K-Pop Demon Hunters and Song Recommendations: “How It’s Done”
Time for a new Wednesday feature!
If you’ve watched the “K-Pop Demon Hunters” movie on Netflix recently, you might still have some of the songs from the movie stuck in your head. While the songs on the whole had a bit more English than the majority of K-pop songs do (though there are certainly K-pop artists who have done songs or even entire albums in English), they were all pretty representative of the genre. If you’re interested in finding more K-pop songs with a similar vibe, I’ve got recommendations.
We’ll start with “How It’s Done,” performed by HUNTR/X, which is the first original song in the movie. My immediate thought on hearing the song was, “They sound a lot like BLACKPINK.”
BLACKPINK debuted in 2016 and only recently have started going their separate ways with a lot of solo songs and albums. They’re TECHNICALLY still a group, but they’ve reached the point in their career where it’s increasingly likely that they won’t do a whole lot of group promotions. That being said, it does look like they’re going to tour as a group in the near future, so don’t count them out yet!
They have two vocalists and two rappers, so this rap-heavy track is definitely their vibe. It’s got some similarities to their “Boombayah,” which was one of their early song releases, in 2016. Both of the songs are high energy with some fantastic lyrics. I’d also suggest “How You Like That” and “Kill This Love” as ones with a similar vibe.
Other artists and songs you might also check out are:
- 2NE1: Another four-member girl group with a similar mix of vocalists and rappers, who debuted a bit earlier than BLACKPINK. Check out “I Am the Best“!
- BABYMONSTER: A newer, seven-member girl group on the same label as BLACKPINK, who shares a lot of their sound. Check out “Batter Up” (their debut) and “Drip“!
- Meovv: A newer, five-member girl group on a label that’s a subsidiary of the same one as BLACKPINK and BABYMONSTER. I’ve mentioned their song “Hands Up” before as one of the catchiest, earworm-iest songs I’ve heard lately, and that’s the one I’d recommend here, too!
- XG: A seven-member Japanese girl group whose members were trained in the K-pop system but sing in English (yes, it’s complicated). They also feature a fairly rap-heavy lineup. Their sound isn’t exactly the same, and their vibe is very different (think 90s ravers mixed with haute couture and sometimes furries?), but they also do some very high energy songs. Check out “Mascara” (which is one of their less weird videos)!
- Alexa/Kim Seri: An American born, Korean/Russian soloist who is primarily a vocalist, but she does a bit of rap in some of her earlier songs (under the first name; the second name is one she’s recently started using after leaving her label). Check out “Bomb“!
I’ll be back every week or so with more analysis and recommendations!
Note: There’s a video on YouTube that makes suggestions for every song on the soundtrack, so if you want to skip ahead, check that out. However, I found that I didn’t know a ton of the song suggestions for certain tracks, and I disagreed with others, so I’m doing my own!
For “How It’s Done,” they recommended “Domino” by Stray Kids (my favorite boy group) and “Dun Dun” by Everglow, both of which share some lyrical elements with “How It’s Done.” So if you particularly like the “done, done, done” line in “How It’s Done,” these are great matches for that!
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