MAVE: – PANDORA’S BOX Review

MAVE Pandora's Box Cover

Release Date: January 25, 2023

Track Listing

  1. Pandora
  2. Wonderland (IDYPIA)

Review

MAVE: (short for “MAKE NEW WAVE”) is a virtual (AI) idol group from Metaverse Entertainment agency. They are a joint project between Kakao Entertainment and Netmarble F&C.

This virtual idol group has four members:

SIU: (Leader, Main Vocalist)
ZENA: (Lead Vocalist)
MARTY: (Sub Rapper, Sub Dancer)
TYRA: (Main Rapper, Main Dancer, Maknae)

Each member has a short backstory, but how they all tie together is unknown. There isn’t much of what their lore as a group is yet.

Virtual idols are not anything new in the world of music. In K-Pop, you have K/DA, ITZY’s Zepetos, aespa’s avatars and whatever the hell is going on in RE: VERSE. If you also follow the Japanese side of entertainment, then you know of VTubers and Hatsune Miku and her merry band of friends.

So if you’re not scared off by any of those things, continue reading.

MAVE: made their debut on January 25, 2023, with the single PANDORA’S BOX and the title track Pandora.

Strictly speaking about MAVE:’s music, one can compare PANDORA’S BOX‘s sound to K/DA or a toned-down aespa. So if that rocks your boat, then the pair of songs on this single should resonate with you in some manner musically.

I’m pretty sure the vocals for these idols are real people. Technology has come a long way, but not far enough to erase humans from the studio entirely.

Visually this group appears to be going for as close to a realistic look as possible. However, when you see them in motion, it’s impressive, but they are still ones and zeroes. Again, there is some humanity behind these virtual idols as the choreography looks to be motion captured.

The good thing is that the entire animation of the group seems smooth rather than janky. But, as I said with the vocals, technology isn’t ready to replace humans yet.

While it may be easy to write this group off because they’re “not real,” I think that would be a mistake. Considering only the music, the songs are very good and worth investing time into.


Stream on Apple Music
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