7/15/2026 Freaky With That Sticky Sticky

I return. 

NCT Wish released a song in April and I like it. I have had this review in my vault for a while.

In April, Wish released two singles: "Sticky" (a prerelease) and "Ode to Love" (the title track for their full album). I'm pretty okay with "Ode to Love" - it's very classic NCT, to me, kind of like the Wish version of NCT Dream's "Dreaming". It's also very boring. I believe the signature "du-duru-du" of the chorus was made popular by the charm of the members alone. That's okay with me. It's okay that you guys want to kiss Sion on the lips.

"Sticky", on the other hand, fascinates me, and it seems also to have fascinated fans. It has been pretty universally¹ described by haters and fans as "neo", a term which is widely used among NCT fans but rather vague. Generally it is used to refer to the crazy fucky side of NCT's music. A crazy fucky Stray Kids or NMIXX or EXO song is not necessarily going to be neo in nature.

What exactly counts as neo? - The answer has evolved significantly over the years. Neo songs are usually futuristic or noisy or edgy in some way, but still incorporate relatively sophisticated vocalism. They also may be characterized by frequent change-ups, usually between the gentle or suave (or surprisingly sweet) and the tough or experimental, but also, as expressed by songs like "Sticker" and "Lipstick", in a strange dissonance between subject matter and delivery. In some cases this produces a new "take" on the subject of the song; in other cases, like in "Glitch Mode", it may be a little tongue-in-cheek.

So if you haven't listened yet you should probably listen to "Sticky" using the link above. I will wait.

The song scores well on the neo rubric. The prominent beat and synths give it that rough sound, while the bossa nova sections lend it sweetness. Crucially, these two aspects butt up against each other.

"Sticky" can be pretty clearly split into different sections, not lyrically but sonically:

1. Elevator Music/Bossa Nova
2. Crazy Fucky Stuff ("sticky-icky-icky")
3. Melodic Verse Stuff
4. Dance break 

In examining these I do not want to neglect the significance of the transitions between them, nor do I want to lose sight of the song they make up together.

Firstly: Elevator Music. While Wish do not have a monopoly on NCT's sweetness and innocence, the straightforwardness of the Bossa Nova really makes this feel like Wish's song. One can argue that the charm of this section exists to be refuted by the more experimental parts of the song - but I would suggest a more complex intent, as indicated by the music video. There are transitions in the music video that take place between this Bossa sound and another one, but they don't exploit the contrast overly. At one point, a Bossa section is illustrated by Sakuya sitting in the corner of a dark room, illuminated by a blinding white spotlight.

He's just sitting there... menacingly!

We see little sticky stars around him to indicate some silly Wishyness, but the ominous lighting remains.

This specific Bossa Nova section - beginning with Sakuya's "mango tango bop" - appears to be controversial among NCTzens. For some people, this part represents what is annoying and absurd about K-pop rap. I am going to be a contrarian and say this is one of my favorite NCT Wish raps. It is not too long if you don't count Sakuya's continuing background vocals during Jaehee's succeeding lines, and it has a purpose, too. Sakuya takes on a specific tone of voice which blends the harsher parts into the softer ones. Admittedly, I initially did not enjoy Sakuya's lazy half-singing background vocals during Jaehee's high note. Ironically, in a way they make Jaehee sound absurd, highlighting the lack of build-up to a rather forced high note.² I understand it a little more now, given that the lyrics describe the "humming" and "drumming" of one's heartbeat, and I think this part illustrates that feeling decently.

Okay, onto the Crazy Fucky Stuff, which actually doesn't take up too much time in the song. I am going to include, then, a part which would technically align with the melodic verse section, given the continuity of instrumental: this is the rap from 0:34-0:46 in the video. I include this in my look at the "sticky-icky-icky" parts because a) it is a rap, and b) it aligns with the Crazy Fucky part in its purpose, which is to provide a stark contrast to the elevator music.

Throughout the Crazy Fucky Stuff sections, more of a harmonic basis is provided to the 3rd scale degree being chanted ("sticky-icky-icky"), which makes me happy because that is a really annoying note to have your chant chorus on with no instrumental basis. Finally, at the end, the Bossa Nova is completely integrated into the Crazy Fucky Stuff - or rather vice-versa, since the vocal line is that of the Bossa Nova sections. I feel this integration also goes to show that the Bossa is not being fully rejected by the end of the song - the cutiefulness of Wish does not necessarily stand in opposition to the Neo Culture Technology part.

In conclusion, the Crazy Fucky Stuff is fine. I don't mind it. It suffers, perhaps, from some sheen of non-commitment, some lack of a special sauce. Songs such as "Poison" by Secret (which is, of course, still fire) almost attain the sound they are clearly reaching for, but are held back by some deficiency in mixing or structure or something. The first "sticky-icky-icky" chorus in "Sticky" still seems to lack something despite the fact that 

a) the simplicity is obviously intentional, 

b) it is eventually elaborated on by the bass after four measures (if we assume the tempo is 150bpm), and 

c) unlike the case of "Poison", I can't quite pinpoint what it's going for. 

It is one of three parts of the song that make me cringe. The second part is Yushi's "coconut milk shower" moment. The melody of his whole line here feels annoyingly familiar, almost cliche, but the repetition of the "coconut milk shower" melody twice in a row strikes me as especially lazy. It nearly ruins my enjoyment of the entire song, and especially of Riku's cheeky line right before it.³ Every time I hear it coming on, I close my eyes and try to time travel a few seconds. 

The third part is the dance break, which is, like, fine in the grand scheme of NCT, considering "Favorite" by NCT 127, which was released in 2021, has an honest-to-fucking- god dubstep interlude. I think I can accept that the "Sticky" dance break was not meant to be heard by human ears, but by the ears of the angels, because it's not trying and failing to be anything that I can recognize. However, I just don't like it when NCT Wish yells in unison - not any more than I like when NCT Dream does it. I didn't like "future's in my hand, that's my wish" in "Wish". I did not like "hey! ho!" in "Surf". I do not like "main dishes!" in the dance break of "Sticky". These parts all sound the same to me and that makes them doubly unpleasant.

So that is "Sticky". How do you feel about "Sticky"? Tell me in the comments when you come across this blog in ten years and then go stream "Boy Meets Girl", NCT Wish's latest Japanese release. 

¹Based on my experience.

²The term forced describes the position of the high note in the structure of the song, not Jaehee's voice. A more egregious example of a forced, though technically well-executed, high note in an NCT song would be Haechan's bullshit high note in "Hot Sauce". 

³To be clear, I typically love to hear Riku and Yushi's high voices play against each other, because Riku's voice is very confident, almost flirtatious (I have no other way to put it), and Yushi's is very earnest.

 

5/4/2026 Female Heterosexual Desire

I am sure there is no lack of discourse on this, and that I am just not reading enough books on the subject, but I feel the contentiousness of having a woman desire a man is poisoning romance. 

Men may argue, blatantly or unconsciously, as they have done through their art for thousands of years, that women cannot experience the desire that they do. Men may do so by reducing the woman to her body; by positioning her constantly as beloved object and never as loving subject; or by implying or outright stating that women lack interiority and the capacity to feel and love nearly as passionately as men. This is the logic behind the courtly love song of the troubadour. It is the archetype of the pining lover and the cruel, frozen-hearted, statuesque woman he loves. 

Women may argue, then, that female heterosexual desire is a pillar of patriarchy. They may call women who pursue men male-centered and insecure, position a woman prizing a man as readjusting the spotlight on an already visible demographic. They may dismiss a woman's perspective of a man she desires as completely unreasonable by emphasizing the unworthiness of the man, by calling her delusional, etc. And I understand the merits of this latter pattern of behavior - not only because I, too, have been flabbergasted and frustrated seeing a woman I esteem restructuring her life around an evil man who doesn't even care for her, but because I cannot pretend that this view is the font of all patriarchy. It is not nearly as harmful as the view men have of women. I also understand it would do better to let in more discourse on romantic and sexual love between women, instead of doing this gender war bullshit.

I mostly want to talk about this because I think the instinct of everyone to dismiss women's desire, hetero- or homosexual, is misogynistic, and it ruins romance. I am sick of pretending that the popular fictional heterosexual dynamic of "man is madly in love with and obsessed with woman who is... well, it doesn't matter" is woke, or even very interesting. Here the dynamic subversion comes not from reversing the typical male desiring subject/female desired object roles, but by reframing desire as embarrassing and humbling. And desire is like that! Desire makes you feel subservient and weak. But desire is also beautiful and enjoyable, and women deserve to feel all of those things, too. Perhaps they even deserve to both feel desire and feel equal to the object of their desire, instead of associating that feeling with the real risk of becoming property.

I was inspired to write this stupid post by fiction. I have seen fictional heteroromantic dynamics with mounds of chemistry made hollow and nonconsensual by the fear of women's desire. It's a disease. It's a strange impulse I will never ever fully understand. How can I get writers to grasp that I do not wish to see a woman respond to a man's desire with discomfort or borderline disgust? If I'm supposed to project onto the female main character, it's even worse, because I would not do all that!

A manhwa I am oddly obsessed with, "Lee Seob's Love" or "Iseop's Romance", which absurd scenarios could be made infinitely better by the woman being into it, is getting a K-drama adaptation soon. I can only hope the drama does not make the same mistake as the comic by almost eliminating any semblance of desire from the female lead's inner voice as soon as she and the male lead get together. What was once (and still somewhat is) an interesting look into the relationship of two recklessly passionate people now feels strange to read. For the love of God, let women be people. It fixes everything.

5/1/2026 "It's Me" by ILLIT is Literally Fine

I do not believe that the music of girl groups under HYBE Entertainment is causing the downfall of civilization, as many people seem to imply with every passing tweet. I also do not believe that slop is a useful word that means anything in the world of art criticism, as of right now, May of 2026. 

Here is "It's Me" by ILLIT (pronounced EYE-LIT). This song has been all the rage on Twitter lately, especially since it is currently being promoted alongside two other songs - "Celebrate" by LESSERAFIM and "Pinky Up" by Katseye - from the same entertainment supercompany, HYBE. At first, I personally disliked "It's Me". The People pointed out that the song was very different from ILLIT's previous releases, speculating that the trio of songs released in the same time frame are manifestations of HYBE's greed, its desire to capitalize off of some kind of EDM craze.  

I think there are some things to criticize about "It's Me". For one, the chorus is essentially that of BLACKPINK's "Jump". For two (???), I don't like the way "I'm the one, I'm your idol" is delivered. For three (??????), I don't like that choreography - it feels ridiculous and too on-the-nose for the silliness of this song. 

But I'm not even interested in criticizing the song anymore, because as much as I hate HYBE Entertainment for being a huge media conglomerate, and as much as I will not listen to this song through official means because of the ongoing HYBE boycott, I'm very sick of the way art is treated these days. I am sick of things being arbitrarily judged as "high-effort" or "slop", "authentic" or "cheap"; I'm very sick of the miserable way in which people dismiss anything that challenges their taste as below them. I know I sound ridiculous as someone who criticizes music all the time - and I think people are absolutely allowed to dig into music that they hate, even so far as to accuse it of having a corporate sheen on it. 

It's just incredibly annoying seeing people moralize constantly about art as if art isn't one of the most subjective things out there. It's come to the point where I am sick of seeing people who don't understand the subjectivity inherent to art attempt to make moral critiques of society through art. People through the ages have always been saying that music was better when they were a kid. I feel like we as a society should have progressed past that. People should be able to say that they don't get what the kids are picking up these days without calling new things "degenerate slop" - or worse, beginning and ending their political critique with "music is bad nowadays because the world is bad." You can easily make an argument for art being affected by the sociopolitical climate in which the artist functions; you can even say "music from the Reagan administration sucked because the world sucked more than usual." You can easily say that shit without annoying the fuck out of me. And yet you have managed to annoy the fuck out of me!

ILLIT fans have (perhaps rightfully!) buried all the tweets I wanted to show as evidence of what I'm talking about, so I sound like I'm making shit up. But I am not, truly I am not. I feel as though this discourse is unavoidable. Do people have no other things to criticize capitalism for, but that it kills some mythical "soul" of art? There is nothing in it; art is nothing. Art is not as strong and all-important as people seem to believe. Art is in the eye of the beholder. Everything is in the eye of the beholder. This post is entirely subjective. Even morality is subjective. Isn't that fucked up? We need socialism. These are things I believe every artist and critic should understand.

Anyway, I do feel that "It's Me" aligns with ILLIT's general identity because it is, at its core, very cute. Who's your bias? I'm your bias! I love the song now, out of spite. Your criticisms have had the opposite effect. Take that!

 

4/21/2026 Posts That Make Me Mad

 Hi again. 

This tweet made me extremely angry. 

I want to start this by saying that I'm a classical vocal student, which doesn't matter much. But I like to say it.

Every single one of the aspects of skill listed here are subjective. "Structure", "timing", "writing", etc. are all things that vary from genre to genre. "Breath control" is a vague and absurd reference to technique that varies all the time even within the bound of a style of singing. If you do not admit to the subjectivity of your critique, then you are assuming you have the absolute right to categorize everything into a specific genre and then judge it "objectively" using an arbitrary set of criteria that you've applied to said genre.

While one person may say that a singer is "bad" at a certain style of singing, another may say the same singer is bridging genres by mixing styles. That's why even some classical vocal teachers will avoid saying a way of singing "wrong" or "bad" but instead specify what makes it "bad" - maybe it's unsustainable and will make it hard for you to phonate within a few years. Maybe it doesn't align with your goals or the institution you're trying to get into. Whatever.

I know there are more important things in the world to blog about, and I'm not saying critique is bad. I just think this is absurd.