At the end of each month, I look back at my three favorite title tracks by K-pop artists. I take my own ratings into account, but there’s a bit of wiggle room as certain songs tend to grow or fade.
October 2026 Overall Thoughts
Well… it’s better late than never, huh? In my mind, October was probably the strongest K-pop month of 2026 so far. After my ratings revisions, the month delivered a whopping five “9” rated title tracks. To put that in perspective, that’s more than the last five months… combined. However, this distinction has a major caveat: October was hard-carried by one particular week. In fact, four of these “9” rated songs were released on the exact same day! 2026 may be underwhelming overall, but both October 12th and April 27th will go down as much-needed “epic days in K-pop.” Comparatively, the rest of the month followed 2026’s general trend of so-so material, dragging down October’s cumulative rating.
The flurry of “9” rated title tracks made my top three songs of the month unusually competitive. Those judging simply by initial ratings might be surprised which songs eked it out to finish in the top spots, but that’s why I have a “risers and fallers” feature. Some songs hit it big right out the gate and slow down quickly after. Others take time to work their way under your skin. Neither option is necessarily “better” than the other, but when looking at these final placements I tend to give the edge to music that sticks around on my playlist and grows more addictive with time. This is why CRAVITY’s Louder should have been an easy number one on last month’s round-up, but with only a single day to judge it I misplaced the song at number two.
For me, far and away the most exciting thing to happen this month was Lee Sooman’s push into the Korean market with his A2O groups. The fact that both Lite and Soul emerged with excellent songs was a welcome surprise. The fact that Neon quickly became a chart-topper in Korea amplified this excitement tenfold. It feels like we’re seeing a changing of K-pop trends in real time. Please let this open the floodgates for vocal maximalism, longer (complete!) song structures and strange, sci-fi lore. These are the aspects that have always differentiated K-pop from its global contemporaries and I really hope audiences are starting to remember that. I couldn’t be more excited for A2O Soul’s official debut next month and any new music A2O Lite may release in the coming months.
Given A2O’s success, the number one trend I’ll be looking out for in 2027 is a return to 2nd/3rd gen approaches in concepts and songwriting. It really feels like we’re on the cusp of this wave. I only hope the industry can navigate it with more flair than they did the overly-muted Y2K resurgence.
Beyond the big A2O standouts, other acts also delivered. Highlights from KickFlip, Sung Hanbin, Xdinary Heroes and MODYSSEY were major pillars in my October playlist. And even when I might not have loved a title track this month, its accompanying album often delivered plenty of bangers. The sheer amount of awesome music released that week of October 12th took me days to fully process. I love when K-pop opens the floodgates like this.
A nod to the past also buoyed my top J-pop song this month. I’ve really fallen out of love with Starto Entertainment’s output in recent years despite being a gigantic fan of the agency’s acts for the better part of a decade. But with the debut of new group KEY TO LIT, Starto has brought back a signature sound (and composer) that makes me hope they’ll realize what made their music so strong and over-the-top in the first place. But I must say, had Bullet Train released a music video for their brilliant Eurobeat track Etrance Fever, that would have been my top choice instead.
With October behind us, we have one more month left before eligibility for my year-end chart has closed. November tends to be the last rush of big releases before everyone moves onto year-end shows/performances in December. It’s also a busy month on the blog as I take a look back at the industry’s biggest agencies and start preparing my comprehensive year-end features. I’ve got some music I’m definitely looking forward to in November, from blog favorites TWS, to A2O Soul’s first album, to comebacks from heavy hitters like TXT, NCT Dream and Nayeon. Hopefully 2026 in K-pop ends with a (good) bang!
Month Cumulative Rating: 7.6
(compiled by averaging the scores of every K-pop review from this month)
J-Pop Highlights
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week One
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week Two
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week Three
New & Noteworthy J-pop: Week Four
TOP J-POP SONGS OF THE MONTH
3. Takanori Nishikawa – Reverb Blaster
2. Kaito – swim?
1. KEY TO LIT – KEY TERUYA2
K-POP
Honorable Mentions
AND2BLE – French Kissing (review)
cosmosy – Give Me Love (review)
Eunhyuk – Blue Sky (review)
Flare U – Bloom (review)
IVE – Looks Can Kill (review)
JUSTB – Party Time (review)
MODYSSEY – Ridin′ (Can You Hear That) (review)
NCT Dream – The Sun (review)
PLAVE – Star Trace (review)
RIIZE – Insomnia (review)
Sung Hanbin – Undead (review)
Teen Top – Don’t Stop (review)
tripleS – Andless (review)
V01D – My Youth (review)
Xdinary Heroes – Obsessed With Youth (review)
This Month’s Risers and Fallers
This Week In K-pop: Week 1 / Week 2 / Week 3 / Week 4
This Month’s Global Pop Round-Up
TOP THREE SONGS OF SEPTEMBER
3. KickFlip – Kick Off The Wall (ft. iann dior) (review)
2. A2O Lite – Neon (review)
1. A2O Soul – Superstar (review)
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of September 2026
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of August 2026
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of July 2026
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of June 2026
Top Three K-Pop Songs Of May 2026
The month has been majorly okay but the highlights we got (in one day!) are so fantastic, it makes up for the lack of consistency in this month.
Anyways, Undead is my top song of the month, followed by Neon and Obsessed With Youth. I hope November follows through, at least the first half!
LikeLike
SUPERSTAR and Reverb Blaster are my co-winners!
I think I still prefer I SPY over NEON, but it’s pretty close.
LikeLike