“How Sweet” by NewJeans, Sunday, July 28, 2024

It shouldn’t work. But it does. We seem to be in a maximalist era of pop music. Big club sounds drowned out the folky acoustic songs that we were listening to during lockdown. I can’t explain it. But somehow the producers behind a K-pop group NewJeans has made simple ‘90s-styled adult contemporary extremely catchy. Relying on subdued instrumentation but never skimping on the beat, the group also offers solid vocal performances but never do the singers belt above loudly above the song’s instrumentation. The group has followed a kind of chill disco since their inception in 2022 over the course of some 20+ songs. This year, the Ador girl group has released two singles and two B-sides and are said to be releasing an album later this year, though whether it is an LP or an EP, we have yet to find out. 

 IT’S LIKE BITING AN APPLE. Of course, we’ve discussed how the squeaky-clean “Bubble Gum” pop singers NewJeans are not without controversy. Not only are the girls the center of a corporate scandal with their manager and sub-label head Min Hee-jin who allegedly tried to buy out her stake in Hybe Corporation and take her label Ador independent, English jazz-funk group Shakatak accused the songwriters of plagiarizing the song “Bubble Gum,” which was released as a b-side of today’s song “How Sweet.” The group claims that the song sounds too similar to their 1981 song “Easier Said Than Done.” The most disturbing issue that has come about this year is when gamers began harassing the members of NewJeans when customizing content that Ador released as a collaboration with the game Battlegrounds. Some gamers used the NewJeans characters to create sexually explicit content. Of these three issues surrounding NewJeans, the individual members don’t seem to be at fault, but rather their fame seems to be drawing bad actors into a seedier area in the K-pop industry.  

ALL I KNOW IS NOW. “How Sweet” was NewJeans’ comeback from March of this year. After releasing several OST (original soundtrack) songs for dramas and remixes, the group began a fresh cycle, which is possibly leading up to an album release later this year. “How Sweet” is a break up song. The line about biting into an apple is apropos—rather than being completely sweet or sour, the experience is tart. It tastes sweet to be without that person but there is a sour and bitterness that could also leave one’s lips quivering. Of the eight songwriters on the track, only one of them is a NewJeans performer, band leader Danielle Marsh (모지혜). The song may be about an actual break up, but with so many songwriters on the team, it’s often hard to know whose experience a song mirrors. Could the song be a planned break up for when manager Min Hee-jin receives her independence from Hybe? Could it be a song that NewJeans could sing if they ever should want to walk away from being a corporate pawn? Could it be a song to tell off all the trolls who use NewJeans for their own purposes? One thing’s for sure, it’s a perfect song to say goodbye to the toxic school year. It tastes sweet being without ya’ll. See you again in two weeks.

Read the English translation on Genius.

Read the Korean lyrics on Genius.