I’ve got IVE’s Love Dive on repeat
Honestly, I don’t listen to as much music as I used to, but sometimes I run across a track that gets stuck in my head. The phrase K-pop may give a sort of happy, bubbly vibe to the reader (and, yes, those type of K-pop songs exist) but I often find myself drawn to those that are more low-key… literally… as in, minor chords (I think?) with a flow that lets me get lost in it.
Which brings me to the featured song: Love Dive by IVE.
IVE is a K-pop girl group under Starship Entertainment which includes former members of IZ*ONE, the group made from the top members of the Korean survival music show, Produce 48. I’ll stop there before it gets even more complicated, but essentially, they have some vets on the team (a big deal in K-pop). They have been around for a while, but are considered new, relatively anyways. But I only discovered this song recently. I’m sure I’ve heard it occasionally as a background track on a Korean show or something, but it never really caught my attention until I watched a Korean variety show called Earth Arcade where one of the IVE members, Yujin (the leader of IVE), is a cast member. The song stuck. And one day, I was having trouble concentrating on something (honestly, almost every day, but I like to pretend it is an intermittent thing) and decided to pull up the song on YouTube to play in the background. Oh boy, that song sent me on a deep dive, and I did not come back up until many, many hours later.
Now most of you have probably heard of the group BLACKPINK. A few days prior to the writing of this article, they released a new song called Pink Venom. I liked some of their earlier music, and considering how much of a marketing push their company, YG Entertainment, is making with this song, one would think that it would make more sense to be writing about it, right? But truth be told, the song could not replace the bop in my head – Love Dive. Although the BLACKPINK girls did really well, and you can tell they are talented, I felt that the song did not do them justice. It was underwhelming and formulaic. Worst of all, it did not bring out the BLACKPINK girls' abilities. I’m sure some people like the song. I mean, it made it to the point that they actually released it. Music videos alone can cost around $500,000 USD per song just to make (might be way more nowadays, not even considering that it’s BLACKPINK). Maybe it’ll be a song that I’ll grow to like or even just be okay with, like aespa’s Savage and Next Level.
But IVE’s Love Dive still wins. The last time I had a tune like this that would get stuck in my head and was perfect for concentration enhancements was IDLE’s, formerly (G)-IDLE, Lion. Unfortunately, I burnt out on that song due to having to muscle through a long, difficult project. So now, when I play it, not only my mind, but my body as well, remembers the stress and trauma of that project.
While writing this article, I found out that IVE has dropped a new song… just an hour or so ago... called After LIKE. This one didn’t draw me in as much as Love Dive, but it still is a nice track. Maybe, again, it’ll be a song that grows on me. At this moment though, I’m going to continue to listen to IVE’s Love Dive on repeat.
(They dropped another track called My Satisfaction a bit later, and this one is pretty good as well.)
