Ah, SPARK SPEAKER. I’m trying to think of a group in right-now idol that’s as well-regarded without having quite broken through the chika glass ceiling. Talk to anybody — “Hey, how about that SPARK SPEAKER huh?” — and you’ll at worst get indifference, at best effusive praise and the kind of fanenbying* that my feed usually only looks like when BTS does something. They’ve been around for a lot longer than people think, have done a lot more than we realize, they perform as relentlessly as a very determined combination of Screaming Sixties and Guso Drop, and it’s like every damn thing they do is brimming with energy and super infectious.

And right now? They’re saying something that people need to hear more and more often, “Believe in yourself”, which yes is in song form apparently written by a labelmate and clearly not being new per se given that it’s been performed live enough to have plenty of material for this MV! Continue reading →