THROWBACK #9: KARD- DON't RECALL

Released: February 16th, 2017

When I think of the year 2017 in terms of K-Pop, the first thing that comes to mind is tropical house. 2017 was a huge year where many releases had tropical-synth influences and an EDM structure in mind. One of the artists who certainly led this revolution was KARD. The co-ed group released a whoopin 4 main singles that year, all of which were reliant on this genre. But it was Don't Recall out of the 4 that blew my mind away. Before I describe why, I want to talk a little about KARD. KARD is purely a co-ed group. Although many subunits of female and male idols are present, technically the idols have already debuted with their proper boy or girl groups before, while everyone in KARD debuted for the first time (except Somin, who previously was with APRIL). I think this unique concept did help in making Don't Recall sound groundbreaking as it was in 2017 and today.

The song uses chirpy-like synths to steer the melody forward, with some interesting sound effects in the background. I like the use of the sound effects, because it helps keep the verses from running dry. We get to the pre-chorus; the contrast between the low vocals of the guys and the high vocals of the girls when they sing the same phrase is a very nice touch, allowing the song to take its time to build up. The tempo in each of the sections gradually increases, and all of that adrenaline carries forward to the chorus. It is a full-on take of tropical house at that point, but the strings take over in the chord progression, giving the chorus that extra boost of loudness. Once the strings come into play, the girls quickly take the song into new territory with a little boost of their vocals, before carrying us to the song's main hook "I don't recall." The particular sequence is just so perfectly executed and shows how dynamic this track is. The momentum doesn't ease anytime soon, as we are treated with a nice instrumental break with ascending synthetic sound effects, before going to the second verse. We hear a refreshing change with JSeph's rap, which is a huge contrast from the first verse. The pre-chorus is the same, but notice how the girls and guys switch parts, which is a cool detail. My complaint is that the bridge and the final chorus are somewhat lumped together, and while they mesh nicely, I can't help but wish for an actual chorus to repeat again, because it was just that good. This makes the song feel a lot shorter than 3:28, and it does bother me a little bit.

Nevertheless, this is a solid production by KARD. There is a distinct increase in energy from verse to the chorus and the chorus plus post-chorus is one of the best I have ever heard. It is tropical house, so the producer could have just made the post-chorus the actual chorus but thankfully that was not the case. The alternating between the raps and the vocals in the verses keeps things interesting and the result is a certified chart-topper that shows the sky is the ceiling in this genre.

RATING: 7.7/10