Going Seventeen

The record

Going Seventeen is SEVENTEEN’s third mini album, released on 5 December 2016 with eight tracks. The title track is ‘BOOMBOOM’. It is the group’s first new record in the five months since the repackage Love&Letter.

Reviews

Idology (아이돌로지) carried the record in ‘1st Listen’, its round-up of new releases from early December 2016, as short pieces by two critics. Doldolmalling read it as the point where SEVENTEEN’s direction begins to move. He wrote that “the lyrics are still witty in places and the group choreography is still drilled, but the freshness that used to come off the music has turned into a different texture”, and gave as his evidence that “the songs work a distinctly 1990s melodic line”. He read that as possible proof “that Woozi, who makes the melodies — and Bumzu, the fourteenth member — are growing more practised and the spectrum is shifting”, and closed: “an interesting step.”

Yu Je-sang picked the record as that issue’s ‘Discovery!’. Of the title track he wrote that the group “have drawn out well the strengths of the several male idol songs released recently”, and that “the melody of the song is steady, but when it goes for it in the chorus it really goes for it. The dense beat adds polish.”

Billboard’s Jeff Benjamin, writing in the magazine’s year-end list, said the “quickly rising boy band SEVENTEEN continued to show their promise with genre-spanning releases”.

Among the tracks

Billboard picked out the title track as “snappy pop”, ‘Highlight’ as “lush EDM”, and ‘Lean On Me’ as “rather sultry”, showing “more mature side of themselves”. The same entry added that “various members write and produce on every track with member Woozi writing two tracks on his own”.

The Korea Herald’s Kwon Yae-rim placed ‘BOOMBOOM’ twelfth when she ranked SEVENTEEN’s thirty best songs in July 2020. She wrote that “switching between various funky rhythms and soaring melodies, this bombastic dance track earned the band the No. 5 spot on Billboard’s World Digital Songs chart”.

Numbers

Billboard placed the record eighth on its list of the ten best K-pop albums of 2016, published on 23 December 2016. The label ships English titles for the songs in its own distribution metadata: ‘붐붐’ is BOOMBOOM, ‘기대’ is Lean On Me, ‘빠른 걸음’ is Fast Pace, ‘몰래 듣지 마요’ is Don’t Listen In Secret, ‘글쎄’ is I Don’t Know and ‘웃음꽃’ is Smile Flower.