Most young male soloists in K-Pop these days lean on a sexy image (Rain when he was active, Jay Park, 2PM's Wooyoung, JYJ's Junsu, Roh Ji Hoon) or an artistic image (JYJ's Jaejoong, INFINITE's Sunggyu, Big Bang's G-Dragon). Looking at the K-Pop landscape, one has to wonder ... where's K-Pop's Justin Bieber?
Before you freak out and exile me from the K-Pop fandom for daring to mention He Who Must Not Be Named (I'm a bit amused at the amount of hate some K-Pop fans have for Justin Bieber), hear me out. There's a reason Justin Bieber completely took over when he showed up with "Baby" in 2010, and that reason was that he was the perfect teen heartthrob. He had the same kind of wholesome, boy-next-door charm of the Jonas Brothers, but since he got his big break by uploading covers on YouTube instead of by appearing on the Disney Channel, he seemed even more down-home and accessible than his contemporaries. He was a singing, dancing, instrument-playing, baby-faced triple-threat, and his songs and image were innocent enough that parents didn't mind their thirteen-year-olds listening to him.
Henry's solo debut album, 'Trap', falls right in line with that kind of image- the whole album is straightforward, easy to follow and has this general niceness to it that doesn't feel overly processed or like it's trying too hard. It's a breath of fresh air in the midst of all the weighty, conceptual music SM Entertainment's been turning out this year. Henry's not being a zombie or a wolf or anything but the singing, dancing, instrument-playing, baby-faced triple-threat that he is, and that's exactly what his fans want from him.
The lead single "Trap" opens with a clangy piano intro and some falsetto oohs and ahhs reminicent of a slowed-down take on SISTAR's "Alone" while covering similar lyrical territory about the loneliness of being hung up on an ex who's moved on. Aside from being obviously slower than "Alone", "Trap" differs from SISTAR's song in the way it portrays the singer's feelings. the emotional draw of "Alone" is in how much it withholds from the audience- SISTAR are cold and aloof and they draw you in by making you feel like there's more to the story that they just aren't telling. "Trap" takes an entirely different approach, wearing its heart on its sleeve and earning your attention with its honesty. It's the kind of song we've all heard before, but it's still engaging enough to be interesting. The cameos from Taemin and Kyuhyun are musically unnecessary, but from a marketing standpoint it makes sense that SM would put two of their biggest stars on Henry's debut single.
The middle of the album will be particularly special to Henry's fans as Henry and his production group, Noize Bank, wrote, composed, and produced "1-4-3", "My Everything", and "Ready 2 Love". "1-4-3" and "Ready 2 Love" fit with the bright euro-dance style that Noise Bank showed us through their work on Super Junior-M's "Go" and "It's You", while "My Everything" turns the tables as a mostly acoustic, One Direction-y midtempo ballad. All three are ridiculously sweet love songs that might be a little too cute for some listeners, but they work with the boy-next-door image that Henry's going for with this album. The fact that Henry himself had a hand in creating these songs takes a bit of the saccharine edge off, just because his delivery feels so genuine."Holiday" is a Jonas Brothers-esque song about needing a break from a stressful relationship or from the stress of dealing with school and exams- a perfect song for this time of year! It rounds things out by being the only non-love song on the album. Piano ballad "I Would", with Andrew Choi on board as co-lyricist and Yiruma as the co-composer and featured pianist, wraps things up nicely. It makes a nice surprise for Henry's English-speaking fans (who make up a very significant chunk of his fanbase), as the song is sung entirely in English.
'Trap's biggest setback is that it is almost too nice. It's so sweet and normal and inoffensive that it's almost forgettable. There's nothing wrong with conventional, mainstream pop, but throwing in something a little unexpected- like, for example, something like what B1A4 did with the dark prechorus in their otherwise bright-sounding "What's Going On?"- would have given the album a little more contrast and made things that much more interesting. That said, the album is still enjoyable and it shows that he knows exactly what kind of artist he wants to be- not a bad way to kick off a solo career.
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