Review Summary: Limping forward.
The drought is over, fans can rejoice over new BLACKPINK material. As the girl group seems to be transitioning from Kpop’s constant flux of singles and EPs standard to Occidental pop’s less frequent, LP-based output, they were left starving. The quartet’s power continues to grow on the worldwide market, so they afford to take their time. At the same time, back home they are trendsetters, since multiple labels are trying to replicate YG Entertainment’s sonic recipes, visuals and PR stunts on the current generation of Kpop acts. Truth is, so far, none managed to portray these concepts as effortlessly as BP does. Now the good thing is this second record,
Born Pink is a slight improvement overall, feeling a tad more cohesive, despite its modest runtime of 24 minutes. Their debut was simply a mixed bag of tracks thrown there to please the horde of fans who insisted on a full length release.
Diving into
Born Pink, we’re directly hit by the full on swag of the two singles, “Pink Venom” & “Shut Down”. Whether it’s the Eastern-type leads of the former or the ‘00s hip hop throwback, complete with a Niccolo Paganini sample from “La Campanella” on the latter, you can’t help but think you’ve already heard them in some form before in their discography. “Pink Venom” offers a cute contrast with the sweet tone on the choruses, but those cannot detract enough from the dumb lyrics. “Shut Down” goes hard with the bragging up to the point where it’s better not to pay attention to what they’re saying. These bratty songs are working for Lisa and Jennie, who have successfully been pushing this concept so far. Unfortunately, Jisoo and Rosé especially are almost audibly out of their comfort zones. Thankfully, the sound shifts soon towards melodic pop tunes. “Yeah Yeah Yeah” is perhaps the lightest one here, dropping their usual shtick, aiming on delivering a lush love song instead. I wish they would temporarily switch the image for the singles to this softer side (remember “Playing with Fire” or “As If It’s Your Last”). They are well-rounded artists, something a track like “Shut Down” does not display. Meanwhile, “Hard to Love” brings some acoustic guitars and city pop-esque aesthetics to the table. The result is actually tight, the saxophone leads work really well, while the vocals are catchy. The only issue is its short length. By the time you would get to a bridge or different chord progression, it's done.
Next, we are treated with the tender ballad “The Happiest Girl”, after which
Born Pink wants to come full circle with the mid-tempo, heavy on the low-end, “Tally”. Not a bad track per se, but it resembles Red Velvet’s “Psycho” groove more than it should. Sadly, it doesn’t have a strong hook either to make up for it. Then, “Ready for Love” kicks in strong, boasting a smooth, immersive melody, only to burst into a generic, title repeating chorus. The producers rely too often on the title track repeating choruses, hoping to grab your attention with a pumping beat. Nevertheless, I was surprised regarding the LP’s decent flow from start to finish. Of course, the 24-minute length “helps”, being a stretch to call this a full length effort. In the end, it seems that YG switched to a format that might allow BLACKPINK to run over the usual life span of a Kpop group (see the “7-year curse”). The less-is-more tactic still works wonders it seems. It would be interesting to toggle the single material a bit though, because those are biggest flaws here and don’t really reflect all the group is about.
