On the tongue-in-cheek opening track ‘Cheese’, the group respond flippantly to anti-fans who feed them with attention. The other heavier tracks in ‘NOEASY’ also fare well. Along with its melody sampling percussion instruments heard in samul nori, a traditional Korean folk music genre, its elaborate music video – filmed at an open set for historical period dramas – also featured colourful pungmul dancers, and white lions associated with the Bongsan mask dance. In ‘Thunderous’, Stray Kids also pay homage to traditional Korean culture through a number of references: its Korean title, ‘소리꾼’ ( sorikkun) refers to a traditional Korean singer who tells stories in musical form, known as pansori. This particular key point of the song indicates how the guys are ever-ready to go into a sonic battle when required.
This lead single retains its strength and self-assuredness from start to the end, anchored by a cacophonous combination of thundering, brassy horns and controlled EDM beats.It even comes with a surprising pre-chorus hook, as Lee Know and Han both smugly deliver: “I’ll always say what I have to say, Ptui, Ptui, Ptui”. And it’s clear that they mean business: “Man I’m not sorry, I’m dirty / Keep on talking, we don’t play by the rules”, he and Felix both defiantly maintain in the one-two English punchline at the chorus’ end (with “sorry” being a homonym of ‘소리’, sori, or ‘sound’ in Korean). “ message… is that Stray Kids, as sorikkun (or singers), will face off against the jansorikkun ( or “naggers”) and confidently let our sound ,” explained Bang Chan, who once turned the tables on an anti-fan who termed their music as “construction noise”. Setting the scene for their first comeback in nearly a year is ‘Thunderous’, a title track that’s just as fierce as its name makes it out to be. The 14-track album also includes their winning Kingdom single ‘Wolfgang’ ( “We are the maestros who lead the world”, they declare), and the surprise June release ‘Mixtape: OH’, which marked Hyunjin’s return after a four-month hiatus from the group. Together with Changbin and Han, the trio are once again at the helm of the group’s noisemaking, alongside producers like VERSACHOI and HotSauce. READ MORE: CIX – ‘OK Prologue: Be OK’ review: a voyage through pop gems from one of K-pop’s most promising actsĬhan’s part of 3RACHA, Stray Kids’ very own producing sub-unit.
“It means that we want to leave a loud impact on the world with our music,” explained leader Bang Chan. And this follows through in their second full-length, ‘NOEASY’, a syllabic Korean pronunciation of the word ‘noisy’. “ we became more certain of the music and performances that Stray Kids could do,” Changbin said recently during a Q&A per Soompi.
STRAY KIDS THUNDEROUS TV
Instead, they’ve carved a niche for themselves in the K-pop scene with their bold artistry ( mala taste, anyone?) and unique creative perspective, which led the group – consisting Bang Chan, Lee Know, Changbin, Hyunjin, Han, Felix, Seungmin and I.N – to their eventual victory on reality TV competition Kingdom: Legendary War. This is very much the case with Stray Kids, who have proven through the years that they’re no mere flash in the pan.
Light may travel faster than sound, but in a storm, thunder’s cavernous rumbles leave a deeper impression than a sudden lightning streak in the sky.