Release Date: April 21, 2017

Genre: Ballad, dance, R&B/Urban/ Soul

Rating: Melon – 4.3 /5, Naver music – 8.5/10

Everybody was waiting for IU’s new album [Palette] to be released, and it has finally released. All of Spotify was on her comeback. In her fourth album there were various genres and it feels like it’s really a palette of her mind. There was huge collaboration which featured G-dragon, O-hyuk, and Sam Kim. All songs were interesting because the lyrics of her songs were from her diary. Her album was an autobiographical reflection about her identity as a popular singer and about her musical growth after her nine-year career. The overall message of her album was identified through the title of the album, showing her identity she drew on a ‘palette’.

Among the songs on the album “밤편지 (Night’s letter)” was the most popular. She first released this as a single and this was the first song to come out. This song is a typical Korean style folk ballad, but feels very classical.

The next popular song was “Palette”. This made people all expect her comeback because Korea’s most famous rapper and singer ‘G-dragon’ was featured rapping. Her message in the song was quite interesting because she reflected and showed her identity to be as a singer and a 25 year old women. G-dragon’s rap offers advice about being a 25 year old artist and motivates the 5 year younger artist IU who is also on the album. She shows herself to be an artist filled with self-love and confidence through lyrics like: “now I seem to know about me.”

Also a famous rookie Korean band Hyuk-o’s singer ‘O-hyuk’ composed and released a song called ‘사랑이 잘’. This song is a R&B/Soul song and both composition and lyrics were made by IU and O-hyuk. As O-hyuk composed this song along with IU, the melody felt very similar with the previous songs of his band. It’s a very urban and has a very simple melody.

The next favorable song was ’이런 엔딩 (Ending like this)’ and ‘이 지금 (This moment)’. The lyrics of the song ‘Ending like this’ relayed the most sad moment of two lovers’ break-up and alluded to the ending scene of a movie. This song attracted people’s interest because a famous Hallyu star Kim Soo Hyun, who once kept in step with IU in the drama ‘The Producer’, and also acted with IU in the music video of the song which showed the sad moment of the couple breaking up. This song was composed by a 20 year old singer songwriter Sam Kim, who’s a genius artist and especially talented at playing guitar. The piano melody of the song i seemed very vintage and lyrical just like Sam Kim’s previous songs he composed.
As she always has done, IU developed as a more mature artist. Her overall album was very reflective. She seemed to show herself capable as a producer and not only as a top singer.

 

Review by news writer Chloe Lee