SPECIAL FEATURE #3: LEGENDARY SONG: INFINITE- THE CHASER

Released: May 15th, 2012

A special feature post is a post where I post content that isn't a typical song critique review. Rather it focuses on other areas of K-Pop that I think are just as interesting, as well as ranking lists of songs from a particular artist or a year, which can be extremely difficult, yet fun to create. Or it can be an in-depth analysis of songs that truly changed the K-Pop landscape for the better.

A little story to tell first; in July of 2011, Infinite, who had only been in the music industry for a year at that time, released their first-full length album and promoted the title track Be Mine. It is a total 80s synthpop bop, and it not only propelled to the top of the music charts, but it also defined Infinite as the group they are today in terms of their musical identity. Be Mine was extremely successful musically and so it was no surprise expectations were sky-rocket high for their next comeback. Rather then succumb under pressure as first-year rookies, Infinite somehow continued to evolve the 80s sound and drop Paradise 2 months later, a falsetto-rich track that exceeded the baseline and sounded even better than Be Mine. There was just no way then that anyone could replicate and surpass the musicality that Paradise and Be Mine brought to the music scene, not even Infinite themselves right? Exactly 8 years ago, the unthinkable happened. Shock-waves penetrated across every single corner in the K-Pop world. The expectations in the music scene would never be the same again when Infinite released The Chaser. It's a better-than-average song at first listen, depending on how you listened to it at that time, but when it was said and done, The Chaser ultimately revealed itself to be a timeless masterpiece that transcends across generations and generations to come. It takes every single element that makes song-writing so powerful and timeless and absorbs them all into one single track without giving in into over-complexity. There are almost no bad parts in The Chaser, and the fact they were able to do so for the third consecutive time makes it sound that much sweeter. I have been desperately waiting till the anniversary date today to properly commemorate one of the greatest tracks in K-Pop of all time.

So what makes The Chaser legendary? Let's start with a word that I commonly look for in a song (and a word I have been over-using in my song reviews these days); momentum. Momentum is scientifically defined as the continuous movement of energy as it travels along a plain field. The formula for momentum is mass times velocity. In music, mass can be analogical to the amplitude of the song, defined by not just the loudness but also the musical layers present and the overall melody within that brief period of time. Velocity can be analogical to the tempo and rhythm of the track. The faster the tempo and the bigger the amplitude, the larger the momentum. In The Chaser, the momentum is at an all-time high, but not during certain periods of time though; it's present throughout the entire track. The sparks of energy immediately light up at the intro, and it never ever dips at any point in the song till the end, except in the parts where it needs to, but it ultimately causes the energy to ascend even higher.

It's easy to hear for the most part that the tempo rarely ever stops for a breather in The Chaser, but let's go deeper into the musical complexity of the track itself. Musical layers. There are layers blanketed everywhere in the track, and they all help to fill in the depth needed to amplify the song without having to increase the volume. In the intro, you have the signature guitar sound coming in to subdue the synths and make it feel as if the song is heading in a complete different direction. Without the guitar, the intro would have sounded pretty generic, but ultimately lack the ambiguity factor; you want a track to sound unpredictable every step of the way. The guitar is once again reminiscent of the 80s theme that made Be Mine and Paradise so successful, so why not use it again to your advantage? The use of it in the verse is brilliant, where it echoes each of the smooth vocal parts to contrast beautifully with the mid-octave synths. In the second half of the verse, an extra synth is introduced whose note stays constant; again this helps balance out the vocals as they transition from the low to the mid-octave. And then we get to the chorus. There is just so much going on here, but I will try my best to simplify everything. The first time I heard the song, I was hearing it from my 2010 LG blackberry, and I honestly thought the chorus was good, but nothing too special. That was because I failed to hear the numerous layers stacked underneath that empower the section even more. You can easily hear the brass playing, but then you can also hear the guitar chord progression that makes each vocal part stronger than the previous one. There is a perfect contrast between the soaring vocals and the low-octave guitar playing here. That one synth sound in the middle of the chorus puts the icing on the cake, as it uplifts the next vocal parts to climb even higher. It's all about progression from there, but also give credit to the vocals here for those beautiful layers! Infinite once again sounds completely breathtaking, even though not all of the members are top-notch vocalists, and the way they combine their singing together to produce one complete voice is just extraordinary. As gorgeous as the the song's composition is, let's also go in-depth into the song's structure that is just as unique. As mentioned before, once the intro plays, the song immediately takes off and never looks back from there. The verses continue to build energy as the vocal notes progress higher and higher, and the chorus maxes out as the climax. Even during the rap parts, who are usually known to slow the song down sluggishly, do they keep the heart rate of The Chaser beating at a fast pace. But later on in the song we hear something intriguing that has never been done before in any K-Pop song; the next chorus becomes a pre-chorus for the chorus itself! The technique is done by slowing down the original pre-chorus and the chorus and adding more gorgeous instrumentals on top of it to change its identity from receiver to giver. The actual chorus is loud enough to where it can immediately pick up where the modified one left off without sounding generic or overused at all. It's done extremely well and I don't know if I will ever hear something like that in the music scene again. Things briefly slow down in the bridge where we hear that beautiful guitar riff, before rising up again one last time, adding a degree of variability yet again with a modulation of the final chorus.

All of these elements described here are the reasons that make The Chaser sound awe-so inspiring, and there are truly no bad sections at all in the song. Well almost. So why is The Chaser not a perfect 10? The bridge, although by no means terrible at all, remains to be the weakest part in the song; I would have loved to hear more variety among the vocals instead of a straight-forward path to the final chorus. I would have also liked the part to sound even more filtered-out to allow the guitar to showcase its deadly signature venom and get a brief solo. I would have also considered minimizing the use of the synths in the first rap part, such as slowly faltering its sound to add some variety and allow us to hear the guitar chord progression more closely. But nevertheless, The Chaser exceeds on so many different levels. It does what a song is supposed to do, and it does it very well, but it's not afraid to add some unexpected twists and turns to make the next parts feel that much sweeter. The Chaser doesn't deviate at all from the signature sound that made Infinite who they are today, but rather takes that sound and stretches it out to its limits even further. It's a song that harnesses the power of music and instruments and backs it up with amazing vocals. It's a song that stood out from the rest of the competition in 2012 and will continue to stay that way for many many years to come. And that is why I have The Chaser as one of the greatest songs in K-Pop history of all time.

RATING: 8.3/10