NCT 127’s fourth album released Jan. 30, keeps their unique infinite group member motif. PHOTO CREDIT: twitter.com/NCTsmtown_127
NCT 127’s fourth album repackage “Ay-Yo” was released on Jan. 30 featuring three new tracks including the title track “Ay-Yo.” This album is a repackage of their fourth full-length album “2 Baddies” which was released on Sept. 16, 2022 with 12 songs.
A little background on NCT, they are the biggest K-Pop group to debut in the industry having a total of 23 members; with three new members to be added soon. The members are Taeil, Johnny, Taeyong, Yuta, Kun, Doyoung, Ten, Jaehyun, WinWin, Jungwoo, Lucas, Mark, Xiaojun, Hendery, Renjun, Jeno, Haechan, Jaemin, YangYang, Shotaro, Sungchan, Chenle and Jisung.
NCT stands for Neo Culture Technology, and the whole concept of this group is having an infinite number of members constantly shifting through subunits. However, there are fixed/set subunits to NCT with a certain number of members belonging to each unit. The only members not in a set unit are Shotaro and Sungchan.
NCT U (United) is the first subunit being the only unit without set members. This means that all 23 members can rotate throughout this unit depending on the concept of each comeback.
NCT 127 is the second subunit (July 2016) with members Taeil, Johnny, Taeyong, Yuta, Doyoung, Jaehyun, WinWin, Jungwoo, Mark and Haechan. However, WinWin has been inactive since 2019 when he joined WayV but is still technically part of 127. Yuta, who is Japanese, is SM Entertainment’s first Japanese idol too; until Shotaro came in 2020. 127 is also the longitude of Seoul, South Korea.
NCT Dream came next in August 2016 with members Mark, Renjun, Jeno, Haechan, Jaemin, Chenle and Jisung. Mark and Haechan were added to this subunit because they were both teenagers and Dream’s five new members were born after 2000.
WayV, formed in December 2018, is the fourth subunit known as the Chinese unit consisting of members Kun, Ten, Winwin, Lucas, Xiaojun, Hendery and Yangyang.
Now that you know the hopefully not confusing history of NCT, let’s talk about the album!
In my opinion, this album is one of their best works. My favorite album of theirs is “Favorite (Vampire),” but “Ay-Yo” is my second favorite. All 15 songs were so good and I loved relistening to the original 12 again.
My absolute favorites from the album were “Tasty” and “1, 2, 7 (Time Stops)” because of the vocals and the catchy beats and lyrics. “Tasty” has a techno beat that was paired very well with all nine of the members’ voices, especially Haechan in his one pre-chorus. “1, 2, 7 (Time Stops)” is a very sweet song and all of the members’ vocals were beautiful. Yuta to me is one of the best vocalists in the group. He doesn’t usually get a lot of lines, but he really shined with his few lines in this song.
“2 Baddies” and “Faster” are both very hard techno-sounding songs, kind of like a softer version of dubstep if that makes sense. I really liked “2 Baddies” when it came out because it followed their last title track “Sticker” which many fans didn’t like, but I liked it. “Faster” was just so awesome, it sounded like a song that belongs in a Marvel movie for an epic fight scene.
“Ay-Yo” and “Skyscraper” had heavy hip-hop vibes to them, which makes sense seeing as though NCT does a lot of techno and hip-hop songs. The music video for “Ay-Yo” wasn’t as big of a production as “2 Baddies,” but it was really good and I enjoyed it. “Skyscraper” is a dangerous song for me to listen to because I will stop everything and just start jumping up and down or whipping my head to the beat of the song.
“Time Lapse,” “Crash Landing,” “Gold Dust” and “Black Clouds” were the more slow-paced songs on the album that I really loved listening to. Something about SM Entertainment is that all of their idols are amazing singers, and all four of those songs displayed NCT 127’s powerful vocals. The Rappers and Sub Vocalists of the group are honestly just as good as the Main and Lead Vocalists.
“Designer,” “Playback,” “Vitamin,” “LOL (Laugh-Out-Loud)” and “DJ” were the songs on the album that weren’t too fast or too slow, but just right. They had good beats to them and were songs that you sort of just vibe to. I sing along to them every time they play through my playlist and I don’t really like them as much as the other songs, but they aren’t songs that I skip when they come on.
NCT as a whole is one of my favorite K-Pop groups, and I truly enjoy listening to all the albums from each subunit. I’m always so impressed with all of their work and I hope they receive a lot of love and gain new fans.