BORN PINK

The record

BORN PINK is BLACKPINK’s second album, released on 16 September 2022 with eight tracks. The title track is ‘Shut Down’; ‘Pink Venom’, put out on 19 August, opens the record, which came two years after THE ALBUM. YG Entertainment’s album introduction states that ‘Shut Down’ samples Paganini’s ‘La Campanella’.

Reviews

Cho Eun-jae covered the record in Idology (아이돌로지)’s monthly album column on 28 October. He called it a declaration that BLACKPINK will inherit the essence of all music that has been in fashion across every time and place, popular music above all. Across the record, he wrote, the density and weight of the sound give the impression of having grown considerably more finely worked, and what is remarkable is the presence of the members standing squarely on that heavier sound; he closed by calling it an album that empowers throughout, so fully does it carry the attitude of meaning to enjoy the height of a peak period.

Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield reviewed it on the day of release. “Like The Album it’s short and sweet: 8 songs, nearly all exactly 3 minutes, nearly all bristling with brassy uptempo confidence,” he wrote, and closed: “And they’ve finally made the great pop album they’ve always had in them.”

Clash’s Abbie Aitken gave the record 7/10 the same day and wrote that, “essentially a ball of fire, ‘Born Pink’ gifts fans a mixture of commanding hip-hop tracks, satisfying pop tracks and affecting piano ballads”. She added that “‘Born Pink’ clearly signifies a shift within Blackpink. Compared to ‘The Album’, the group have clearly worked on clarifying what sounds they want to venture into and taken the time to craft songs that feel rounded and complete.”

NME’s Tanu I. Raj, writing on 23 September, took up the record’s softer side: “Moments of uncharacteristic vulnerability, when they appear, endear us to the group.”

Among the tracks

‘Shut Down’ is the song four of the pages took up. Idology’s Cho wrote that the moment the album starts one meets, in the introductory ‘Pink Venom’, a line paying homage to Rihanna’s hit ‘Pon de Replay’, while the title track loops a sample of Paganini’s ‘La Campanella’ staged to suit the weight and scale BLACKPINK already had, so that two songs in the listener is already overwhelmed. Clash’s Aitken wrote: “Second track ‘Shut Down’ is a triumph. It feels simple in its components. A violin combined with a heavy bass leads throughout with gun shot effects dropping in when needed.” Rolling Stone’s Sheffield called it “a typical moment: these women floss in their car over a trap beat and a crazy loop of classical violin”. Billboard’s Jeff Benjamin wrote that “incorporating classical music—specifically, a part of ‘La Campanella’ by 19th-century composers Franz Liszt and Niccolo Paganini—into their hip-hop sphere makes for one of their most exhilarating and instantly satisfying productions to date”.

The pre-released ‘Pink Venom’ had a page of its own: Kwibi wrote it up in Idology’s monthly singles column on 24 September. Unlike ‘DDU-DU DDU-DU’ and ‘How You Like That’, which finished on a traditional Korean image, he wrote, the introductory geomungo sound and its imagery function here as something close to a MacGuffin, and the place the geomungo vacates fills densely with interpolations of American popular music — the Notorious B.I.G., 50 Cent, Rihanna, Taylor Swift. He called it a single showing that even a YG method kept up for a decade and more can give a different impression through shrewd subtraction and addition.

‘Yeah Yeah Yeah’ was named on two pages. Rolling Stone’s Sheffield wrote that “‘Yeah Yeah Yeah’ is the peak, riding on a jagged guitar riff—somewhere between Kelly Clarkson’s ‘Since U Been Gone’ and the Cars’ ‘Let’s Go’—with lavish flourishes of over-the-top synth-disco”. NME’s Raj called it “a neat callback to 2020’s ‘Lovesick Girls’ in more ways than one”, adding that “with a smooth, easy synth-pop sound, the song explores the apprehension and pain of falling in love again”.

Numbers

Billboard reported at the head of its ranking that the pre-released ‘Pink Venom’ had reached number one on the Billboard Global 200.