STILL DREAMING

Lo and behold, TOMORROW X TOGETHER is no longer just Big Hit Entertainment’s junior boy band, living in the shadows of BTS. On the group’s first Japanese full-length album, STILL DREAMING, members Soobin, Yeonjun, Beomgyu, Taehyun, and Huening Kai rerecorded previously released tracks, a collection of their most ambitious material: from the retro disco of “Blue Hour” from Minisode1 : BLUE HOUR to the digitized vinyl pops and handclaps of the jazzy “Drama” from the Dream Chapter: ETERNITY EP. That these Korean songs could so effortlessly translate to Japanese speaks to the strength of TXT’s idiosyncratic pop—they exist beyond language.

Especially noteworthy are STILL DREAMING’s two Japanese originals: the acoustic guitar balladry of “Everlasting Shine,” which fans may recognize as a theme from Season 4 of the anime Black Clover, and the production-heavy anthem “Force,” which doubles as the opening theme for the second season of another anime, World Trigger. Without any doubt, TXT’s global pervasiveness is nigh—on record, on television, everywhere.