밤편지 (Through the Night)

The song

‘밤편지 (Through the Night)’ is a single by IU, released on 24 March 2017. It is a one-song release, and the album introduction states that it is the first pre-release song from the fourth studio album, describing it as an acoustic ballad built on guitar and voice. The music video was uploaded to the 1theK (원더케이) channel on the day of release, and the song was placed eighth on Palette, which followed on 21 April 2017.

Reviews

IZM reviewed the single in March 2017. Hong Eun-sol opened by writing that “an exterior of nothing but voice and guitar still cannot hide a fierce interior”, and that “in a register that is not especially high, she manages an explosion of her own”. Setting the song beside the earlier remake album, Hong wrote that “the calm guitar work and the thick chorus line are familiar, but this is plainly of a different order from A Flower Bookmark, which was built on stability”, and added that “a lyric like this meeting a vocal whose breath and timbre are both complete makes it formidable indeed”.

The Singles Jukebox took up the song on 24 April 2017, each writer signing a short piece with a mark out of ten. Seven wrote.

Leonel Manzanares de la Rosa gave it seven: “There is a deep sense of growth in the cohesion of this track, from the playing of those guitar chord progressions to the sound mixing, and IU’s sweet tone carries the song exquisitely, even when it feels more restrained than usual in this setting.” He added: “Perhaps ‘Through the Night’ is a bit too long for its own good, but what an effective slow burner it is.”

Jonathan Bradley gave it five, writing that “IU is a careful balladeer, and ‘Through the Night’ is characteristically delicate. It is all the more lovely for it.” He read the song’s craft as lying in “the slow-motion glimmers it arranges against a light of brilliant nothing”.

Will Adams wrote that “it’s hard to fault ‘Through the Night’ when its delicate acoustics are executed so well (thanks mostly to IU’s up-close singing)”. Madeleine Lee wrote that “‘Through the Night’ falls into the genre of ballad that’s comforting to listen to for its predictability”, and Ryo Miyauchi that “her bashfulness gives way to a tender ballad that wraps up her new album nicely”.

Afterwards

The second pre-release, Can’t Love You Anymore with OHHYUK, followed two weeks later on 7 April 2017, and the fourth studio album Palette on 21 April.