Release Date: February 19, 2019
Track Listing
- X X
- Butterfly
- Wiseong (Satellite)
- Curiosity
- Saegkkal (Colors)
- Where you at
- Stylish
- Perfect Love
- Yeolgi (Heat)
- favOriTe
- Hi High
- + +
Review
LOONA are a 12-member female Korean pop group signed to Blockberry Creative. They were first introduced to the public through a “girl of the month” campaign that started in October 2016. Each member was showcased via solo and sub-unit singles that revealed their personalities and musical profiles.
The buildup to the reveal of the entire roster of LOONA went in three waves and took two years to complete. In August of 2018 the full 12-member group debuted with their first EP + + which featured the group’s pre-debut single favOriTe and the lead single Hi High.
In February of 2019 the repackaged edition of + + titled X X was released adding the lead track Butterfly and five other new songs (X X, Satellite, Curiosity, Colors and Where You At) to bring the total number of tracks on the album to 12.
LOONA’s sound can best be described as a blend of old school hip-hop, 1990’s R&B and pop oriented electronic dance music. Many of their songs make great use of this combination of different types of music. The best of them tend to be mid-tempo R&B/Pop crossovers such as Curiosity , Stylish and Colors. If you are looking for something a little faster paced and/or bubbly you will find that there are not a lot of those types of songs available on this album. Perfect Love, favOriTe and Hi High are about the only ones that fit that billing.
The last track to make note of is Where You At, which is probably the closest you will get to a contemporary slow song on X X. The members are allowed to exercise their inner divas a little bit here. Seeing that it appears midway through the album it provides a nice break before things start to pick up again in the second half.
Overall X X gives a different view of LOONA as a group compared to the initial release of + +. The musical direction for the album is much more defined and cohesive with the addition of the new songs. It’s not just a mish-mash of different styles of music slapped together on an EP like on the original 2018 release.
LOONA feel like a group who do not instantly impress listeners. The slow burn to their eventual debut seemed to be an intentional build of their fanbase organically over time rather than having them show up out of the blue with a bang.
If you are in the camp that slept on them in favor of other girl groups who are flashier or have more impactful music perhaps give them another chance. You may discover that they do excel at the genres of music mentioned earlier and that they have some pretty catchy songs.
For those who are new to LOONA this is a great starting point to get into them.