4.
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Also, the intro kinda sounds like Billie’s bad guy, though the whole production is going completely different approach after the muted intro.
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i think the sugar honey ice tea is just meant to meant “SH*T” (yes, as in “I’m the sh*t), but yeah, I agree that the lyrics are really bad… please stop giving them all-English songs (or at least a new lyricist)
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Speaking of T-ARA, I can’t wait to see their career rating as well! My prediction of T-ARA is most likely a ~8.5 tier with at least 3 legendary 10 song. Hope we could get it in short soon. 😉
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i only see bo peep bo peep having a slight chance at getting a 10. then again, it didn’t appear in any major countdowns like the 100 best kpop songs of all time. but who knows, we might as well get multiple 9’s.
Nick reviewed sugar free and sexy love through random shuffle not too long ago (around 2-3 years atp), so i’d probably expect only some small rises. maybe mid 9’s would suit those.
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*multiple 10s. I really wish we had the ability to edit our comments.
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the things I would do so we could get songs like 2ne1’s again…
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were really seeing kpop experience brat summer as evidenced by everyone and their mothers doing something bright green and clubby for some reason this year. why 1 year late? we’ll never know…
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K-pop has always been late bloomer in joining in the global trend.
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Idk why they’d be promoting drinks but tbh when i first read this review i just thought of its acronym and decided they were probably trying to be a bit…. edgy? but yeah i feel like there’s probably better ways of getting their point across :’D
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YG did not learn anything after the trahic Hot Sauce incident last year. Its like they are on a mission to ruin Babymonster discography with food-related song every year.
Honey Sugar Ice Tea is just another fad of ‘talking over a beat’ type of song that relies heavily on hooks and beat. The problem is the hook is cringe (not catchy at all) and the beat is too subdued for anyone to bop. There are some brilliant melody and ad-libs parts in the later parts sure, but it come too late to be enjoyed.
After aespa Lemonade and baemon Ice Tea, H2H will release Lemon Tang? Kpop summer is about to end before it began, what a disaster….
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*the tragic Hot Sauce incident
*the ear-numbing Lemonade
*the disastrous Honey Ice Tea
*the unneeded Lemon Tang
I wonder what culinary treat KPOP choose for next year
the only recent and decent dish-related song is SPAGHETTI
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K-pop is definitely serving food name song but not the music itself.
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Basically non-existent hooks/chorus with just the weird shouting/repetition of the track name.
Quite boring overall, and it’s not even catchy, it’s pretty shit.
Or Sugar Honey Ice Tea. Haha.
6.25/10
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The women in BM are so much better than the material they are usually given. They had a nice run from “Forever” to “Supa Dupa”…it could happen again, maybe. I really wish they were with a different agency. A couple of good songs on the album give me hope…🥹🥹
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how did this end up worse than choom? idk yg looks like he wanna join the repetitive trend but this just leaves a ? on my mind lol. the title speaks itself i guess, pure sugar honey iced tea
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Now I can’t unhear the result of an AI prompt “Make me a song like Lemonade Ice Cream in the style of T-ara”.
Lovey-Dovey and Roly-Poly are classics of kpop, even if they don’t rank high anywhere. Everyone was doing the Lovey-Dovey shuffle back when.
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The main hook sounds like Key’s “CoolAs”. CoolAs is much more tastefully done, I think
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I like it better than Choom, but not as much as most of the Drip album.
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It’s pretty obnoxious, but I’d take this over Lemonade any day. It’s slightly better than “CHOOM”. Rating the same.
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i really like it, and the MV is pretty good. while i don’t like it as much as moon, it’s a close second. ❤️
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Had a kind of nice beat to it, but honestly they could have done a far better job of naming it than just Suga Honey Iced Tea. I mean c’mon tone of other potential ideas out there for name of songs and they decided to name it after iced tea? Are groups really scrapping the bottom of the barrel like that now. Better off just writing bunch of random words on scraps of papers tossing them in the air and picking whichever one you catch as the name.
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