It’s been a week since IVE SECRET released. It takes me longer than a week to formulate thoughts on any music release, regardless of how many times I listen, but I had a very small thought about the title track.
While IVE SECRET for now feels very much like IVE EMPATHY part 2, XOXZ has a very different sort of feel.
Somehow XOXZ reminds me of Accendio in a way that tells me they totally should be related (like when you are watching something and mistake one actor for someone else even if they don’t really look alike at all). But I don’t think I’m too far off the mark with that notion.
Jang Wonyoung once said that one of the title tracks from IVE SWITCH was like Love Dive. I learnt never to believe media play like that ever since DIA’s WooWoo was purported to be the second Roly Poly, but it was still a heartening thought. That song turned out to be Accendio and it was nothing like Love Dive in the slightest.
That being said, I suddenly changed my mind right after deciding that XOXZ is kind of like Love Dive. If the siren section of Love Dive was inspiration for a song, I think XOXZ would fit the theme quite nicely. With its stripped back instrumentation and spacious soundscape, XOXZ certainly could be the echoed shouts responding to the whispers and sirens. To follow that thought of songs resembling fragments of Love Dive, isn’t Accendio a lot like the “you into me, me into you” line?
What if the big picture here is to reinterpret pieces of Love Dive (or give that impression) and trickle those songs throughout the discography.
It’s not that IVE are only as good as Love Dive but if they insist on selling Loved IVE versions of their albums I am going to assume there’s a Loved IVE version of their discography.
Hush Nili 